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PDF versionFacing the elephant in the room of Vatican disarray
by John L Allen Jr on Feb. 13, 2012
ROME -- A consistory, the event in which a pope creates new cardinals, is supposed to have a festive air. New cardinals bring family, friends and supporters to Rome, to see the sights and to enjoy one another’s company. The afternoon of the consistory is the only time the doors of the Apostolic Palace are flung open to the general public, giving the place the feel of a block party.
This week, however, it’ll be difficult to just let the good times roll, because the Vatican hosting the 22 new cardinals Benedict XVI will create on Saturday once again looks like the gang that can’t shoot straight.
Consider the headlines that have dominated the Italian press, with echoes around the world, in just the last 72 hours:
- “Plot against the Pope: Dead within 12 Months”
- “Pope is Isolated amid War in the Vatican”
- “Money Laundering, Priests Investigated: The Silence of the Vatican”
- “Gays, Scandals and Even Masonry: The Church Fears Deep Throat”
Not since a 2009 cause célèbre created by the pope’s decision to lift the excommunications of four traditionalist bishops, including a Holocaust denier, has the Vatican been gripped by such an intense wave of scandal – coupled with the inevitable finger-pointing, both public and private, about who’s to blame.
Before proceeding, let’s stipulate two points.
First, some of this is the usual Italian melodrama, not necessarily to be taken seriously. Speculation about Machiavellian plots is a favorite indoor sport in Italy, in every walk of life. It goes on about secular politics, business, even sports, and over the last few days it’s just been the Vatican’s turn.
Second, there’s little atmosphere of crisis inside the Vatican itself. When you walk into most Vatican offices, you’ll find people calmly going about their business. Personnel are aware of the storms brewing around them, and many are worried about what it all means, but it’s not as if panic is in the air.
That said, the present mess can’t just be dismissed, for one key reason: Underneath it all lie real Vatican documents, leaked by insiders who knew full well what affect they would have. This “war of the photocopies,” as one Italian commentator has dubbed it, is thus the latest sign that all is not well in the Vatican’s internal governance.
Let’s briefly review recent events.
First came revelation of private letters written in 2011 by Italian Archbishop Carlo Maria Viganò to Pope Benedict XVI and to the Secretary of State, Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone. In them, Viganò complained of corruption and cronyism in Vatican finances, and of an internal campaign of defamation against him and his reforms.
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Today the pope’s nuncio, or ambassador, in the United States, Viganò was the number two official at the Government of the Vatican city-state at the time.
Pointedly, Viganò named names in this correspondence about who was supposedly out to get him. His villains included Monsignor Paolo Nicolini in the Vatican museums, and a well-connected lay advisor named Marco Simeon, who’s reportedly close to Bertone. The language in the letters was nothing short of incendiary; Viganò accused Nicolini, for instance, of “vulgarity of behavior and language” at the Vatican museums, along with “arrogance and presumption regard his coworkers,” not to mention various shady financial dealings.
At the moment, Italian papers are full of hints that Viganò might return to Rome, ready to air all sorts of other Vatican dirty laundry. (That’s the reference to “gays, scandals and masonry” in the headline quoted above.)
Next up has been a series of accusations directed at the Institute for the Works of Religion (IOR), the so-called “Vatican Bank.”
An Italian television program called “The Untouchables” has broadcast sensational reports charging that IOR recently transferred millions of Euro to foreign banks, to evade Italian controls, and that it’s refused to cooperate with various Italian inquests, including a probe into the 1982 death of Italian financier Roberto Calvi, known as “God’s Banker” for his close Vatican ties. It also cited an internal Vatican memo suggesting that a new anti-money laundering law decreed by Benedict XVI contains a massive loophole, making suspect transactions before April 2011 exempt from scrutiny.
The Vatican has systematically denied those charges, but naturally the rebuttals have not laid suspicions to rest.
Most recently, an Italian paper set off another earthquake by publishing an anonymous letter, written in German, which quoted Italian Cardinal Paolo Romeo of Palermo about an alleged plot to kill Benedict XVI within twelve months, and to replace him with Cardinal Angelo Scola of Milan. The letter had been passed along to the pope by retired Colombian Cardinal Darío Castrillón Hoyos.
