''The Way'' () is a book about spirituality composed by Josemaría Escrivá, the initiator of the Roman Catholic religious organization

Opus Dei is an institution of the Catholic Church that was founded in Spain in 1928 by Josemaría Escrivá. Its stated mission is to help its lay and clerical members seek holiness in their everyday occupations and societies. Opus Dei is officially r ...

. The book was published first during 1934 with the name ''Consideraciones espirituales''. It received its present title during 1939. More than four and a half million copies have been sold, in 43 languages. According to Escrivá his motivation was: "The 999 points which make up ''The Way'' were written with yearnings to see 'Christ, the Light of the World.' Anyone who reads it with the same yearnings will not have opened this book in vain." ''The Way'' was composed based on notes Escrivá made based on his thoughts about the

gospel Gospel originally meant the Christianity, Christian message ("the gospel"), but in the second century Anno domino, AD the term (, from which the English word originated as a calque) came to be used also for the books in which the message w ...

and its application to specific situations occurring during his personal pastoral experience. Many of the sections are counsels he actually gave to persons in spiritual direction. Some are letters he wrote and received. Thus it has a conversational style. As a reviewer in the

Vatican Vatican may refer to: Geography * Vatican City, an independent city-state surrounded by Rome, Italy * Vatican Hill, in Rome, namesake of Vatican City * Ager Vaticanus, an alluvial plain in Rome * Vatican, an unincorporated community in the ...

newspaper '' Osservatore Romano'' (March 24, 1950) stated: "Msgr. Escrivá de Balaguer has written something more than a masterpiece; he has written straight from the heart, and straight to the heart go the short paragraphs which make up ''The Way''." The writer on the Spanish Catholic world, Frances Lannon, has described it as "a bizarre amalgam of traditional piety, penitential discipline, and crude popular moralizing; it aims at a fusion of devotion with efficiency, inward humility with the exercise of leadership and power. Its readers are exhorted to childlike simplicity, to silence and discretion, and to orderliness; they are encouraged to pray to guardian angels and to the souls in

purgatory In Christianity, Purgatory (, borrowed into English language, English via Anglo-Norman language, Anglo-Norman and Old French) is a passing Intermediate state (Christianity), intermediate state after physical death for purifying or purging a soul ...

, and to bless themselves every day with

holy water Holy water is water that has been blessed by a member of the clergy or a religious figure, or derived from a well or spring considered holy. The use for cleansing prior to a baptism and spiritual cleansing is common in several religions, from ...

. But they are also urged to acquire professional competence, to stand out from the crowd, to lead and to dominate."Frances Lannon, ''Privilege, Persecution and Prophecy'', p.226

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