Render Unto Rome
Page 45
19. James Freeman, “Pennies Backed by Heaven,” Wall Street Journal, May 16, 2008.
20. Ralph Cipriano, “Lavish Spending in Archdiocese Skips Inner City,” National Catholic Reporter, June 19, 1998.
21. “A Continuous, Concerted Campaign of Cover-up,” excerpts from the Grand Jury’s Report, Philadelphia Inquirer, September 22, 2005.
22. Robert West and Charles Zech, “Internal Financial Controls in the U.S. Church” (Villanova, PA: Villanova University, Center for the Study of Church Management, January 2007).
23. Susan Spencer-Wendel, “Bookkeepers Believed Priest Was Skimming from Church,” Palm Beach Post, February 18, 2009; and “Jury Finds Priest Stole Collections,” Palm Beach Post, February 23, 2009.
24. Anemona Hartocollis, “Monsignor Gets 4-Year Sentence for Large Thefts from His East Side Parish,” New York Times, September 23, 2006; Associated Press, “N.Y. Church Sues Insurer Over $1.2 Million Thefts Blamed on Priest,” Insurance Journal, January 26, 2005; Veronika Belenkaya, “Priest Who Swindled East Side Parish Released from Prison,” New York Daily News, September 22, 2007.
25. Michael Ryan draws on parish population data from the Center for Applied Research in the Apostolate (CARA), a Georgetown University–affiliated research center, and financial figures drawn from media reports he has culled in more than twenty years of research on Catholic church embezzlements. Ryan estimates that nearly $90 million was embezzled from Sunday collections in the calendar year 2010.
“News articles concerning specific embezzlements occasionally include a reference to the stolen funds being replaced by the diocese acting as its own insurer,” writes Ryan. “I am amazed that any commercial insurers are or would be willing to indemnify the church or a particular diocese without requiring them to implement readily available procedures that would prevent virtually all Sunday collection embezzlements. Insurers often pay out large sums of money when an embezzlement is discovered, and many diocesan officials are quick to announce that the loss suffered by the victim parish is being recovered through insurance. Whether such losses are paid for by a commercial insurer or a fund created and maintained by the diocese, it is still a loss that need not have been sustained.”
Ryan continues: “The $90 million estimated to have been lost from collection plates in 2010 was arrived at by estimating that the average Sunday collection embezzlement totaled $25,000, or about $500 per week, and that such embezzlements are ongoing in 20 percent of parishes at any given time. For 2010, 20 percent of CARA’s reported 17,958 American parishes comes to 3,592 parishes. Multiplying that number by the estimated average loss per affected parish results in a total estimated loss of $89.8 million in 2010 alone.
“The key years (’65, ’74, ’75, ’84, etc.) were computed using the 2010 estimate of $89.8 million as the base year and applying the Consumer Price Index (CPI) calculator to determine the equivalent ‘real dollar’ value for each of the key years. The average yearly loss for each of the five multiyear periods was then determined by adding the beginning and ending years’ estimated losses and dividing the total by two.”
ESTIMATE OF LOSSES DUE TO SUNDAY COLLECTION EMBEZZLEMENTS IN THE U.S. CATHOLIC CHURCH
ESTIMATED CUMULATIVE LOSSES 1965–2010: $2,317,036,000
* Annual loss figures are based upon an estimation that collections in 20% of existing parishes lost an average of $25,000 in CY 2010. Losses for other years shown in left column were computed by applying the Consumer Price Index to the CY 2010 estimation.
† Center for Applied Research in the Apostolate, http://cara.georgetown.edu/CARAServices/requestedchurchstats.
html.
‡ Estimated from trend reflected by CARA figures.
26. Alan Gomez, “Bishops Look at Fleecings of Flocks,” USA Today, February 18, 2007.
27. Julie Shaw, “Priest Admits Stealing from School: Sex Abuse, Drug Use Alleged,” Philadelphia Daily News, March 10, 2009; Joseph A. Slobodzian, “Judge Calls Priest Liar; Sends Him to Prison for $900,000 Theft,” Philadelphia Inquirer, May 22, 2009.
