22 In 1996, for instance, following an emergency appendectomy, there were widespread reports that his health was so poor he might have to resign. Parkinson’s in particular had “implications for the future of his pontificate,” since those with the disease frequently have “some mental changes, including depression and features of dementia.” Ray Moseley, “Health of Pope Has Vatican Guessing,” Hamilton Spectator (Ontario), October 19, 1996, B8.
Chapter 33: The Kingmaker Becomes King
1 “Several years ago, the Financial Times put the value of the Vatican’s real estate holdings at $37.2 billion and its stock portfolio at $23.9 billion,” according to Charles W. Bell, “Church Rich in Art, Cash,” New York Daily News, April 3, 2005, 21.
2 Cardinal Sergio Sebastiani quoted in Victor L. Simpson, “Next Pope Can Add Vatican’s Financial Woes to Long List of Responsibilities,” Associated Press, International News, Vatican City, BC cycle, April 12, 2005. Father Thomas Reese, a noted writer about the church, was also quoted by Simpson: “The dollar has really hurt them. We’re not only talking about money coming from United States. All the rich guys in the Third World also give in dollars.”
3 Szoka quoted in “Trouble at God’s Bank,” The Toronto Star, April 17, 2005, A20.
4 Simpson, “Next Pope Can Add Vatican’s Financial Woes to Long List of Responsibilities.”
5 John Pollard quoted in “Trouble at God’s Bank,” The Toronto Star, A20.
6 Simpson, “Next Pope Can Add Vatican’s Financial Woes to Long List of Responsibilities.”
7 Ibid.
8 Deirdre Macken, “Next Pope’s ID Is in Da Vinci Code; Relativities,” Australian Financial Review, April 9, 2005, 31.
9 Calum MacDonald, “Politicking Begins as the Cardinals Go into Conclave; Secret Body That Will Choose New Leader,” The Herald (Glasgow), April 5, 2005, 6; see also Paddy Agnew, “How the Kingmaker Became King,” The Irish Times, April 23, 2005, 1.
10 Agnew, “How the Kingmaker Became King,” 1.
11 Those stories were by La Repubblica’s Marco Politi and L’Espresso’s Sandro Magister, men who had excellent Curial sources.
12 Peter Stanford, “Pope John Paul II: Who Will Lead One Billion Souls?: The College of Cardinals Must Now Elect a New Pope,” The Observer (London), April 3, 2005, 16.
13 Grocholewski quoted in Stephen McGinty, “Campaigning Candidates Are Reined In as Agreement Made to Stop All Media Interviews,” The Scotsman, April 7, 2005, 4.
14 Ibid; see also “Political Wrangle for Potential Popes,” St. Petersburg Times, April 6, 2005.
15 See generally Lydia Polgreen and Larry Rohter, “Third World Is New Factor in Succession,” The New York Times, April 5, 2005, 1.
16 Sandro Contenta, Cardinals Divided in Choice for Pope,” Toronto Star, April 5, 2005, A1; Julia Duin, “Latin America Eyed for Next Pope,” The Washington Times, April 7, 2005, A14.
17 Charles W. Bell, “The Games Cardinals Play. Mud’s Flying as They Angle for Big Job,” New York Daily News, April 15, 2005, 16.
18 Ibid.
19 Stanford, “Pope John Paul II: Who Will Lead One Billion Souls?”
20 “Will the Cardinals Look Beyond Italy Again?,” Daily Mail, April 2, 2005, 4.
21 See Dominus Iesus: On the Unicity and Salvific Universality of Jesus Christ and the Church, http://www.vatican.va/roman_curia/congregations/cfaith/documents/rc_con_cfaith_doc_20000806_dominus-iesus_en.html. Ratzinger was the principal author and it was issued in 2000.
22 John Follain and Christopher Morgan, “Lobbying Begins for Papal Rivals,” Sunday Times (London), April 10, 2005, 23.
23 Both quotes repeated widely, see for instance Stephen McGinty and Richard Gray, “Meet the Cardinal Who Will Play Kingmaker in Rome,” Scotland on Sunday, April 10, 2005, 8.
