Merchants in the Temple (27 page)

In this manner many cardinals in the Curia were shown the door. And at the same time as he was drafting the new regulations for Pell, the Holy Father removed the American Cardinal Raymond Leo Burke from his position as Prefect of the Supreme Tribunal of the Apostolic Segnatura. Burke became patron of the Sovereign Order of Malta, a largely honorary post. This conservative cardinal, once described as “a harpsichord playing in the desert” by some of Francis's loyalists, was one of the most vociferous opponents of the Pontiff. “Many of the faithful”—he stated after the Synod—“are feeling a bit seasick because they feel the church's ship has lost its way.”

In March 2015 another member of the Curia, Cardinal Versaldi, President of the Prefecture, was transferred to the Congregation for Catholic Education. Monsignor Mariano Crociata was demoted, from the powerful Secretary General of the Italian Bishops' Conference to Bishop of the small diocese of Latina. Crociata was famous for his gaffe on the day of Bergoglio's election, when the Italian Bishops' Conference that he headed issued a press release welcoming the elevation to Peter's Throne of Cardinal Angelo Scola. He was replaced by Monsignor Nuncio Galantino, who in August 2015 openly attacked Italian politics as “a harem of cronies and con artists: the people are not just a flock of sheep to be guided and sheered.” He also took aim at the hardline anti-immigration policies of the Northern League: “Do not seek votes on the backs of others.”
4

Jessica and the Others

For months Francis was in a silent tug of war with the Dean of Papal Protocol, the powerful Francesco Camaldo, who had been demoted to Canon of the Vatican basilica. Camaldo is the prelate who, on the evening of March 13, 2013, after the white smoke, could be seen in the second row to the left of the Pope on the balcony overlooking St. Peter's Square. This picture went around the world and was a source of no small embarrassment for Francis.

For many years Camaldo had been the Secretary of the former Vicar of Rome, Cardinal Ugo Poletti. The names of both men appeared in an investigation into the disappearance of Emanuela Orlandi, the teenage daughter of a clerk at the Prefecture of the Pontifical house, who on June 22, 1983, after her classes at a music school in Rome, was never seen again. The Italian prosecutors had long connected her disappearance with the odd burial place of Renatino De Pedis. The alleged cashier of the Magliana gang—an organized crime group that controlled the capital's drug market in the 1980s—De Pedis had for mysterious reasons been laid to rest in the crypt of the Sant'Appolinaire Basilica. This strange burial had been authorized by Cardinal Poletti while the investigators believed that the practical details had been left to his travel secretary, Camaldo.

Francis might also have received word of the nickname by which Camaldo was known in certain corners of the capital as emerged during the prosecutor's investigations: Jessica. It was hardly fitting for a man of the cloth, especially one so close to the Pope. He was not the only prelate or cardinal with such a unique sobriquet. There was also “Mother Superior,” a Sicilian monsignor with a penchant for champagne and novices; “Peacock,” a vain cardinal from northern Italy who enjoyed being “pampered” by a handsome young entrepreneur who did business with the Vatican; “Monica Lewinsky,” and many more. The associates of the so-called gay lobby had nicknames that identified them by their origins or sexual proclivities. They would allegedly procure the services of laymen with criminal records who at night, after work, would cruise the Roman bars and nightclubs in search of young boys to satisfy the vices of the senior prelates who protected them. As compensation, the panderers would apparently receive tips, protected careers in Vatican offices, or government jobs, and higher pay than normally accorded a person with their job description or skill set.