A Vatican spokesperson dismissed that report as “madness.”
Yet for the record, the documents in each case are authentic. By now, the Vatican has acknowledged that the Viganò letters, the money laundering memo, and the anonymous letter about an anti-papal plot are all real – while insisting that in each case, the contents are either exaggerated or erroneous.
In other words, the Vatican is leaking like a sieve.
There’s intense debate about who’s behind these leaks, with Italian papers pointing to a “mole hunt” inside the Vatican. There seems greater consensus about whom to blame for the overall state of affairs: Italian Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone, the Secretary of State, who’s supposed to be the “Prime Minister” of the Vatican, the guy responsible for making the trains run on time.
As Italian commentator Sandro Magister has put it, the mess makes Bertone, 77, look like “the Prime Minister of a government that doesn’t work.”
On Friday, all the members of the College of Cardinals will gather with Pope Benedict XVI for a “day of prayer and reflection” ahead of the consistory. It remains to be seen whether the cardinals will use that occasion to confront the elephant in the room, pushing Benedict, gently and respectfully, to get things under control.
There are three reasons they might want to do so – which is not the same thing, of course, as predicting that they will.
First, some of these cardinals have fish to fry back home, and the present Vatican meltdown isn’t helping. Timothy Dolan of New York, for instance, is currently involved in a high-stakes tug of war with the Obama administration over insurance mandates. It would be nice if a powerful and well-connected papal ambassador were on the scene in Washington to help navigate these tensions, but that's obviously not the situation.
Second, perceptions of intrigue have overshadowed what ought to be a couple of good news stories for the Vatican. Last week, the Vatican co-sponsored a summit on the sexual abuse crisis, calling for a proactive global response and committing itself to reforms. Right now, Vatican personnel are moving heaven and earth to bring the institution into compliance with international standards of financial transparency; probably at no other point in its history has the Vatican been so thoroughly committed to cooperation with external, secular regulatory bodies. In a normal news cycle, those storylines might recalibrate impressions of the Vatican and the church in a positive key; at the moment, they’re competing with, and basically losing to, narratives of scandal.
Third, the harm done by the Vatican’s woes is felt all over the Catholic world. When a real bomb explodes, damage is most intense closest to the blast zone. When a PR bomb explodes in Rome, however, those closest to the scene often don’t feel it, but Catholics in far-off locales can be heavily scarred. Senior Vatican personnel often move in a bubble, surrounded by subordinates and well-wishers, insulating them from the effects of negative public impressions. Catholics who live out in the real world aren’t so lucky. They have to face the fallout in the media, among their friends, and around the water cooler. Getting things under control thus isn’t exclusively, or even primarily, about helping the pope or the Holy See. It’s about not putting unnecessary obstacles in the path of the Catholic rank-and-file, who just want to live their faith and, maybe, share it with others.
On Friday, the cardinals are supposed to be talking about the “new evangelization.” Perhaps taking a hard look at the Vatican’s disarray might be a place to start.
"...there’s little atmosphere
"...there’s little atmosphere of crisis inside the Vatican itself. When you walk into most Vatican offices, you’ll find people calmly going about their business. Personnel are aware of the storms brewing around them, and many are worried about what it all means, but it’s not as if panic is in the air."
THIS is what I would call a bubble. The leadership and employees of the Vatican are living in their own world. We hear it over and over again: THEY ARE OUT OF TOUCH.
Where is Robert Langdon,
Where is Robert Langdon, "symbologist" hero of Dan Brown's "DaVinci Code," when we really need him to unravel the mysterious plots and intrigue entangling the Vatican and the Catholic Church?
Italians know, since they have seen emperors and popes come and go for millennia, these Vatican "internal knife fights" are really so very entertaining. If you can't have martyrs in the colosseum, you still need some kind of "bread and circuses" to keep the people preoccupied. Such is life in the early 21st century at the imperial papal court of the world's oldest, all-male feudal oligarchy. Actually, all this sounds more like the TV mini-series "The Borgias" - the original crime family!
You could say that these "tempests in a tea pot" were almost quaint if they were not so serious due to the fact that these hierarchs have literally $billions of dollars to play havoc with in these high-stakes political poker games. If the Vatican hierarchs didn't have all that money, no one would care. It would truly be totally irrelevant to the lives of everyone, as Allen puts it, especially for "around the water cooler" Catholics.