24 Bruce Johnston, Swing to Ratzinger Boosts Chance of Becoming Pope,” The Daily Telegraph, April 13, 2005, A12.
25 Bell, “The Games Cardinals Play,” 16.
26 Justin Sparks in Munich and John Follain and Christopher Morgan in Rome, “Papal Hopeful Is a Former Hitler Youth,” The Sunday Times (London), April 17, 2005, 23.
27 Ruini quoted in Charles W. Bell, “A People’s Pope Favored. Hints That New Pontiff Will Be Like John Paul,” New York Daily News, April 22, 2005, 7. Quote is the reporter’s summary of the Ruini comments.
28 “Briefly,” The Toronto Star, September 28, 1997, A11; Thavis, The Vatican Diaries, 278–79.
29 Philip Pullella, “Pope Opposed Bob Dylan Singing to John Paul in 1997,” Vatican City, Reuters, March 8, 2007.
30 Joseph Ratzinger, while Pope Benedict, John Paul II, My Beloved Predecessor (Miami: Pauline Books, 2007): “There was reason to be skeptical—I was, and in a certain sense I still am—to doubt if it was really right to let these types of prophets intervene.”
31 Thavis, The Vatican Diaries, 279–80; Alessandra Stanley, “Pope’s Labor Rally Joins Mass and Rock Concert,” The New York Times, May 2, 2000, A6. See Eric J. Lyman, “Vatican Pop Culture Guru Backpedals on Lou Reed Tribute,” The Salt Lake Tribune, October 29, 2013.
32 John L. Allen Jr., Cardinal Ratzinger: The Vatican’s Enforcer of Faith (New York: Continuum, 2000); John L. Allen Jr., Pope Benedict XVI: A Biography of Joseph Ratzinger (London: Bloomsbury Academic, 2005).
33 Joan Vennochi, “A Vote for Pope, an Insult to Abuse Victims,” The Boston Globe, February 17, 2013.
34 Charles W. Bell, “Vatican Gets Tough to Thwart Leaks,” New York Daily News, April 15, 1005, 16.
35 Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger, Milestones: Memoirs, 1927–1977 (San Francisco: Ignatius, 1998).
36 Allen, Cardinal Ratzinger, 8, citing Uriel Tal, Christians and Jews in Germany.
37 Allen, Pope Benedict XVI, 49.
38 See generally “Profile: Emeritus Pope Benedict XVI,” BBC News, Europe, May 2, 2013; Greg Sheridan, “Administration Was Not Benedict’s Forte,” Real Clear World, February 11, 2013.
39 Allen, Cardinal Ratzinger, 15; see generally David Gibson, The Rule of Benedict (NY: Harper, 2009).
40 Sparks, Follain, and Morgan, “Papal Hopeful Is a former Hitler Youth,” 23.
41 Ibid.
42 Ratzinger quoted in Charles W. Bell, “New Pope? Nope. ‘Relativist’ Catholics Ripped by Hard-liner,” New York Daily News, April 19, 1005, 4.
43 The long shots were Canada’s Cardinal Marc Ouellet at 80 to1 and Cardinal Jean-Claude Turcotte at 100 to 1. Scott Stinson, “Italian Favoured in Online Pope Betting,” National Post (Canada), April 6, 2005, A16.
44 The exact voting tallies for this conclave are known because five months later an Italian political magazine, Limes, published the conclave diary believed to have been kept by Cardinal Carlo Maria Martini. It included vote totals on each ballot. In the past, unconfirmed reports had later filtered out about the votes, but never were as credible as the contemporaneous diary. See generally “TV Report: Cardinal’s Unauthorized, Anonymous Diary Says Pope Was Elected with 84 Votes,” Associated Press Worldstream, International News, Vatican City, September 22, 2005; Nicole Winfield, “Cardinal Diary Details Papal Conclave,” Associated Press, International News, Vatican City, September 24, 2005.
