Merchants in the Temple (7 page)

Your obedient servant, Zahra

The most immediate countermeasure was the decision to establish a communication task force, taken at the meeting of October 12, 2013. The task force had three ambitious goals.
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The first was to manage COSEA's relations with the media—whose activity they hoped would remain dormant, given the delicacy of the subject matter. The second was to “analyze in depth how the Vatican communications system is currently structured,” in order to shake it up radically, given the ongoing leaks to the press and the more critical stance international media was taking to the Holy See in the wake of the Vatileaks scandal (the moniker given to the leaking of confidential documents by me, and the basis for my previous book,
His Holiness
). Finally, the task force had “to be able to provide the Holy Father with the most appropriate recommendations to increase the efficiency and effectiveness of Vatican communications, internally and externally.”

The media was one of the most delicate fronts to manage. The “enemies” were flocking in large numbers, at least according to the surprising revelations of another member of COSEA, the Frenchman Jean Videlain-Sevestre, disclosed in a grave email that he had sent to his colleagues and to the Pope's confidants one month earlier:

Our actions will highlight the financial and administrative shortcomings that the enemies of the Church obviously wish to see. I am speaking of some governments, some politicians and much of the media. For example, we must at all costs prevent the free masons from circumventing or even infiltrating our plans of action.

As Sevestre so clearly indicated, the members of the Commission felt embattled. Not only did he fear internal resistance to the reforms of Francis, which were already emerging forcefully, he also feared the Freemasons. They always tracked the financial activities of the Vatican with close attention and sometimes open hostility: the “brotherhood of the masons” might even “infiltrate”—as the Frenchman put it—the Commission's operative plans, in order to manipulate their execution and impede the achievement of their goals.

Similar fears were emerging during the selection of advisors and experts to help the Commission in the conduct of its investigation. After Sevestre met with the renowned consultant Roland Berger in Paris on September 14, 2013, Berger advanced his own candidature, but added some concerns that were bothering him:

We wish first of all to reconfirm our deep attachment to the Catholic Church … You can be certain of the utmost discretion of the signatories of this letter, of their Catholic faith, of their not belonging to organizations that are adverse to the Catholic Church, whether Masonic or of another nature.

These were the first signs of resistance and acts of sabotage that would increasingly hinder the investigation by COSEA. The investigation into the saints' factory would last for months, but the effect of Francis's reform on that Congregation is still unclear today.

 

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The Secrets of the Peter's Pence

The Perks of Being a Cardinal

There is a black hole in the heart of the Church that took great efforts for Francis to uncover: a black hole created by mismanagement of the Vatican's finances and compounded by swindling and accounting fraud. Through the Commission that he established in an unprecedented blitz, the pope was able to ascertain that the expenses of the Curia were paid for by money that was supposed to go to the poor. Offerings for charity that Catholics from throughout the world sent to the Vatican were being used to plug up deficits created by a handful of Church officials who maneuvered the bureaucratic levers of the Holy See.

Jorge Mario Bergoglio had chosen the name Francis because his mission for the Church was to help the poor, in service of the teachings of St. Francis of Assisi. From the moment he stepped out on the balcony overlooking St. Peter's Square in March 2013 to salute the crowd, he rejected all frills. He often wore simple, shabby tunics. He invited the homeless to the Sistine Chapel and asked the heads of the Church's religious orders and administrative bodies to shelter the needy in their unused buildings, in the halls, hostels, and dormitories of the great seminaries that had been deserted because of the crisis in vocations.

In addition to rigor and transparency, poverty and charity were the key words of his pastoral language and pontificate. He tried to foster this sense among nuns and priests in particular, starting with the smallest, simplest things, such as the use of motor vehicles. He discussed this at length during an audience with seminarians and novices on July 6, 2013:

“I tell you, it truly grieves me to see a priest or a sister with the latest model of a car,” he declared, “but this can't be! It can't be … cars are necessary because there is so much work to be done, and also in order to get about … but choose a more humble car! And if you like the beautiful one, only think of all the children who are dying of hunger … You are all disgusted when you find among us priests who are not authentic, or sisters who are not authentic!”

