Romana

Monte Carmelo publishers has produced the Dictionary of St. Josemaría Escrivá de Balaguer, as part of its collection of large dictionaries. The volume contains 288 sections, of which 158 are of a theological-spiritual character, while 130 are historical-biographical. The first group explores various topics of spiritual life and theological reflection in light of the teachings of St. Josemaria. The historical-biographical sections provide essential information about the persons, places, and most relevant events connected to the history of the founder of Opus Dei. His written work and preaching are also analyzed, as well as some of the apostolic initiatives that he fostered throughout the world.

This volume of 1358 pages, under the direction of the Historical Institute of St. Josemaría Escrivá, is the work of more than 226 authors from 32 countries, among them theologians, canonists, historians, philosophers and other specialists, under the supervision of an editorial committee led by Msgr. José Luis Illanes, director of the Historical Institute. He says that it will be a “general reference work concerned not only with the life of St. Josemaría, but also with his message and teaching, and with the institution to which he gave life.”

Illanes hopes that the dictionary “will help readers to know better the life and teachings of one of the most important figures of the history of the Church in the twentieth century, a saint of the ordinary (as Blessed John Paul II called him on the day after his canonization), that is to say, a promoter of a path of holiness and apostolate, of a sincere and deep Christian life, in the varied circumstances of ordinary life in the middle of the world.”