I should specify, however, that Francis did not find a “gay lobby” in the Vatican. That is to say, there is no structured homosexual organization that determines appointments, assigns contracts, or controls dicasteries, money and people's lives and careers. But the reality is actually worse. In the clergy being gay is experienced as a secret, an unspeakable weakness, a broken taboo, and an easy target for blackmail. “Many cardinals cultivate a secret vice”—explains a banker, a Vatican consultant who preferred to remain anonymous—“some like boys, some like models, some are passionate about food and wine, some are greedy for money. If a con artist is looking for a mark, once he's pinpointed a cardinal's weakness he's on easy street. He satisfies the cardinal's itch and he'll be compensated handsomely.” But doesn't this happen in every bureaucracy of the world? “No, at the Vatican they live with the hypocritical fear of causing a scandal, which conditions their choices, their reactions, and is unequaled in other parts of the world. They worry that the truth will alienate believers from the faith, which is why they keep everything hidden. At a very high cost. It's a shame that all these secrets foster pressure and blackmail. Francis is trying to end this situation but he is running into strong resistance.”

The consultant then related the story of a monsignor who had been tailed on his visits to gay massage parlors on Via Merulana and in the Parioli district. A few choice photographs and the priest was a goner. Anyone who doesn't want to end up being blackmailed has to search for friendships and hookups on special gay websites that guarantee absolute anonymity. But sometimes these encounters lead to tragedies, like the case of a cardinal's young lover who years ago jumped off the building in Rome where he worked, tired of the pressures and the blackmail to which his beloved cardinal was being subjected.

Immediately after his election, Francis read the notes left for him by Benedict XVI, the report on the leaked documents, and he realized that the situation—also in terms of the morality and habits of his collaborators—was out of control. He asked for the files of the stipends and monthly salaries of the main advisors, where he discovered that there were secretaries being paid as much as 15,000 euros a month. “These sums”—as one of Bergoglio's collaborators commented—“are proof of friendship for sexual purposes.” The reaction of the Pontiff is not known, but he is certainly aware that on this front, from the times of Benedict XVI to today, the situation shows no sign of improving.

 

Epilogue: Will Francis Resign, Too?

An Incomplete Revolution

I have described how Francis, upon his election, found the Curia in disarray, characterized by inertia, scandals, thefts, wrongdoing, and opaque interests. An unreliable Curia had led Benedict XVI to resign and alienated many of the Church's faithful. To change that dynamic Francis had invested the best minds in the Vatican and spent millions of euros on consultants, hiring lay professionals from outside the walls and inviting them to comb through the accounts of the Holy See. This was an unusual gesture of trust but also a necessary path. Only in this way could the Pope defeat the old power centers that had taken root during the Cold War and grown in the shadows for decades. Only in this way could he restore full credibility and a future to a Church suffering from a chronic crisis in vocations, followers, and offerings.

Of all the reforms contemplated during the first year of his pontificate, very few managed to get off the ground. This unfortunately meant one thing: Bergoglio's plan to drive out the merchants from the temple was still unfulfilled some three years after his election. The only project that did become concrete was the communications hub, through the establishment of the new Secretariat for Communications. All the other projects and changes announced remained in the drawer or were only partially realized. This situation was a source of discontent all around. More and more cardinals were criticizing the Holy Father, some quite openly, like the Slovenian Franc Rodé, the former Archbishop of Ljubljana.

“Without a shadow of a doubt”—Rodé stated to the Slovenian national press agency—“the Pope is a communications genius. He communicates quite well with the crowds, the media and the faithful.” He then added, “A great advantage is that he seems likeable. On the other hand, his opinions, on capitalism and social justice, are too far to the left. You can see how the Pope is marked by the environment from which he comes. In South America there are great social differences and lively debates on this situation take place every day. They are people who talk a lot but solve very few problems.”

There was also the Guinean Cardinal Robert Sarah, the Prefect of the Congregation for Divine Worship. In March 2015, upon his return from a trip to France, he said, “Inside the Catholic Church there are signs of a certain confusion on fundamental doctrinal, moral and disciplinary questions.”

Some cardinals made their dissent even more explicit, such as Gerhard Ludwig Müller, Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, who did not participate in a Mass because he did not share some of the Holy Father's interpretations of theology. Or Camillo Ruini, the former President of the Italian Bishops' Conference, who in October 2014, out of disagreement with positions on the remarriage of divorced persons, refused to shake Francis's hand after the Synod.

