VATICAN CITY
Crux
John L. Allen Jr.
Associate editor
@JohnLAllenJ
March 10, 2015
Every now and then a story comes along that perfectly captures a couple of aspects of the Vatican’s internal culture, points that often aren’t well understood, but that are essential to grasping what makes the place tick.
This week’s revelation that a former employee apparently is trying to ransom back a couple of stolen letters by Michelangelo is a classic example.
In a nutshell, a Roman newspaper reported over the weekend that a letter personally penned by Michelangelo had gone missing almost two decades ago, although that loss was never disclosed. Recently, someone approached a senior Vatican official to offer to return the stolen property for a payment of 100,000 Euro, or a little more than $100,000.
On Sunday, a Vatican official confirmed the story, adding that two letters were actually stolen, not just one, while insisting the Vatican has no intention of paying any ransom because taking the documents was a crime.
In brief, here are two elements of Vatican culture the story illustrates:
* Never air your dirty laundry in public.
* On the inside, the system traditionally has put much more emphasis on trust than vigilance.
Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.