28. Andrew Greeley and William McManus, Catholic Contributions: Sociology and Policy (Chicago, 1985), pp. 2–3.
29. The study by Joseph Claude Harris, The Cost of Catholic Parishes and Schools (Kansas City, MO, 1996), is cited in Charles E. Zech, Why Catholics Don’t Give … and What Can Be Done About It (Huntington, IN, 2000), p. 13.
30. Zech, Why Catholics Don’t Give, p. 71.
31. Jack Ruhl, personal communication with the author.
32. See “Mercer Actuarial Study,” National Religious Retirement Office, www.nccbuscc.org/nrro.
33. Fred Kammer, SJ, “The Jaynotes Interview,” Jaynotes: The Magazine of Jesuit High School in New Orleans, Graduation 2008 34, no. 2 (2008): 28.
34. Fred Kammer, SJ, Faith. Works. Wonders. An Insider’s Guide to Catholic Charities (Eugene, OR, 2009), pp. 63–64.
35. Cindy Wooden, “2006 Vatican Budget Closes with Surplus; Peter’s Pence up $42 Million,” Catholic News Service, July 6, 2007.
36. Robert Mickens, “Church with a Midas Touch,” The Tablet, September 27, 2008.
37. The Nature and Scope of the Problems of Sexual Abuse of Minors by Catholic Priests and Deacons in the United States. The report underreported the number of victims; John Jay researchers did not interview attorneys with long experience in litigation for victims, nor groups like Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests to cross-reference what the bishops reported. For a solid analysis of the report, see Mary Gail Frawley O’Dea, Perversion of Power: Sexual Abuse in the Catholic Church (Nashville, 2007).
CHAPTER 1: BOSTON IN THE FAULT LINES
1. Walter V. Robinson and Michael Rezendes, “Geoghan Victims Agree to $10m Settlement,” Boston Globe, September 19, 2002; Kevin Cullen and Stephen Kurkjian, “Church in an $85 Million Accord,” Boston Globe, September 10, 2003. The settlement negotiated by attorneys was $85 million, covering 542 victims. The archdiocese later came to terms with a small number of victims who filed their own claims without counsel, boosting the final settlement to an estimated $90 million for 552 victims.
2. For a concise account, see Boston Globe Investigative Staff, Betrayal: The Crisis of the Catholic Church (New York, 2002). The authors—Matt Carroll, Kevin Cullen, Thomas Farragher, Stephen Kurkjian, Michael Paulson, Sacha Pfeiffer, Michael Rezendes, Spotlight Team Editor Walter V. Robinson—and Deputy Managing Editor for Projects Ben Bradlee Jr. shared a 2003 Pulitzer Prize and other awards.