All this "inside baseball" Vatican intrigue reminds me of the opening scenes in the 1987 biopic ["The Last Emperor] where Puyi, the twelfth and final ruler of the Qing Dynasty, as an almost 3 y.o. ascends the throne in the Forbidden City totally isolated and cut-off from the turmoil of the revolutions raging outside in China. Puyi's world is totally controlled by a caste of eunuchs who maintain the ceremonial life and facade of the imperial court completely disengaged from the reality outside the walls.
Such is life behind the Vatican walls today: Old men, "eunuchs for the sake of the kingdom," scurrying around in their magenta and scarlet robes, propping up the decayed and corrupt Vatican curial system, who exert their control over the Vatican by invoking ritual and the mystical, totally obsessed about what "il papa" is doing and thinking any given moment of the day. Very patriarchal! Totally cut off, in fact dismissive, of the world around them.
J23rd is once said to have responded to a question from a reporter of "about how many people work at the Vatican?": "Oh, about half."
Some things never change, especially in the Eternal City - Rome didn't get that moniker for nothing! Sad, but we are witnessing the slow-motion implosion of the Vatican hegemony over Catholicism. The fate of the church really is in the hands of the people because after the Vatican hierarchal superstructure crumbles, a new birth of Christianity will be possible.
LET THE PEOPLE DECIDE!
The first-century Caesars are
The first-century Caesars are probably the original "crime family" - the Borgias were positively restrained by comparison. Nero killed his mother - something no Borgia ever did. OTOH, she did murder her step-son Britannicus & her hubby (& Emperor) Claudius, to clear the way for Nero. Tiberius may have been murdered - he was succeeded by Caligula, who married his own sister; and was murdered, afte which Claudius was elected Emperor. Caligula's family had mostly been "liquidated" by his predecessor.
This beats the Borgias by a very long way.
All things forgiven in the
All things forgiven in the confessional no doubt.
What a legacy.
Can we really take our Spiritual Powerhouse seriously, who of us can remain with our credibility in tact before God and man.
When I think of those who died protecting it.
As said before: Ever thing
As said before: Ever thing must come to light.After The Divinci Code was brought to our attention and the Kamora did you notice..The floors in the Catholic Churches where all designed and covered.Nothing to hide so much to gain believe or not"God's plan is Gods plan regardless of the plan we have.Then on the other hand all of this is nothing new,it's just a letter!
A whistblower and a deep
A whistblower and a deep throat were enough to depose a president and end a bloody war. I hope it will work, also, in the Vatican.
The last two items of the
The last two items of the article tell it all. The Vatican is just like Washington D.C. or as we call it "Inside the Beltway." Outside of there is where the people live. Secondly, I have no faith in the Church's desire to "re-evangelize" my children or grandchildren. Let's all run to India and Africa for the new salvation and growth of the Church.
Sorry, not buying it.
Mike you are so right! The
Mike you are so right! The "new evangelization" means going back before Vatican II when no one questioned the authority of the Church leaders and we all walked lock step with Rome.
Please Mike, do not confuse
Please Mike, do not confuse the good people who live "inside the beltway" ( I do) with Congress and the Lobbyists.
There are magnificent people making their living in the civil service.
Also, we have many other bases of our economy, including the home offices of many national and international companies, great colleges and great towns and counties which are healthy and functioning well.
Congressional breakdown and corruption hurts us as much as the rest of the country.
If you know someone who lives "inside the beltway"(which BTW needs major transportation improvements just like the rest of the country) come visit.. Bet you'll like us.
It's all about Congress which lives and works on its own little planet.
But remember John Allen's
But remember John Allen's "Trends"....the Southern Hemisphere is the location of the next "Rome."
VATICAN IMPLODING SOON ....
VATICAN IMPLODING SOON .... Thanks, John, for pulling back the Vatican curtains a bit.
The pope and curia must be terrified, bubble or no bubble. For the first time since the fourth century when Constantine commandeered the consensual Church and imposed the current coercive imperial structure, the Vatican is facing an invincible foe--an international legal process founded on transparency and accountability--two values Jesus mandated.
