The future of Torreciudad, in the hands of the Holy See. After months of conversations and a principle of agreement to regularize the status of the oratory, whose definitive signature was delayed indefinitely, the Bishop of Barbastro-Monzón, Ángel Pérez Pueyo, tired, decided to “raise the regulation of Torreciudad to the Holy See”, so that it is the Secretariat of State that resolves the conflict with Opus Dei over the ownership of the oratory-sanctuary dedicated to the Virgin, one of the “treasures” of the Work.
Last week, as elDiario.es learned and confirmed by the diocese of Barbastro-Monzón, Pérez Pueyo held various meetings at the Holy See, with the heads of the Secretariat of State and the Dicastery for the Clergy, as well as with Pope Francis, to whom he delivered all the documentation of the frustrated conversations held throughout these months with the authorities of Opus Dei.
In a brief note, the diocese emphasizes that “it has placed in the hands of the Holy See the solution to the differences of criteria with the Prelature of Opus Dei regarding the legal, canonical and pastoral regularization of Torreciudad.” “The request for intervention, sent last week to the Secretariat of State and the Dicastery for the Clergy, documents the contractual relationship regarding this diocesan enclave since 1962, as well as the twenty meetings held in the last four years between the two parties,” affirms the Bishopric, which shows its “full confidence” to “reach the resolution of this matter which constitutes, since the request for contractual novation by the Prelature in 2020, an opportunity to regularize the status of Torreciudad and erect it, canonically, as a sanctuary.
This weekend, in fact, the traditional Family Day took place in Torreciudad, chaired by Pérez Pueyo, which, according to various sources, was “boycotted” by the Work, which ignored the prelate and the rector appointed by him (on the Torreciudad website, a year later, the former rector, Ángel Lasheras, still appears in place of the one appointed by the bishop, José Mairal).
As reported by elDiario.es, and after Pérez Pueyo appointed the new rector in July 2023, Opus Dei denounced the prelate. The case continues in the Apostolic Signatura, which has been delaying a decision for months, hoping that, it seems, the Work and the diocese would reach an agreement.
The center of the conflict is the control of Torreciudad, one of the jewels of Opus, which generates more than a million euros a year from visits by the faithful.
Ecclesiastical sources regret that, “once again”, the failed attempts at an agreement are “relayed by media close to the Work”, and recall how, “on at least 12 occasions” until January 3, 2023, the date on which it was agreed to renew the transfer agreement “and start from scratch”, the meetings between the bishop and different people on behalf of the Opus – “a different person always came” – did not bear fruit.
In January, an act of conciliation took place, to which the prelature did not appear, and which aimed at the revision of the contract signed in 1962 and the recovery of the sculpture of Our Lady of the Angels, property of the diocese but which is venerated in the megacomplex erected in 1975 by order of Escrivá de Balaguer.
And the contract was signed when Opus Dei was not even a personal prelature, but with an entity, Inmobiliaria General Castellana, SA, which no longer exists and whose heirs are Desarrollo Social. Nor did the Board of Directors of Torreciudad exist at that time, an entity that is currently responsible for everything that happens, in the civil sphere, with the oratory-sanctuary.
After months of fruitless negotiations, the Bishopric declared the agreement null and void and requested the restoration of the sculpture and the return of the hermitage, the inn and the adjoining lands to the diocese, which the Work refused. The diocese denies that the economic issue entered into the equation. “There are no claims” of this type, they emphasize. They also separate this case from the canonical or pastoral question. They assure that Rome approves the future transformation of Torreciudad into a diocesan sanctuary and supports the action of Bishop Pérez Pueyo in having appointed a new rector for Torreciudad, which Opus Dei still does not recognize.
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