The Vatican Dossier

physician, heal thyself

A gathering of cardinals

Origin: the Bible, Luke 4:23 (King James Version)

“And he said unto them, Ye will surely say unto me this proverb, Physician, heal thyself: whatsoever we have heard done in Capernaum, do also here in thy country.” 

Some might say that the unraveling of the Roman Catholic Church began with the election of Jorge Mario Bergoglio as the 266th pope (on March 13, 2013 by 115 cardinals on the second day and fifth ballot of the cardinals’ conclave).   

That election, they might say, effectively put an end to what had been dubbed ‘Holy Silence’ on perhaps the most outlandish religious hypocrisy in the world. More than any other faith, the Roman Catholic Church, hiding behind ‘a veneer of holiness,’ has been assertive in projecting its views on world affairs, society, religion, and politics, while at the same time stifling its own scandals as if its conduct can’t and shouldn’t impact its views.   

St. Peter's Square - Vatican City

The election of the Argentine Jesuit exposed that hypocrisy. It was the first time in history that the church elected a Jesuit Pontiff, a surprise given that Jesuits have historically served popes rather than become popes. “In a sense, having a Jesuit pope is rather like having a civil servant as prime minister,” Jon Anderson wrote in the Catholic Herald magazine. It should therefore not have come as a surprise when, for the first time, a reigning pope ignored the Holy See’s security concerns and stepped across St Peter’s Square in Rome to mingle with regular folks, shook hands with stunned passersby, telephoned ordinary people at home to express his solidarity with their plight and quite compellingly, chose to simplify the extravagant papal wardrobe. In the true spirit of a Jesuit, Pope Francis ditched the ‘holier than thou’ aura that had, in all of the church’s checkered history, closeted pontiffs under a shroud of mystery like an unfathomable cocoon, and by so doing, made himself, for all intents and purposes, a common mortal. 

Pope Francis

Since his election, the pope has gone to great lengths to reform the church, telling bishops that he wanted a church that was humble and poor, and not obsessed with preaching doctrine or acquiring power. He explained that Christian doctrine wasn’t a closed or rigid system but rather one that lives and changes and develops. Speaking on November 11, in Florence, Italy, to bishops and delegates of 226 dioceses of the Italian Episcopal Conference, he said Christians shouldn’t be obsessed with power, “even when it takes the shape of a power that is useful to the social image of the church.”  

Pietro Vittorelli - ex-abbot

Montecassino Abbey

It must be one of the tragic ironies of the church that while he was giving the above exhortation, the Italian media was erupting with news of the theft of half a million €uro at Montecassino Abbey in Rome by its former abbot, Pietro Vittorelli. Appointed the 191° abbot by Pope Benedict XVI (Pope Francis’s predecessor), Vittorelli, in a classical case of saying one thing and doing another, once told an Italian newspaper, “We are not the owners of the goods we possess, we are only administrators.” But between 2007 and 2013, according to the Italian Financial police, the former abbot, with uninhibited access to the coffers of the Montecassino abbey, connived with his brother, Massimo, to systematically steal the funds rather than administrate them.

This event was neither “the last nail in the coffin” nor was it any more heartbreaking than the rest of the mind-boggling scandals emanating from this figurative home of saint-makers—unabashed abuse of minors spanning decades, rampant pedophilia & cover-ups, internal power struggles, theft of secret documents, financial malfeasance, subtle political intrigues, corruption, excesses of prelates, alleged involvement of the Vatican Bank in money laundering for the mafia and former Nazis as well as funding priests caught up in sex abuse allegations.

The Sistine Chapel (Getty)

Given the vast wealth of the Vatican state, it might seem a little difficult for prelates not to succumb to temptations, except that, unlike lay politicians, they are religious figures who had sworn fealty to both honesty and the simple ways of life taught by Christ. Their congregation therefore should be able to take their complete disregard of materialism for granted. Ironically, the failure of prelates to overcome these temptations is matched by an eagerness to scold society about the same ills, which brings the following Bible verse to mind. 

Luke 6:41-42 “…41Why do you look at the speck that is in your brother’s eye, 

but do not notice the log that is in your own eye? 42 Or how can you say to your 

brother, ‘Brother, let me take out the speck that is in your eye,’ when you yourself 

do not see the log that is in your own eye? You hypocrite, first take the log 

out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to take out the speck that 

is in your brother’s eye.”   