45 Bruce Wilson, “Cardinals Set a Ratzinger Trap—Liberals Against Papal Frontrunner—Electing a Pope,” Daily Telegraph (Sydney), April 19, 2005, 13.
46 John L. Allen Jr., “Profile: New Pope, Jesuit Bergoglio, Was Runner-up in 2005 Conclave,” National Catholic Reporter, March 3, 2013.
47 See generally Wilson, “Cardinals Set a Ratzinger Trap,” 13.
48 On the last ballot, one vote went to the disgraced Boston cardinal, Bernard Law. He was one of the electors, and it is not clear if someone cast a protest vote against Ratzinger, since it was then clear that Ratzinger was about to become Pope, or if he did it himself so he would always remain an odd footnote to the final tally.
The information about what motivated the cardinals was also part of discussions later over the publication of Cardinal Martini’s diary. See Dani
el J. Wakin, “Ritual and Secrecy Surround Conclave,” The New York Times, March 11, 2013.
49 Agnew, “How the Kingmaker Became King,”
50 John Hooper, “A Moment Of Doubt, Then A Cry Went Up,” The Guardian, April 20, 2005.
51 Benedict XXI quoted in “New Pope Admits To ‘Inadequacy And Turmoil’ ” The Telegraph (London), April 20, 2005.
Chapter 34: “As Flat as Stale Beer”
1 U.S. Court of Appeals, Ninth Circuit, Opinion No. 03-15208, D.C. No. CV-99-04941-MMC, Alperin v. Vatican Bank, Argued and Submitted October 7, 2004—San Francisco, California, filed April 18, 2005, online at “Court Clears Way for Suit Against the Vatican Bank for Nazi Gold,” Silicon Valley Business Journal, April 18, 2005, reporting on the judgment of the Ninth U.S. Circuit Court, April 12, 2005; see “Nazi Gold–Vatican Bank Ruling, U.S. Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals,” Jurist, University of Pittsburgh School of Law, April 18, 2005.
2 “Court Clears Way for Suit Against the Vatican Bank for Nazi Gold,” Silicon Valley Business Journal. The IOR’s American lawyers filed an appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court later that fall. On a Petition for a Writ of Certiorari to the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, in the Supreme Court of the United States, in Istituto per le Opere di Religione v. Emil Alperin et al., October 2005, courtesy of Jonathan Levy.
3 Benedict seemed as laid-back that fall when Italy’s newspapers were filled with the old IOR-Calvi scandal as five men finally went on trial in Rome charged with murdering the Ambrosiano chairman. Everyone but the Pope seemed to be talking about the prosecutor’s opening statement in which he said, “There were many different kinds of interests represented in the Ambrosiano. There was the Vatican, the Mafia, Freemasons and politicians. This trial is going to tell just a part of all of these stories.” A Vatican spokesman issued a standing “no comment” to press queries. And the new Pope did not miss a beat that December when headlines were filled with the news of yet another book contending that Pope John Paul I was murdered; this time the motive was supposedly because he knew about money laundering inside the Vatican Bank.
4 Ulrich Schwartz, “ ‘Coded Language’ and Yes Men: Cables of Confusion from the Heart of the Vatican,” Der Spiegel, December 13, 2010; See 02-20-09 WikiLeaks The Holy See: A Failure to Communicate Cable, 09VATICAN28_a; https://www.wikileaks.org/plusd/cables/09VATICAN28_a.html.
5 Ibid.
6 Carla Del Ponte and Chuck Sudetic, Madame Prosecutor: Confrontations with Humanity’s Worst Criminals and the Culture of Impunity (New York: Other Press, 2011), Kindle edition, location 365 of 7695.
7 Del Ponte and Chuck Sudetic, Madame Prosecutor, Kindle Edition, 3586 of 7695.
8 See copy of August 26, 2005 U.S. cable, subject “Del Ponte Makes ‘Ugly Impression’ at the Vatican,” at http://racconta.espresso.repubblica.it/espresso-wikileaks-database-italia/dettaglio_eng.php?id=55. Del Ponte even provided a list of the monasteries to assist the search; see Del Ponte and Sudetic, Madame Prosecutor, location 5040, 5057 of 7695.