There were open manifestos, such as the book
Remaining in the Truth of Christ
, written by five cardinals—Müller, Raymond Lee Burke, Velasio De Paolis (former leader of the Prefecture), the Italian Carlo Caffarra, and the Austrian Walter Brandmüler—disputing the idea that divorced people can partake of the sacraments.

For a progress report, let's start with the Secretariat for the Economy, where Cardinal Pell was supposed to achieve the goal of consolidating all the Vatican's finances. This was Francis's wish, but so far it hasn't happened. Its twin, the Secretariat of State, continues to hold full control over the resources that it managed in the past—starting with the Peter's Pence, the generous flow of money from dioceses all over the world that is meant to support the pastoral mission of the Church and instead ends up being used to cover the deficits of the dicasteries.

Management of the Peter's Pence was supposed to be transferred to the Secretariat for the Economy, but there was huge resistance from Parolin's offices. For that matter, Pell and Parolin never managed to establish a true collaboration and have sometimes clashed bitterly. One example of this occurred in December 2014 and February 2015, when Pell spread the word that the investigations of previous months had turned up hundreds of millions of euros not reported in the Vatican's balance sheets.

“At the Consistory I explained that to date [February 13, 2015], there are 442 million euros in additional assets in the dicasteries, in addition to the 936 we had identified in an earlier moment.” In the end it was found that a total of 1.4 billion euros had not been entered into the balance sheets. Then came Parolin's cutting reply: “The Secretariat of State also did not know it was not the only one to have set aside so much money for a rainy day.” Some Vaticanists interpreted these statements as an attack by Pell on Parolin, and corrections and rectifications were quickly issued by the Vatican press office to clarify that the euros had been kept in reserve, off the books, and not in a slush fund. But the most significant fact was that the revelation of such a huge amount of money off the books had taken away both resources and discretionary power from those who, until recently, had managed those sums with complete autonomy.

As for the other dicasteries, the Governorate remained autonomous, as did Propaganda Fide and APSA. While it is true that APSA had to give up management of rental income, which was handed over to Pell, it still controlled the properties themselves. Here, too, there were daily tensions between Team Pell and Team Calcagno. The latest news that I can relate before this book goes to press took place in July–August 2015, when there was yet another tug of war between APSA and the Secretariat for the Economy over who should keep the archives for the Holy See's immense real estate holdings. These files contain the secrets on the sales and leases of palaces and houses to friends of friends. Who did the archives belong to? To APSA, the owner of the assets, or the men of the Australian Cardinal, who were trying to make better use of rental income? This was another occasion for infighting and misunderstandings.

A census and estimate of the artistic patrimony was in the works but still hadn't gotten off the ground. The reform of employee pensions was still in the planning stages, although it was a matter of urgency to prevent the more than 800 million euro deficit predicted by COSEA. All of the projects regarding health insurance and creating a single office for human resources were at a standstill. Secretary of State Parolin had taken upon himself the job of coordinating the various personnel offices, but centralization was still a distant dream, despite the fact that it would prevent the many fiefdoms and feuds that foster private interests and privileges.

The Auditor's Office—the control tower for all the Vatican's finances—would open for business after a one year delay. It reports directly to the Pope but the roles and responsibilities will not be defined until approval of the regulations enabling the office to become fully operational. So there has been some progress on accounting procedures to obtain standardized and, above all, credible, financial reporting.

Resistance, Sabotage, and Fake Bugs

Francis may never have imagined that he would encounter such entrenched and tenacious resistance. It was no easy matter to uncover dirty business dealings, not even for a pope. The evidence was hard to collect: at the Vatican no one reports wrongdoing, and few trust or confide in one another. The reform juggernaut of Francis was always at the center of misinformation campaigns and acts of outright sabotage—not only anonymous letters, burglary, and veiled threats like the forwarding of letters to Michele Sindona, but also criminal operations, such as various illegal wiretaps.