'Tide Turned against Catholic Church in Vatican'

Press TV
May 28, 2012

http://www.presstv.com/detail/2012/05/28/243444/leaked-vatican-docs-show-tug-of-power/

[with video]

Pope Benedict's butler Paolo Gabriele has been charged with illegal possession of secret documents that revealed cronyism and corruption in Vatican contracts.

The documents revealed allegations of corruption, mismanagement and cronyism in the awarding of contracts for work in the Vatican and internal disagreement on the management of the Vatican bank.

Press TV has interviewed Gerard O'Connell, a Vatican Affairs analyst in Rome about the ramifications of the leaked information of the internal conduct of the Catholic Church and the investigations that have been opened regarding the matter. What follows is an approximate transcript of the interview.

Press TV : Documents that allege corruption in the Vatican contracts with Italian firms… they've now hit the very heart of the Roman Catholic Church with the arrest of the Pope's personal butler.

How sensitive do you think this has become when we speak of it becoming nearer or closer to the Vatican doors?

O'Connell: Well, it's certainly dramatic. It's certainly serious. What you are seeing here is the revelation of private correspondence at the heart of government.

In any government if the internal communication systems broke down and the information was leaked to the public, this would be classified as very serious. The same is true in Rome. In the Vatican they're considering it very serious; they actually have three investigations going on.

One, a criminal one - in other words - Who took the documents, who gave them to the public, who released them?

The second one is an administrative one to see what's going wrong with the internal systems.

And the third one is an overview to see how high up this lack of trust; this breakdown is.

Press TV : One Italian paper put it in a way that this is about the Pope himself being betrayed, so to speak, by his butler.

Do you think that this is much more than that, that it is basically about a Vatican power struggle some are saying, or actually part of a bigger plot concerning internal bickering in the Vatican itself?

O'Connell: It's a mixture of all those. I should first of all say that the Vatican judge has actually accused the Pope's butler of possession of having serious theft. They have not said that he is the mole or the whistle blower, whatever you want to call him.

There is certainly… the documents certainly reveal internal power struggles. Now, in every administration in every government, you have different groups; different ways of approaching problems. What you don't have is some of this internal discussion being made public. You don't have internal charges of one person accusing another being put into the public domain... not usually.

Press TV : The Italian president of the Vatican bank has been ousted and a lot of speculations are being made about what was behind his ouster, of what happened… not enough transparency… Do you think there isn't enough transparency when it comes, for instance, to the Vatican's financial operations - the latest case that's been issued?

O'Connell: Well, let me say first of all that it's not true that the Vatican paper hasn't actually reported. The Vatican paper did report that it had set up the investigations and there was this problem.

Secondly, in terms of the head of the Vatican bank - of what's called the Vatican bank. It's technically the Institute for Religious Works; it's not like an ordinary bank. Yesterday the full detailed reasons for the vote of no confidence; the removal of the Director of the Vatican bank was made public - it was given to an Italian paper. And that came from the Vatican, that information.

And one of the members of the board gave an interview to two of the main papers today explaining the reasons why this man was forced out. It was that he was actually blamed for not governing properly. And he was also implicitly accused of being one of the people that were leaking some of the information to the press.

Press TV: What about the documents that are being called the 'Vati-Leaks' those documents that are referring to financial corruption in the institutions that are run by the Vatican.

Do you think these documents that have been leaked will show the corruption? One question that is legitimate to be raised is why hasn't there been transparency up until now about these transactions?

O'Connell: There are a variety of documents: there are some documents that deal with the church in a given country in Syria, in China, in Berlin - so, that's one set of documents.

Another set of documents is the Pope's advice to some of the cardinals or to some of the head to his departments. A third set of documents deal with the financial aspects.

So there are quite different sets of documents. The question is… In any government would you have the internal documents put out in the public arena? I don't think this would happen in Tehran; it wouldn't happen in the US, it wouldn't happen in England.

Some documents are made public, but some of the documents regarded contrasting advice on given questions. Some of the documents related to, in fact, accusations made by one arch bishop against specific people inside in the system who are the assignment of contracts; who are the way of dealing with personnel.

That of course is very embarrassing and as your speaker at the beginning said, you know, you expect standards of integrity and high ethical behavior within an institution such as the Catholic Church and these documents are showing that this is not always the case.

But then of course the Vatican defense would be that the church is a church of sinners as well as of saints and so you have human failings in every organization.

Press TV : Many victims were concerned - victims of sex abuse were concerned that his holiness had done nothing and will do nothing, in their words, to punish the bishops for their high level involvement - for instance, in the cover ups of these crimes.

One spokes person was saying the church's words and actions do not go together: Bishops are still not accountable; they still do not have to report abuse to the police; they do not have to be subject to independent oversight for instance. And many say that the cover up of sex abuse in the Catholic Church that has been going on for many years is even worse than the abuses.

How do you see the Vatican's handling of this case?

O'Connell: There are two points here I'd like to make. First of all, the abuse of children is not just confined to the Catholic Church. It's a fact right across human society.

But secondly, it is true as your last speaker said; there was a lot of cover up. I think this Pope has come to put down a rather hard line to insist on bishops in different countries complying with the law of the country and first of all the paramount priority is the protection of children because these are the innocent victims and the church has failed over a period of years in this question.

But I think now, the tide has turned. And certainly the instruction being given to the priests and to the bishops and to the Catholic Church throughout the world is that there's no more room for a cover up - there's no room for this. As John Paul II said there is no room in the Catholic priesthood for a priest who abuses children.

And this means - and it has meant in recent times - that many priests have been removed from the ministry and a small number of bishops; perhaps there should have been more.

But the line is very clear. And it's come from this Pope who between 2001 and 2005 read through thousands and thousands of dossiers and so arrived as Pope with a broad knowledge of the problem and he has made it very clear to his chief prosecutor to the Vatican offices that the instructions they have to give to the Catholic Church throughout the world is that this has to be eliminated. It's not and either, or.