3. Michael Paulson, “Diocese to Mortgage Seminary, Cathedral,” Boston Globe, December 9, 2003.
4. Phyllis Berman and Lea Goldman, “Catholics in Crisis,” Forbes, September 19, 2005.
5. Michael Paulson, “Diocesan Headquarters Sold to BC,” Boston Globe, April 21, 2004.
6. Marie Roth, genealogical tree and personal communication with the author, May 16, 2009.
7. Paul L. Williams, The Vatican Exposed: Money, Murder, and the Mafia (Amherst, NY, 2003), p. 81.
8. John Pollard, Catholicism in Modern Italy: Religion, Society and Politics Since 1861 (New York, 2008), p. 122.
9. Thomas Powers, The Man Who Kept the Secrets: Richard Helms and the CIA (New York, 1979), p. 31.
10. Tim Weiner, Legacy of Ashes (New York, 2007), p. 27.
11. Ibid.
12. John Cornwell, Hitler’s Pope: The Secret History of Pius XII (New York, 1999), p. 329.
13. John Cooney, The American Pope: The Life and Times of Francis Cardinal Spellman (New York, 1984), pp. 159–60.
14. Nino Lo Bello, The Vatican Empire (New York, 1968), p. 143.
15. Weiner, Legacy of Ashes, p. 27.
16. Christopher Duggan, The Force of Destiny: A History of Italy Since 1796 (London, 2007), p. 478.
17. Thomas H. O’Connor, The Hub: Boston Past and Present (Boston, 2001), p. 8.
18. Thomas H. O’Connor, Boston Catholics: A History of the Church and Its People (Boston, 1998), pp. 4–5.
19. O’Connor, The Hub, pp. 33–35.
21. On the French missionaries and the first Catholic Church, see O’Connor, Boston Catholics, pp. 19–22, 24; on the riots, see O’Connor, The Hub, p. 150.
22. On Protestant Charlestown, see Lukas, Common Ground, p. 76; on Beecher’s sermon, see James Hennessey, SJ, American Catholics: A History of the Roman Catholic Community in the United States (New York, 1981), p. 122; on drunks feeding bonfires, see Charles R. Morris, American Catholic: The Saints and Sinners Who Built America’s Most Powerful Church (New York, 1997), pp. 56–57.
23. For Great Famine emigration data, see R. F. Foster, Modern Ireland: 1600–1972 (London, 1989), p. 345. The Bunker Hill Aurora quote is in Lukas, Common Ground, p. 77.
24. Thomas H. O’Connor, The Boston Irish: A Political History (Boston, 1995), p. 150.
25. St. Catherine of Siena Parish, Ninetieth Anniversary Celebration, 1887–1977 (Boston, 1977), no page numbers.
26. John Henry Cutler, Cardinal Cushing of Boston (New York, 1970), p. 214.
27. Lukas, Common Ground, p. 25.
28. Cutler, Cardinal Cushing, p. 82.
29. See Jason Berry and Gerald Renner, Vows of Silence: The Abuse of Power in the Papacy of John Paul II (New York, 2004), p. 65.
30. Dante Alighieri, The Divine Comedy: The Purgatorio, trans. John Ciardi (New York, 2003), p. 431, canto XVII.
CHAPTER 2: ORIGINS OF THE VATICAN FINANCIAL SYSTEM
1. “Papal Donations Bring Hope to Needy Worldwide,” Catholic News Agency, July 22, 2010.
2. According to USCCB.org, the website of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, “the Peter’s Pence Collection supports the Pope’s philanthropy by giving the Holy Father the means to provide emergency assistance to those in need because of natural disaster, war, oppression, and disease.”
3. Information at www.thepapalfoundation.com.
4. Alessandro Speciale also reports for a religious news service in Rome, among other outlets, and worked as a research associate for this book.
5. On the Vatican II debt burden, see Communiqué on the Fifth Meeting of the Council of Cardinals for Studying the Organizational and Economic Questions of the Holy See, Press Office, March 9, 1985; translation of Italian from L’Osservatore Romano to English, dated March 10, 1985. On the deficit figure, see Holy See General Final Balance Sheet and Profit and Loss Account, 1985, p. 7. Copies of both were provided by a background source.
6. Philip Willan, The Last Supper: The Mafia, the Masons, and the Killing of Roberto Calvi (London, 2007).
7. “Outline of Remarks by Cardinal Krol on Vatican Deficit,” November 18, 1987, unpublished.
8. Praefectura Rerum Oeconomicarum Sanctae Sedis, Statement of Income and Expenditure of the Holy See, Year 1987. The financial figures cited are taken from a three-page letter addressed “Dear Brother Bishops,” dated October 14, 1988, and signed by seven cardinals, including Krol of Philadelphia; John O’Connor of New York; Edward Clancy of Sydney; Albert Decourtray of Lyon; Joseph Cordeiro of Karachi; Eugenio de Araújo Sales of Rio de Janeiro; and Paul Zoungrana of Ouagadougou. Copies were provided by a background source.
