VATICAN CITY
Washington Post
By Anthony Faiola
Published: February 15
VATICAN CITY — Inside a 13th-century monastery in a sleepy village north of Rome, the Rev. Salvatore Palumbo was allegedly serving more than one higher authority. Italian prosecutors say a Ferrari-driving lawyer who defrauded insurance companies used the priest as a frontman, with Palumbo stashing the illicit cash inside the secretive Institute for Works of Religion.
A.k.a. the Vatican Bank.
The arrests over the past six months of Palumbo and the 34-year-old lawyer, Simone Fazzari, highlight one major source of the scandals and power struggles that observers say contributed to Pope Benedict XVI’s historic resignation this week — the murky world of Vatican finances.
With ATMs offering transactions in Latin and a castle-like headquarters protected by spear-toting Swiss Guards, the financial arm of the Vatican has never been a run-of-the-mill bank. But a sense of crisis has been building around it and other Vatican financial dealings. …
Evidence suggests the outgoing pope sought to shed light on the dark Vatican books, but that effort yielded even more controversy. The former president of the Vatican Bank, Ettore Gotti Tedeschi, was forced to resign in May, alleging he was fired for getting “too close to the truth.” Last year, other documents leaked by the pope’s butler and other sources revealed the depth of the internal tug of war over financial transparency, with Vatican reformers pitted against traditionalists who appeared to believe the church should answer only to a higher power.
On Friday, the pope backed a decision by a commission of cardinals to name Ernst von Freyberg to head the Vatican Bank. The German-born lawyer and member of the ancient Knights of Malta was selected, the Vatican said, because of “his vast experience.” However, Italian commentators were quick to question why the choice was not left to the incoming pope.
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