Cardinal George Pell

Many Catholic watchers believe that if prelates practiced what they preach, they’d direct the wealth of the church to the needy rather than continue accumulating same. The Vatican, according to the prefect of the secretariat for the economy, Cardinal George Pell, is so wealthy it can stumble across millions of €uros just ‘tucked away’ off of its central balance sheet. “It is important to point out that the Vatican is not broke,” Cardinal Pell wrote in an exclusive article in the Catholic Herald. “Apart from the pension fund, which needs to be strengthened for the demands on it in 15 or 20 years, the Holy See is paying its way, while possessing substantial assets and investments.” 

Inside the Apostolic Palace (Eric VandervilleGamma)

Reporting in the International Business Times, Shane Croucher, wrote, “Vatican City itself has a rich economy relative to its size. Though data is scarce, and the exact GDP figure is unknown, the CIA estimates Vatican City’s 2011 revenue to be $308m. It only has a population of 800 people, meaning its nominal GDP per capita is $365,796 – making it the richest state on the planet by this measure... And much of its assets are near impossible to value because they will never be sold off, such as its gold-laden palatial church property and priceless works of art by the likes of Michelangelo and Raphael. It also owns a global network of churches and religious buildings, many of which contain precious historical treasures, serving the world’s 1.2 billion Catholics. What we do know is that Vatican Bank, officially titled the Institute for the Works of Religion, manages €5.9bn ($7.3bn, £4.64bn) of assets on behalf of its 17,400 customers. And it manages €700m of equity which it owns. Another tidbit to emerge is that it keeps gold reserves worth over $20m with the US Federal Reserve.”

Pope's residence

In spite of this enormous wealth, the new pope has kept his focus on what should matter most to the church—faith. His simplistic lifestyle, in fact, was evident even as a cardinal in Buenos Aires, where he abandoned living quarters in the elegant archbishop’s residence for an austere room elsewhere. He has maintained the same attitude as pope, shunning the luxurious papal apartments in the Apostolic Palace in Rome and taking up residence instead in a small suite in the Domus Sanctae Marthae building adjacent to St. Peter’s Basilica in the Vatican City, which presently functions as a guesthouse for various clergy having business with the Holy See, and as the hotel residence of members of the College of Cardinals when they participate in a Papal Conclave to elect a new pope. 

The Pope's Renault 4L

Further, the pope gave up use of his official Mercedes-Benz known famously as Popemobile, choosing instead to travel in a 1984 Renault 4L, which was given to him as a symbolic gift of his humility by Don Renzo Zocca, an Italian priest who works with disabled people, the poor, and drug addicts in a working class neighborhood in Verona in northern Italy. So far, all attempts by the pope to convince prelates to follow his example have proved fruitless, and people are baffled that since becoming pope, he has devoted a great deal of time and energy preaching to fellow preachers almost more than to lay people. This, observers say, indicates how far away the church is from its core value. 

Cardinal Bertone

Early this year, when news emerged that Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone, a former secretary of state, and for a brief period administrator of the Holy See and acting head of state, was building a luxurious penthouse for his retirement, rumors were rife that Pope Francis was furious. A newspaper report about the project said refurbishment involved merging two existing flats: one of between 300 and 400 sq meters (previously assigned to the head of the Vatican gendarmerie), and another of around 200 sq meters (belonging to a deceased prelate). A photo published by Italian gossip magazine, Chi, showed the renovation atop the Palazzo San Carlo building, a palatial home with scaffolding soaring as high as four storeys around the entire penthouse complex in contrast with the meager lifestyle the pope has been promoting.   

Penthouse of the scandal (Chi)

Though the pope has not made any specific comment about it, a sermon he delivered shortly before Easter, carping about “unctuous, sumptuous, presumptuous” clerics was interpreted by many in the press as revealing his reaction to Bertone’s project. In the past, the pope had warned against church leaders who bear the “psychology of princes,” also blasting “airport bishops” who spend more time jet-setting than tending to their flocks. In an Apostolic Exhortation, Evangelii Gaudium, to bishops, clergy, and lay faithful, he said, “God save us from a worldly church with superficial spiritual and pastoral trappings!”  