9 Lajolo quoted in Del Ponte and Sudetic, Madame Prosecutor, location 5067 of 7695.
10 See generally Ulrich Schwarz, “ ‘Coded Language’ and Yes Men: Cables of Confusion from the Heart of the Vatican,” Der Spiegel, December 13, 2010. See also August 26, 2005, Del Ponte Makes “Ugly Impression” at the Vatican, https://www.wikileaks.org/plusd/cables/05VATICAN516_a.html.
11 Del Ponte and Sudetic, Madame Prosecutor, location 5077 of 7695.
12 See also David Rennie, “Vatican Accused of Shielding ‘War Criminal,’ ” The Daily Telegraph, September 20, 2005.
13 “Vatican Denies Knowledge of Indicted War Criminal’s Whereabouts,” Agence France-Presse, Vatican City, September 20, 2005; “Vatican Hits Back at UN Prosecutor over Wanted Croatian,” Deutsche Presse-Agentur, Vatican City/Zagreb/London, September 20, 2005.
14 The Israeli ambassador, for example, received a Vatican statement that was supposed to contain a positive message for Israel, but it was so veiled he missed it, even when he was told it was there: 02-20-09 WikiLeaks The Holy See: A Failure to Communicate cable.
15 Rachel Donadio and Jim Yardley, “Vatican Bureaucracy Tests Even the Infallible,” The New York Times, March 19, 2013, 1.
16 Tony Blankey, “Pope Benedict in the Lion’s Den; A Teacher to Unwilling Students Across the World,” The Washington Times, November 29, 2006, A19, citing Time from the previous week.
17 Thavis, The Vatican Diaries. Thavis, a recently retired Rome Bureau chief of the Catholic News Service, provides one of the most astute portraits of Benedict and his personal shortcomings upon assuming the Papacy. See Chapter 10, “The Real Benedict,” 278–306.
18 It is customary for Curia officials to resign when reaching seventy-five, but it is subject to the desires of the Pope. Only two days after he was elected, Benedict reappointed Sodano as Secretary of State.
19 According to Edward Pentin, a reporter with the National Catholic Register, “A source close to the Vatican said the announcement was made now to halt widespread speculation about new Vatican appointments in the Italian press.” Edward Pentin, “Benedict Names Cardinal Bertone Secretary of State,” National Catholic Register, July 3, 3006, referring to a statement of Pope Benedict dated June 22, 2006
20 Pentin, “Benedict Names Cardinal Bertone Secretary of State,” National Catholic Register, July 3, 3006, referring to a statement of Pope Benedict dated June 22, 2006.
21 Emiliano Fittipaldi, “Vaticano, le due cordate,” L’Espresso, May 28, 2012.
22 Rocco Palmo, a veteran Vatican-based journalist, called the process the ‘Widows of Sodano,” as the Secretary of State put “his dearest aides in high posts as a reward for their loyalty. “Rome Notes,” Whispers in the Loggia, July 12, 2006.
Sodano also refused to move out of his grand apartment so long as he retained the title as Secretary of State. It forced Bertone to squeeze into an uncomfortable flat, something most Curialists interpreted as a personal slight. Fittipaldi, “Vaticano, le due cordate.” L’Espresso. Sodano did not leave his office for a year until the renovation was complete on his new one as the Dean of the College of Cardinals. That meant Bertone was stuck in a smaller adjacent room. See Nuzzi, Ratzinger Was Afraid, 133.