He was the first to set the example. When he went to the Italian island of Lampedusa to embrace the refugees arriving from Africa, he used a Fiat jeep provided by a parishioner who lived on the island. On a visit to Assisi, the land of St. Francis, he used a small car, a Fiat Panda. “When a priest from Verona gave him a Renault 4, the Pope accepted it but transferred it to the graveyard of papal vehicles.”
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Confronted by these words and deeds, unusual for a pope, there were many cardinals in the Curia who, after their initial surprise, tried to manifest their allegiance to the new era, but only in words and smiles. Their real attitude is better expressed by a joke that was making the rounds among their drivers: “They have left their limousines and sedans in the garage, and now they're driving around in economy cars, a Fiat 500 or Panda, but they're still living in the same luxury apartments.”

The truth behind these words is apparent in the living quarters of the cardinals who occupy the highest positions in the Church hierarchy. Many live in luxurious homes in the heart of Rome—unimaginable realities for most.

The story of Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone's home made headlines. By combining two apartments, he created an immense residence for himself on the top floor of the Palazzo San Carlo at the Vatican. This is not the exception, but the rule. The cardinals of the Curia reside in princely dwellings of 400, 500, even 600 square meters.
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They live alone or with a missionary nun—usually from a developing country—as their assistant, cleaning lady, or housekeeper. The apartments have rooms for every whim and fancy: waiting rooms, television rooms, bathrooms, reception rooms, tea rooms, libraries, rooms for the personal assistant, the secretary, the files, and rooms for praying. And these dwellings are often in stunning buildings, like the splendid Palace of the Holy Office, immediately behind the colonnade of St. Peter's Square: it dates back to the sixteenth century and had once been the headquarters of the tribunal of the Inquisition.

The largest apartment in the Palace of the Holy Office—a full 445 square meters—was given to Cardinal Velasio de Paolis, born in 1935, a hard-core ally of Ratzinger and President Emeritus of the Prefecture for Economic Affairs of the Holy See. Slightly smaller is the 409-square-meter apartment of the eighty-one-year-old Slovenian cardinal, Frank Rodé. The former archbishop of Lubljana, he had been a personal friend of Marcial Maciel, the disgraced founder of the Legionnaires of Christ, who had been suspended from the ministry for pedophilia.
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Rodé is also a member of the Pontifical Council on Culture. Cardinal Kurt Koch, President of the Pontifical Council for the Promotion of Christian Unity, had to settle for a house of 356 square meters.
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Another group of cardinals lives not far away, on the opposite side of St. Peter's Square, in a beautiful building, in the heart of the Eternal City. This is the residence of the Canadian Marc Ouellet, born in 1944, Prefect of the Congregation for Bishops and President of the Pontifical Commission for Latin America. His apartment is almost 500 square meters. Cardinal Sergio Sebastiani, eighty-four, also a member of the Congregation for Bishops and of the Congregation for the Causes of Saints, lives in a 424-square-meter apartment. (Let us not forget that all cardinals older than eighty have a role that is primarily symbolic, and do not have the right to vote in the Conclave.)

Raymond Burke, an American cardinal born in 1948 and a patron of the Sovereign Military Order of Malta, is quite comfortable in his 417 square meters, as is the Polish cardinal, Zenon Grocholewski, born in 1939, who had been the Prefect Emeritus of the Congregation for Catholic Education until March 2015. His residence is 405 square meters. A stone's throw away, in the Borgo Pio neighborhood, is the 524-square-meter princely residence of the American Cardinal William Joseph Levada, born in Long Beach, California, in 1939, a loyalist of Ratzinger, who appointed him as his successor at the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith. In 2006, Levada was summoned to testify, in San Francisco, about the sexual abuse of minors by priests in the archdiocese of Portland, Oregon, where he had been Archbishop from 1986 to 1995. The priests were later found guilty of abuse. By comparison to these sumptuous quarters, Room 201 of the Casa Santa Marta, the home of the Pope, was almost a closet, barely 50 square meters.

