There has never been a foundational psychosis

I have such a horror of anything that could entail human ambition, however blameless, that if God in his mercy has wished to make use of me, a sinner, for the foundation of the Work, it has been in spite of me. You know the aversion I have always felt for some people’s urge to set up new foundations, when this is not based on very supernatural reasons, which is for the Church to judge. It seemed to me, and it still does, that there were too many foundations and founders. I could see the danger of a kind of founding psychosis that made people create unnecessary things and for reasons that I found ridiculous. I thought, perhaps with a lack of charity, that sometimes the rationale was not actually important: the main thing was to create something new and be able to call oneself a founder.

And so the foundations multiplied, with names and ends that split up apostolic endeavours into tiny fragments and frequently changed their aims. And all this seemed to spring from a desire to be the head of a dog. I was not a little amused, I have to confess (and ask God to forgive me if I have offended him in this), thinking to myself as I considered their specific, tiny aims, that they only gave rise to some outlandish clothing and to religious families that were just like ones already in existence. Their only distinguishing feature was the colour of their habit, or the corded rope belt or the leather belt around their waist: the Foundation of Father So-and-So, the Daughters of St Emerentiana of Such-and-Such for the granddaughters of cross-eyed widows with fair hair. Don’t be surprised if I tell you that I know institutions set up to rescue corrupted young women (one example among many) which, within a few years, changed their foundational work, not because there were no more corrupted women, but because they would have an easier life if they dedicated themselves to setting up fee-paying schools or other such projects.

Beginning of the Work: out of obedience alone to a clear divine will

Since then, although I am no friend of play-acting, I have often had the temptation, the desire, my children, to get down on my knees and ask for your forgiveness. Because of my aversion to foundations, I resisted as much as I could, in spite of having abundant and clear signs to found the Work. May it serve as an excuse before God our Lord that, since 2 October 1928, in the midst of this internal struggle of mine, I have worked to fulfil God’s holy will by starting the apostolic work of Opus Dei. Three years have gone by, and I can see now that perhaps the Lord wanted me to suffer that complete repugnance then, and still continue experiencing it now, so that I would always have yet another external proof that it is all his and nothing of mine.