23 Rocco Palmo, “Rome Notes,” Whispers in the Loggia, July 12, 1996, online at http://whispersintheloggia.blogspot.com/2006/07/rome-notes.html. Time and again, Benedict was passive when it came to filling top Curial posts. For instance, when it came to the Secretary of the Congregation for Religious Life and Societies of Apostolic Life, Benedict favored Cardinal Crescenzio Sepe. But there was stiff resistance to him from the influential mother superior of the Brigittine Sisters, Tekla Famiglietti. So Benedict sent Sepe to run the diocese in Naples and a Franciscan priest, Franciscan Father Gianfranco Gardin, was the compromise. In 2007, Sepe was embroiled in a broad scandal in which—among other charges—he was accused of giving free Propaganda Fide apartments to Italian politicians in exchange for them directing millions of dollars in public money to his office for never performed restoration work.
In June 2010, Italian magistrates opened a formal investigation. Sepe has denied any wrongdoing and no charges have been filed. John Allen Jr., “Facing Financial Scandals, Pope Creates New Vatican Watchdog,” National Catholic Reporter, December 30, 2010; see also Philip Pullela, “Vatican Enacts Laws on Financial Transparency; New Laws Adopted in the Wake of Money Laundering Allegations,” Reuters, January 1, 2011.
24 Rocco Palmo, “Rome Notes,” Whispers in the Loggia, July 12, 1996.
25 Lai, Finanze vaticane, 93–94; see also Rocco Palmo, Whispers in the Loggia, July 12, 1996, online at http://whispersintheloggia.blogspot.com/2006/07/rome-notes.html.
26 Benny Lai interview with Angelo Caloia, June 1, 2007, in Lai, Finanze vaticane, 152.
27 02-20-09 WikiLeaks The Holy See: A Failure to Communicate cable.
28 Ibid.
29 Richard Owen, “Benedict Eager to Modernise Arcane World of Vatican Ba
nk: Averse to Inefficiency, the Pope Is Forming His Own Team to Control Church Finances,” The Times (London), September 18, 2006.
30 Richard Owen, “Pope to Put His House in Order,” The Australian, September 20, 2006, 10.
31 Owen, “Benedict Eager to Modernise Arcane World of Vatican Bank.”
32 Ibid.; see also Owen, “Pope to Put His House in Order,” 10.
33 Lai, Finanze vaticane, 95.
34 Rosemary Church and Alessio Vinci, guest Father Thomas Reese, “Pope Benedict XVI,” Transcript, CNN International, April 3, 2006.
35 Michael Valpy, “A Look at the Pope Nobody Knows,” The Globe and Mail (Canada), April 15, 2006.
36 “The AFP Europe news agenda for Sept 10,” Agence France Presse, Paris, September 10, 2006.
37 Victor Simpson quoted in Thavis, The Vatican Diaries, 280.
38 Thavis, The Vatican Diaries, 281.
39 Ibid., 280.
40 Ibid., 281.
41 Benedict quoted in “Pope Benedict vs. The Jihadists,” New York Daily News, September 14, 2006, 34.
42 Catholic News Service bureau chief John Thavis recalled that by asking Lombardi about the language beforehand the journalists were “offering the Vatican a preemptive defense.” In fact, no one around Benedict warned him that repeating such words without also clearly repudiating them might cast him in the popular press as a modern-day crusader against Islam. Thavis, The Vatican Diaries, 285–86.
43 Jon Meacham, with Edward Pentin in Rome, “The Pope’s ‘Holy War’; By Quoting a 14th-Century Christian Emperor on an ‘Evil and Inhuman’ Islam, Benedict XVI Ignites a Global Storm. What Was He Thinking?,” Newsweek, September 25, 2006, 36.
44 See, for example, James Mills, “Pope’s Criticism of the Prophet Inflames Muslims Worldwide,” The Evening Standard, September 15, 2006, 7, “Muslims in Pope Rage,” Evening Gazette, September 15, 2006, 6; Michael Valpy, “Pope’s Quote Kindles Islamic Rage; Fury Compared to That over Danish Cartoons,” The Globe and Mail (Canada), September 16, A1; Geraint Jones, Gordon Thomas, and Julia Hartley-Brewer, “Pope ‘Sorry’ as Churches Are Bombed by Muslims,” Sunday Express, September 17, 2006, 7.
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