The Vatican curtains will soon be completely removed. The sordid revelations of corruption and abuses of power will become daily media feasts, as the public increasingly demands punishiment for the curial crimes. Finally, the child sexual abuse cover-up and the sordid financial irregularities will finally be fully disclosed soon, hopefully before the papal election likely before year-end. The Spirit is working overtime!
It is revealing that your hero du jour, Timothy Dolan, is already laying the blame on the US papal nuncio, Vigano, for the inevitable failure of the current "anti-contraception crusade" to replace Obama as US "prosecutor-in-chief" with a "friendlier" Reublican like Santorum.
This disasterous crusade will only increase the votes for Obama among women and Catholics.
It is ironic that the crusade is being disguised in an anti-contraception Trojan Horse. John XXIII fifty years ago launched the papal birth control commission report that overwhelmingly approved of contraception. Of course, Paul VI, elected by curial cardinals switching their votes to him, soon repaid them by banning the pill and purportedly preserving the weak papal claim to infallibility.
We now have the current pope repaying his papal election support debt to the curia, while his Church is imploding due to his and John Paul II's complete leadership failures. The recent revelations of widespread cover-ups of priest abuse in Poland only underscores JP II's longstanding leadership failures.
For more information on the ploy to dump Obama, please note the comment, "Founding Fathers Shock", and the comment, "Obama's Dream Comes True", accessible by clicking on at:
http://ncronline.org/news/politics/bishops-studying-revised-contraceptio...
"Mutiny of Monsignors" . .
"Mutiny of Monsignors" . . Bertone exposes the real Elephant in the ROOM . . Homosexuality . . RELATED:
"This consistory will be taking place in an atmosphere that is certainly not very glorious or exalting," said one bishop with direct knowledge of Vatican affairs.
The sources agreed that the leaks were part of an internal campaign - a sort of "mutiny of the monsignors" - against the pope's right-hand man, Secretary of State Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone."
It's all aimed at Bertone," said a monsignor in a key Vatican department who sympathises with the secretary of state and who sees the leakers as determined to oust him. "It's very clear that they want to get rid of Bertone."
Source: Reuters / Article: "Monsignors' mutiny" revealed by Vatican leaks
Link: http://in.reuters.com/article/2012/02/13/vatican-scandal-idINDEE81C0FH20...
**********
Perhaps this goes a long way in explaining why they're gunning for Bertone:
Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone said in a news conference in Chile on Monday that "many psychologists and psychiatrists have demonstrated that there is no relation between celibacy and pedophilia."
They do believe, however, "that there is a relation between homosexuality and pedophilia," he said. "That is true. ... That is the problem."
Source: New York Daily News / Article:
Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone blames homosexuality - not celibacy - for child abuse sex scandal / Tuesday, April 13, 2010
***********
The predominantly gay community within the Roman Catholic priesthood / hierarchy are hoping to OUT him before he OUTS them!
You have stated: " It would
You have stated: " It would be nice if a powerful and well-connected papal ambassador were on the scene in Washington to help navigate these tensions, but that's obviously not the situation."
John, are you saying that a US government health care mandate is being influenced by an Ambassador from a foreign country? A theocracy at that?
So, is that why Biden visited the Pope recently? Biden needed Vatican approval of a US health regulation?
This is very serious business. Borders on treason.
Are you saying that the Vatican should have any influence at all in the health care of American women?
(We know how they feel about women)
Very alarming. Not surprising.
I am an American woman and I have not ceded any power over my health or the health of my family to the Vatican or its representatives, the Cardinals and Bishops.
(Incidentally, the Cardinals and Bishops are very uninformed, They need a class in Women's heath and family development before they do any more damage.)
BORGIAS and MEDICIS, move
BORGIAS and MEDICIS, move over! See what happens when you try to RESTORE a RENAISSANCE PAPACY!
They were even satirized at the Grammy's - MINUS the Red Pradas, of course:
http://parlourmagazine.com/2012/02/nicki-minaj-grammy-show-channels-cath...
Memo to Nicki Minaj:
You can certainly hustle that red outfit in Rome at the upcoming consistory.
But informed viewers know where your designer "borrowed" the material.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CYzRL9YIswQ
CATHOLIC LEAGUE
CATHOLIC LEAGUE ALERT!