Prelates, it seems, turn a deaf ear to these exhortations. Cardinal Bertone’s palatial retirement home, dubbed “penthouse of scandal,” is not the only one causing raised eyebrows. An investigation by CNN’s DanielBurke revealed that at least 10 of the 34 active archbishops in the United States defy the Pope’s example and live in residences worth more than $1 million. 

In Germany, Bishop Franz-Peter Tebartz-van Elst had come under fire for his extravagant lifestyle. 

Bishop Tebartz-van Elst

Nicknamed the “Bishop of Bling,” he was suspended by the Vatican and placed under investigation after spending $43 million to renovate his residence in Limburg, Germany. Tebartz-van Elst, known as theologically conservative, denied any wrongdoing, saying that the cost of the renovation was legitimate because surrounding structures had to be protected, including the old city wall. But many people in Limburg do not approve of the bishop’s excesses. “He built his office on lies,” a Limburg resident, Patrick Dehm, was quoted by the CNN as saying. “This must come to an end. The diocese doesn’t deserve this.”

Version published by Dr. Fukushima

And now, as if the world hasn’t had enough of Vatican scandals and intrigues, a new element has entered the fray—an alleged plot to discredit the pontiff­. The shocking headline was unleashed, like lightning, on the Vatican and the world at large recently by an online newspaper, QN—Quotidiano Nazionale—Pope Francis has a brain tumor. It said the tumor was diagnosed by the world famous Japanese neurosurgeon, Takanori Fukushima, who was summoned to the Vatican.

Version published by Vatican

“It is false,” said Father Ciro Benedettini, deputy director of the Vatican press office. “It is totally unfounded.” Dr. Fukushima has also categorically denied it, saying he had met the pope only once, and not privately. In a curious twist, though, a photo he had published on his blog of that meeting, which showed him, alone, shaking hands with the pope, was quickly removed when it turned out it was photo shopped after the Vatican’s official newspaper, L’Osservatore Romano, published the same photo, showing the Japanese neurosurgeon surrounded by a large crowd in St. Peter’s Square as he shook hands with the pope.

Trying to make sense of the stranger-than-fiction story, the Italian newspaper, Libero, wrote that the release of such hurtful news might have been triggered by two recent events, firstly, the bitter discord that marked the final week of the Synod on family and reform; secondly, the media attacks on the pope that was followed by a leak of a highly critical letter penned by angry cardinals to the pontiff.

Luigi Bisignani

Someone else has a different view. Luigi Bisignani, a former Italian journalist and fixer, generally regarded as a “manager of hidden powers,” said the release of the news was part of a plot by the Opus Dei to discredit the pope, suggesting that there is, in fact, an ongoing rivalry between Opus Dei and the Jesuits. “The first think they are the Jesuits of the third millennium, but the latter have the pope in their ranks.”

Bisignani’s allusion to someone with a connection to the anti-Bergoglio plot, according to an online publication, infiltrato.it, was a clear reference to Monsignor Lucio Angel Vallejo Balda, a former Jubilee Secretary of the Prefecture for Economic Affairs, with ties to Opus Dei, the “desperate moves by a former powerful Spanish monsignor from whom the Vatican even took the precaution of cutting off his service phone.”    

Monsignor Lucio Vallejo Balda

Six months ago, Bisignani, the publication said, had revealed an anonymous letter threatening Jorge Bergoglio (“St. Peter’s Square will soon be purified with your blood,”) packed with details of the engagements of the pope, the Cardinals of the Curia, and the operators and envoys of the major basilicas and sanctuaries, with “a well updated pontifical annual report.”

Will Pope Francis live long enough to save the church from itself or is it enough to call on the ‘physician to heal thyself’?  

Pope Francis poses with cardinal advisers during a meeting at the Vatican. From left: Chilean Cardinal Francisco Javier Errazuriz Ossa; Italian Bishop Marcello Semeraro, secretary to the Council of Cardinals; Indian Cardinal Oswald Gracias; German Cardinal Reinhard Marx; Pope Francis; Honduran Cardinal Oscar Rodriguez Maradiaga; Italian Cardinal Giuseppe Bertello; U.S. Cardinal Sean O'Malley; Australian Cardinal George Pell; and Congolese Cardinal Laurent Monsengwo Pasinya. (CNS/Reuters/L'Osservatore Romano)

  

The Argentine Jesuit, Jorge Bergoglio, who became Pope Francis

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