The Hunt for Thieves in the Vatican

VATICAN CITY
Chiesa

Stolen papers. Venom. Arrests. In the Roman curia, it’s war. The ouster of the president of the bank. The maneuvers of Cardinal Bertone. The pope’s false friends

by Sandro Magister

ROME, May 31, 2012 – There’s method in this madness. Since the butler of His Holiness ended up in jail, the scene has suddenly changed. At center stage is no longer the dispute over the contents of the stolen papers. It’s the thieves. Intent on scheming in the shadow of a venerable white robe.

“With justice eliminated, what are kingdoms if not a great band of thieves?” The phrase is from Saint Augustine, but it was Benedict XVI who cited it in his first encyclical, “Deus Caritas Est” of 2005. He didn’t know that seven years later it would become the public image of the Vatican. A citadel devastated by thievery, with no corner left inviolate, not even that “sancta sanctorum” which the private desk of the pope should be.

The real or presumed thieves of Vatican papers have declared in chorus to the newspapers, under anonymity, that they acted precisely out of love for the pope, to help him clean house. And it is true that none of the wrondoing laid bare in the documents involves his person. But it is even more true that everything falls upon him, inexorably.

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