9. Thomas J. Reese, SJ, A Flock of Shepherds: The National Conference of Catholic Bishops (Kansas City, MO, 1992), p. 282.
10. Jerry Filteau, “Vatican’s Financial Head Says Catholics Not Giving What They Can,” Catholic News Service, November 12, 1991.
11. Sandro Magister, “For Peter’s Cash, a Calm Amid the Storm,” trans. Matthew Sherry, January 30, 2009, www.chiesa.espressonline.it.
12. On Peter’s Pence figures, see Peter R. D’Agostino, Rome in America (Chapel Hill, NC, 2004), p. 31. On Rome real estate, see John F. Pollard, Money and the Rise of the Modern Papacy (Cambridge, UK, 2005), p. 62.
13. Nicholas P. Cafardi, “The Availability of Parish Assets for Diocesan Debts: A Canonical Analysis,” Seton Hall Legislative Journal 29, no. 2 (2004–2005), p. 362.
14. David I. Kertzer, The Kidnapping of Edgardo Mortara (New York, 1998), p. 15.
15. Eamon Duffy, Saints and Sinners: A History of the Popes (New Haven, CT, 2006), p. 286.
16. David Kertzer, telephone interview with the author, May 8, 2009. See also David I. Kertzer, The Popes Against the Jews: The Vatican’s Role in the Rise of Modern Anti-Semitism (New York, 2001), chap. 3.
17. Pollard, Money and the Rise of the Modern Papacy, p. 24.
18. Charles Dickens, Pictures from Italy (New York, 1974), p. 165.
19. Tommaso Astarita, Between Salt Water and Holy Water: A History of Southern Italy (New York, 2005), p. 75.
20. Massimo Franco, Parallel Empires: The Vatican and the United States—Two Centuries of Alliance and Conflict (New York, 2008), p. 32.
21. Kertzer, The Popes Against the Jews, p. 79.
22. James Carroll, Constantine’s Sword: The Church and the Jews (New York, 2001), p. 379.
23. Kertzer, The Popes Against the Jews, p. 115.
24. Pollard, Money and the Rise of the Modern Papacy, pp. 32–33.
25. “Peter’s Pence,” www.britannica.com.
26. D’Agostino, Rome in America, p. 31.
27. James M. O’Toole, The Faithful: A History of Catholics in America (Cambridge, MA, 2008), p. 132.
28. David I. Kertzer, Prisoner of the Vatican: The Popes’ Secret Plot to Capture Rome from the New Italian State (Boston, 2004), p. 5.
29. Kertzer, The Kidnapping of Edgardo Mortara, p. 79, quoting Jan Derek Holmes’s The Triumph of the Holy See (Shepherdstown, WV, 1978).
30. Anthony Rhodes, The Power of Rome in the Twentieth Century: The Vatican and the Age of Liberal Democracies, 1870–1922 (London, 1983), pp. 36–37.
31. Duffy, Saints and Sinners, p. 289.
32. Ibid., pp. 293–94.
33. “Peter’s Pence,” New York Times, December 4, 1860.
34. John F. Pollard, Catholicism in Modern Italy: Religion, Society and Politics Since 1861 (New York, 2008), p. 22; Kertzer, Prisoner of the Vatican, p. 24.
35. Garry Wills, Papal Sin (New York, 2000), p. 74.
36. Duffy, Saints and Sinners, p. 228.
37. Pollard, Money and the Rise of the Modern Papacy, pp. 32–33.
38. J. N. D. Kelly, The Oxford Dictionary of Popes (Oxford, 1986), pp. 314–16. On 3.5 million lire, see Duffy, Saints and Sinners, p. 233.
