El Hombre de Villa Tevere. Chapter XII.

St. Josemaria is the Father of a large family, Opus Dei, the best place to live and the best place to die. He would always remind his children to have details of affection with one another, and would preach it with example, noticing when people were not feeling well even if they didn't say it.

A fellow of the Roman College, Illanes, was with fever just by Christmas time; so that he wouldn't miss the happiness of the festivities, he asked the administration to make a mini-Christmas tree with chocolate decorations and he himself brought a mall child-Jesus for his room.

He had attempted three times along with his sons, to buy a piano for the Roman College, but each time when they had saved enough money, they had to buy somehting more important, thus they "ate 3 pianos". When finally they bought it, he suggested to gift it to his daughters, and even before finishing the sentence, they all said "YES".

When visiting his daughters in Germany he realized they were very badly economically and didn't have a washing machine (they had to do a lot of washing for many people). Before he went back to Rome, he made sure (he had it bought) they had a washing machine and other few useful tools.

In this family there are no levels or hierarchies. If there are any governors or bishops, when they reach home, they remove all their stuff, put it in a drawer and are the same at home.

The directors of this family are there to serve, and when they stop being directors, they go back to be one more. Encarnita Ortega had been in the central governement for over 20 years, and when she went back to spain, the Father told her to go back to serve and to teach with example.

Whenever some of his children would die, he would be very deeply moved, he loved them all the same but would certainly be more moved by the dead of those he had been living with for a longer period of time.

When Salvador Canals died he was really destroyed. He knew he was about to die but had to go out of town, before leaving, he went to visit him and made sure of getting him a box of sweets he knew Salvador liked a lot. St. Josemaria didn't remember the name, made the effort to find out and had them bought. The box was too small and got a bigger one. He was really enjoying when seeing Salvador delighted with the sweets.

When Wladimiro Vince died in a place accident, three other people of the Work went to the island where the accident had been. While relatives of the otehr victims couldn't get close to them because of not being able to bear the fould smell, the members of the Work did it... The Work si the best family, best to live and best to die.

El hombre de Villa Tevere. Chapter XI

In Opus Dei St. Josemaria is called, from the very beginning as The Father. and this is not just a beautiful poetical or figurative way of doing so. This chapter is full of examples of why he was called the Father.

Being a very busy man, never felt it was a waste of time to spend a few minutes with his 'children'. Once a daughter of his asked him to draw a duck for her while she played the violin for him, just like that, in the middle of the corridor.

He was very attentive to the needs of people; while a son of his, Carlos, was reading, because of his work, very heavy stuff (theology, philosophy, etc), the Father suggested him he could read 'El Quijote de la Mancha' for his spiritual reading.

He would respect freedom but would help people to live with human tone. He saw an elderly fellow dressing like a youngster, thus he asked to be told delicately to improve his way of dressing to his age. Another fellow, a young man, who had long hair he told him he thought it was good for him: "una muestra de sinceridad" [a token of sincerity].

He had to correct when he had to, but always looking at that the person corrected was not hurt. A daughter of his who lost an important document had to be strongly (but tenderly) corrected by the Father. But later on, he made sure that she wasn't hurt. A few days or weeks afterwards, he called her to thank her for giving a class about the love and care for that kind of documents (el catecismo).

He did not like being a tyrant, thus, he would always ask "please" without giving strong orders, even for the minutest detail.

He was always with good humour, looking for ways to help people have a good time, enjoying the time he spent with his children and enjoying when they "cheated" him so as to spend more time with him. Once he told a fellow after looking into his watch to tell him after 5 minutes to stop the get-together. After 15 minutes he realized that that son had not told him, and the fellow reacted "that watch sometimes goes too fast, don't trust it" and he had a good laugh.

He would go out of his way not to loose anybody. For instance, one day he spent the whole day at a station with Don Alvaro, waiting for a lady of the Work from an Italian city who had decided to "run" away. When she saw him waiting for him, showing his love for his daughters, she decided to stay. And another time he was found crying because of a son of his who was about to loose his vocation because of not struggling far away from the "muros capitales de la fortaleza" [capital walls of the fortress].

HE REALLY WAS A FATHER.