This weekend, members of one of the most vibrant and controversial movements in the Church will meet in Rome to choose a new leader. As the first prelate not to have close personal links with the organisation’s founder, he can be expected to usher in a change of direction

The founder of Opus Dei, Josemaría Escrivá – who was canonised in 2002 by St Pope John Paul II – died in 1975. His successor was another Spanish priest and his closest collaborator, Álvaro del Portillo, who died in 1994; he was beatified in 2014 in Madrid in a Mass that Cardinal Angelo Amato presided over on behalf of Pope Francis. Del Portillo was followed in turn by a third Spaniard, Javier Echevarría, who had been Escrivá’s secretary, and whose death last month left a new vacancy to be filled.

With the election of the next prelate, Opus Dei enters uncharted waters: he will be the first head of the organisation not to have had a close relationship with its founder. He will be chosen by a group of 156 members of Opus Dei – laymen, priests and bishops – from 45 countries, known as the Congress of Electors. It includes the regional vicar for Great Britain, Oxford-graduate Nicholas Morrish, 57, and for Ireland, Texan-born Justin Gillespie, 42.

The new leader must come from this group and be a priest or a bishop, which means there are about 90 possible candidates. In practice, the pool is even smaller because, although the electors are all men, they will receive from Opus Dei’s central Women’s Council, based in Rome and with 38 female members, the names of those whom they consider suitable for the post.