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/celebritology/post/nicki-minajs-gram...
Memo to Bill Donahue:
Admit it, Bill. You do NOT watch the GRAMMY's which means you learned about Nicki here at NCR, which you do FREQUENT - religiously!
South Park RULES!
"sensational reports charging
"sensational reports charging that IOR recently transferred millions of Euro to foreign banks, to evade Italian controls, and that it’s refused to cooperate with various Italian inquests"
Well the last time the Vatican attempted transparency by depositing €25 million in and Italian back, the Italians stole it and told the Vatican they didn't fill out the paperwork correctly. Maybe that is why they are looking at non Italian banks.
The hierarchs perpetual
The hierarchs perpetual antiphon seems to be "Show Me the Money," despite what Vox Clara has fed us. Catholic lay faithful must develop an informed conscious in matters of faith and a discerning mind in matters of world and religious politics.
Given the fact that a
Given the fact that a condensed version of this same story is appearing in secular newspapers, I have a tendancy to believe that there is a deeper truth to this than what the Vatican is saying. But we know that the Vatican is not noted for its transparency at all.
It is funny how the media
It is funny how the media doesn’t abide by the norm of “innocent until proven guilty,” and how it (including the NCR) gives only lip service to truth and accountability.
“Plot against the Pope: Dead within 12 Months
This was an anonymous letter, written in German, quoting a Cardinal. It was passed on to the pope by Card. Hoyos. Frankly, it could be a prank, or a setup by anyone. Imagine this: Hoyos gets the letter in the mail. What does he do with it? He can discard it, or send it to the pope, with the idea of: FYI. Who leaked it? Well it could be the person who wrote it. This is likely to be perfect exercise in disinformation. And the media, given the anti-Catholic ant-Vatican atmosphere (including in the NCR) runs with.
“Pope is Isolated amid War in the Vatican”
I presume this is a reference to Viganò’s letter and the reactions to it. The only thing we seem to know from it is that he had people who did not like what he was doing, and he complained about it to the Pope. Show me one organization (for example, one parish), where there is not going to be bruised egos, conflicts and tensions when there is a structural change implemented, when people’s actions are criticised (rightly or wrongly) and when people’s ‘freedoms’ are curtailed. The fact is that none of the changes implemented by Viganò have been reversed. He probably did a good job, but he, like the others, could have a fairly big ego, which clouds his personal judgments of others character and reactions to their actions. These are of course never discussed or taken into consideration. No, if the news is Catholic Church related or Vatican related, it must be interpreted in the worst possible form: it is sinister, it is scandalous.
“Money Laundering, Priests Investigated: The Silence of the Vatican”
So, the big news is that the “IOR recently transferred millions of Euro to foreign banks”. No kidding. Every bank is doing that.
Of course the charge is that this has been done “to evade Italian controls, and that it’s refused to cooperate with various Italian inquests,”
And the proof of this is … what? It is an accusation.
“including a probe into the 1982 death of Italian financier Roberto Calvi, known as ‘God’s Banker’ for his close Vatican ties.” Oh yes, if all else fails, just print Calvi’s name, and it will certainly sell the story. The fact is that the IOR has been recently investigated by Italian authorities for similar charges, and has been cleared (conveniently passed over in silence by the media, including the NCR). Does anyone in his or her right mind think that if this kind of thing happened again, the Italian authorities would not jump on it immediately?
“It also cited an internal Vatican memo suggesting that a new anti-money laundering law decreed by Benedict XVI contains a massive loophole, making suspect transactions before April 2011 exempt from scrutiny.”
Woopty do! The fact is that they found the loophole and they wrote a memo about it. Is this not how thing supposed to happen? Of course, the insinuation by the media is: it was done on purpose, and a good soul wrote a memo, and he/she has been promptly sent to the gallows.
“Gays, Scandals and Even Masonry: The Church Fears Deep Throat”
And the juicy one was left for the last. This is of course simply a speculation by tabloid-like Italian media that when Viganò will return from his exile, a knight in shining armour, he will reveal the ‘rest of the story’, the real ‘dirty laundry’. And, of course, this is being re-printed by ‘objective’ and ‘conscientious’ journalists and media, and taken as the content of a ‘Vatican document’.
