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 joined Opus Dei on 7 September 1961. In the 1960s, as a theology student, he lived in Rome alongside
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 Academy of Theology 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. Ocáriz was appointed Vicar General of the Prelature of Opus Dei on 23 April 1994. In 2014, he was named Auxiliary Vicar of Opus Dei. He became the provisional head of Opus Dei upon the death of the prelate of Opus Dei,
Javier Echevarria, in December 2016. He was elected prelate of Opus Dei on 23 January 2017, and on the same day Pope Francis confirmed that appointment. ==Prelate of Opus Dei==