The Founder of Opus Dei: Volume II, God and Daring (The Life of Josemaria Escriva) by De Prada Andres Vazquez

Author:De Prada, Andres Vazquez [Vazquez, De Prada, Andres]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Scepter Publishers
Published: 2011-04-19T04:00:00+00:00

In The Way this becomes:

Mad! Yes, I saw you (in the bishop’s chapel, you thought you were alone) as you left a kiss on each newly consecrated chalice and paten, so that he might find it there when for the first time he would “come down” to those eucharistic vessels.62

As is mentioned in its preface, Considerations was written without any “literary pretensions or concern about publicity.” Basically it was just a collection of thoughts arranged by subject. The Way, on the other hand, was from the first intended to be a published book, and its composition, though it began with the idea of enlarging Considerations, was governed by a strong unity of spirit and intention.63

As the book took shape in 1938, the author, building on the 438 points of Considerations, saw the need to develop certain topics at greater length. The number of chapters was increased, the material was rearranged, and greater cohesion was given to the various chapters.

The aim is stated at the beginning: “I will only stir your memory, so that some thought will arise and strike you; and so you will better your life and set out along ways of prayer and of Love. And in the end you will be a more worthy soul.” 64

The objective is no less than the conversion of the reader’s intellect and will. As the bishop of Vitoria remarks in his introduction, the points in the book invite the reader to fill them out from his own life experience. The desire to stir readers’ consciences is reflected in the style, which abounds in exclamations and questions, in appeals to common sense, in irony and exhortations, in imperatives and fragmentary phrases. Here is a challenge to the reader to improve his life, and the mood it evokes in some readers is a kind of reflective tension. The first chapter is entitled “Character,” and it begins with a wake-up call:

Don’t let your life be sterile. Be useful. Blaze a trail. Shine forth with the light of your faith and of your love.65

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