I think these are perfect examples of what is wrong with today’s media, including the NCR.
The Church has outlived
The Church has outlived empires: it will outlive this gleeful American leftist palm-rubbing.
the biggest and most
the biggest and most unspeakable scandal and offense to our Faith is the guys ratzo makes cardinals to preserve the wojo nazi capitalist project well into the next papacy. why there is no more church going on, except among the most poor, those of us too poor to notice, to bother . . .
the meek shall inherit the earth. Blessed are we poor
I suggest that you start
I suggest that you start following your own comment code. If it is appropriate for commenters, then it is appropriate for you.
Be respectful. Particularly of the Holy Father.
Use appropriate language. Your piece rambles. You take more familiararities than you have been granted. Who set you up as a judge?. Remember. Detraction is a sin. How often do you examine your conscience?
Keep to the point. I suggest some refresher courses in journalism. You might want to go back and review the Catechism and the Compendium of the Social Doctrine of the Catholic Church.
Mr. Berkly, I would submit
Mr. Berkly, I would submit to you that the entire Roman Catholic "hierarchy" need a refresher course in the RC Catechism.
In 2005, the church issued its "Instruction Concerning the Criteria for the Discernment of Vocations with regard to Persons with Homosexual Tendencies in view of their Admission to the Seminary and to Holy Orders". The policy states that those men with "deeply rooted homosexual tendencies" cannot be ordained under any circumstances.
Rev. Donald Cozzens, author of the 2000 book "The Changing Face of the Priesthood," estimates 50 percent of all Catholic priests are homosexual.Psychotherapist Richard Sipe, a former Catholic priest who has written and spoken widely on the priesthood, says 15 percent of homosexual priests are sexually active. If all homosexual clergy were to leave the U.S. Catholic Church now, the church would lose one-third of its bishops as well.
The R.C. Catechism underpinned by the Sacred Scriptures, presents homosexual acts as “acts of grave depravity” that are “intrinsically disordered.” and “contrary to the natural law (Article 6 / 2357), and which the Sacred Scriptures. (See God's Word . . Romans 1:18, 24, 26-27
And while While the RC “church” as an institution may not have embraced the “Gay Agenda”, it is equally apparent that her priesthood has wholeheartedly done so!
These are those who have been entrusted with providing spiritual rule and guidance to the flock in the matters of faith and morals!
What a departure from what God requires of those who oversee the flock of God . . as it is set forth in 1 Peter 5:2-3 who are called not to be “lords”, but “examples to the flock”.
In this regard, the hierarchy . . the priesthood are at variance with their own teaching and are need of a thorough "cleansing of the temple"!
The Terrorist Is Hereby
The Terrorist Is Hereby Arrested By This NCR Blog.
In Cardinal Darío Castrillón Hoyos,the Blessed Virgin Mary, the Our Lady of Fatima has found a Voice. And should the Holy Father,Pope Benedict XVI happen to choose to ignore this time-tested information...this link provides the unfolding scenario.Let the Vatican Security outfit/authority look into the contents of
1.
2.http://marysrose.hubpages.com/hub/THE-FATIMA-MESSAGE-AND-THE-21ST-CENTURY-CHURCH-CONCLUDING-POST-PROPHETIC-MISSIONARY-SCRIPT
3.http://evurulobi.hubpages.com/hub/The-Church-And-Global-Security-Introducing-A-Fifth-Gospel-To-Nigeria
4.http://evurulobi.hubpages.com/hub/CHIEF-MATHEW-OLUSEGUN-AREMU-OBASANJO-AND-THE-SEARCH-FOR-THE-SOUL-OF-NIGERIA
5.http://marysrose.hubpages.com/hub/an-open-appeal-to-tell-magazinestanding-on-the-legitimacy-of-the-cause-of-freedom-and-good-governace
The embarrassing publications against the Vatican are just programmed to cut the the Vatican and the Holy Father off from public support and sympathy when the unexpected happens, and in this way create room for a new kind of propaganda by Secularists that will end up handing the Church over to the "New Reformers" for "cleansing" and "repositioning". U.S.A is involved in this plot.Barack Obama is at a game that is also billed to consume him.
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