Fernando Ocariz

Monsignor Fernando Ocáriz Braña
Prelate of Opus Dei
Msgr. Fernando Ocáriz
Church	Roman Catholic
See	Opus Dei
Installed	23 January 2017
Term ended	Incumbent
Predecessor	Javier Echevarría Rodríguez †
Successor	Incumbent
Orders
Ordination	1971
Personal details
Born	(1944-10-27) 27 October 1944 (age 72) Paris, France

Fernando Ocáriz Braña (born 27 October 1944) is a Roman Catholic priest and monsignor who serves as the fourth and current Prelate of Opus Dei. He is widely published in philosophy and has been a consultor of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith since 1986.

Fernando Ocáriz Braña was born in Paris on 27 October 1944 to José Ocáriz Gómez and María Dolores Braña, and is the youngest of eight children. He studied Physics at the University of Barcelona, where he graduated in 1966.

In the 1960s, as a theology student, he lived in Rome alongside Saint Josemaría Escrivá, the founder of Opus Dei. He received a licentiate in theology from the Pontifical Lateran University in 1969 and a doctorate in theology from the University of Navarra in 1971.

He was ordained a Catholic priest in 1971, and was especially involved in ministry to young people and to university students during the first years of his priesthood.

Since 1986, he has been a consultor of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, as well as other departments of the Roman Curia: the Congregation for the Clergy (since 2003) and the Pontifical Council for Promoting the New Evangelization (since 2011). He has also been a member of the Pontifical Theological Academy since 1989. In 2009, it was announced that he would participate in the doctrinal discussions between the Society of St. Pius X and the Holy See.

In the early 1980s, Ocáriz was among the professors who began the Pontifical University of the Holy Cross, where he was a tenured professor (now Emeritus Professor) in Fundamental Theology.