39. Pollard, Money and the Rise of the Modern Papacy, p. 39.
40. Kertzer, Prisoner of the Vatican, p. 19.
41. Ibid., p. 26.
42. Ibid., p. 31.
43. Gertrude Himmelfarb, Lord Acton: A Study in Conscience and Politics (London, 1952), p. 102, explains that “the Roman States” had sixty-two bishops representing 700,000 people, while a single bishop represented 1.7 million Polish Catholics. “In ecclesiastical statistics, it appeared that twenty learned Germans counted for less than one untutored Italian.”
44. Wills, Papal Sin, pp. 249–56.
45. Ibid., p. 215.
46. Corrado Pallenberg, Vatican Finances (London, 1971), p. 59.
47. Hans Küng, Infallible? An Unresolved Enquiry (New York, 1994), pp. 145–46.
48. Pallenberg, Vatican Finances, p. 32.
49. Ibid., p. 33.
50. Kertzer, Prisoner of the Vatican, p. 132.
51. Pollard, Money and the Rise of the Modern Papacy, p. 51.
52. D’Agostino, Rome in America, pp. 61, 78.
53. Pollard, Money and the Rise of the Modern Papacy, p. 51.
54. Rhodes, The Power of Rome, p. 76.
55. Kertzer, The Popes Against the Jews, p. 192.
56. Pollard, Money and the Rise of the Modern Papacy, p. 360.
57. James M. O’Toole, Militant and Triumphant: William Henry O’Connell and the Catholic Church in Boston, 1859–1944 (Notre Dame, IN, 1992), p. 16.
58. Ibid., p. 11.
59. Ibid., pp. 34, 39.
60. Ibid., pp. 56–57.
61. Charles R. Morris, American Catholic: The Saints and Sinners Who Built A
merica’s Most Powerful Church (New York, 1997), p. 114.
62. Ibid., pp. 103, 93.
63. John Cooney, The American Pope: The Life and Times of Francis Cardinal Spellman (New York, 1984), p. 24.
64. O’Toole, Militant and Triumphant, p. 182.
65. Ibid., p. 186.
66. Ibid., p. 193.
67. Kelly, The Oxford Dictionary of Popes, pp. 314–16; Duffy, Saints and Sinners, p. 333.
68. John F. Pollard, The Unknown Pope: Benedict XV (1914–1922) and the Pursuit of Peace (London, 1999), p. 122.
69. Christopher Duggan, The Force of Destiny: A History of Italy Since 1796 (London, 2007), p. 399.
70. Ibid., p. 400.
71. Pollard, The Unknown Pope, p. 146.
72. John Henry Cutler, Cardinal Cushing of Boston (New York, 1970), p. 63.
73. Edward R. Kantowicz, Corporation Sole: Cardinal Mundelein and Chicago Catholicism (Notre Dame, IN, 1983), p. 42.
74. Ibid., p. 39.
75. Morris, American Catholic, pp. 163, 187.
76. Ibid., p. 168.
77. Ibid., p. 171.
78. Ibid., pp. 186–87.
79. Kertzer, The Popes Against the Jews, p. 241.
80. George Seldes, The Vatican: Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow (New York, 1934), p. 326.
81. Ibid., p. 330.
82. Ibid., p. 426.
83. Donald Sassoon, Mussolini and the Rise of Fascism (New York, 2007), p. 85.
84. Ibid., p. 427.
85. Duffy, Saints and Sinners, p. 337. Italics added.
86. Cooney, The American Pope, p. 39.
87. Duffy, Saints and Sinners, p. 339.
88. Emilio Gentile, The Sacralization of Politics in Fascist Italy (Cambridge, MA, 1996), p. 59.
89. Duffy, Saints and Sinners, p. 339.
90. Peter Godman, Hitler and the Vatican: Inside the Secret Archives That Reveal the New Story of the Nazis and the Church (New York, 2004), p. 27.
91. Ronald J. Rychlak, Hitler, the War, and the Pope (Huntington, IN, 2010), p. 73.