The cardinals' privileges do not end there. The cardinals did not have to pay any rent, only the utilities, for as long as they hold an official post in the Curia, after which they are charged a monthly rental fee of 7–10 euros per square meter. In reality, however, even after the mandatory retirement age of eighty, some cardinals hold onto a dicastery assignment that allows them to continue to benefit from the no-rent policy. The typical response to criticisms of the sizes of these apartments is that various rooms are needed to accommodate the two, three, and even four nuns who live with the cardinal to administer to his domestic needs.

The cardinals of the Curia administer the most important departments of the Holy See, however: they control the heart of the universal Church. And it was from here that Francis felt that the evangelical and charitable work of the Church should begin and emanate throughout the world. But I have to use the conditional “should,” because the reality is a different matter completely.

Where Does the Money for the Poor End Up?

According to the Vatican website, the Peter's Pence is

the financial support offered by the faithful to the Holy Father as a sign of their sharing in the concern of the Successor of Peter for the many different needs of the Universal Church and for the relief of those most in need … The faithful's offerings to the Holy Father are destined for Church needs, to humanitarian initiatives and social promotion projects, as well as for the support of the Holy See. The Pope, being Pastor of the whole Church, is attentive to the material needs of poor dioceses, religious institutes and of faithful in grave difficulties (the poor, children, the elderly, those marginalized and the victims of war or natural disasters; concrete aid to Bishops or dioceses in need, Catholic education, assistance to refugees and immigrants, etc.).

The pontiffs have always valued the charitable aims of the Peter's Pence, and have urged the faithful to give generously. “‘Peter's Pence' is the most characteristic expression”—Benedict XVI emphasized—“of the participation of all the faithful in the Bishop of Rome's charitable initiatives.”
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He describes the central importance of charity in his encyclical
Deus caritas est
(2006), noting that, “The Church can never be exempted from practicing charity as an organized activity of believers, and on the other hand, there will never be a situation where the charity of each individual Christian is unnecessary, because in addition to justice man needs, and will always need, love.”
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Yet according to the financial statements and balance sheets—which I was able to consult directly—the management of the Peter's Pence is an enigma cloaked in the most impenetrable secrecy. Every year the amount of the collection is publicized but there is no explanation of how it is administered. In other words, we know how much money has been collected from the faithful but not how it is spent. Absolute secrecy is maintained around this detail.

This paucity of information raised the suspicions of the COSEA members, who wanted a clearer picture of the situation. They had also sensed that their success depended on getting the Peter's Pence managers to comply with the audit. It was clear that something was amiss when the charity did not reply to Versaldi's July 2013 request for financial reports, data, and documents. They did not reply, not by the deadline indicated by the Cardinal, nor by the end of autumn. They did give a few informal, evasive answers, but nothing written. Not a single clear, formal, and thorough document emerged from these queries.

Was this just the classic example of buying time until attention shifted away from the problem? If so, rather than respond negatively, evaders usually prefer to send partial signals, involve other persons, and pretend they don't understand the request, maybe by claiming that the documents have gone missing. This seemingly casual strategy ended up raising the suspicions of the COSEA members and of the financial consultants of McKinsey, KPMG, and Promontory Financial Group who had been hired by the papal Commission. The issue almost provoked a diplomatic incident in the Curia. The story helps to illustrate the hostile climate in which Francis has to operate. Through the documents that have come into my possession, I am able to reconstruct every step of the conflict.

The problems started in December 2013 when the Secretariat of State and APSA proved to be less than forthcoming in their answers to the Commission's requests for documentation. On December 2, in a letter to Reverend Alfred Xuereb, Francis's personal secretary, the Commission requested the Pontiff's direct intervention: