UNITED KINGDOM
The Telegraph
By Damian Thompson
Pope Francis is discovering just what a nasty place the Vatican can be. Having acknowledged that there was a “gay lobby” in the Curia, the Pope has been told that the man he’s appointed to be prelate of the Vatican Bank, Monsignor Battista Ricca, has an allegedly scandalous gay past.
Moreover, Ricca is not only Francis’s personal representative at the bank: he’s also Director of the Domus Santa Marta, where Francis has chosen to live. Indeed, the Pope often eats with the 57-year-old Ricca, whose supposed sexual indiscretions are the subject of an explosive article by Sandro Magister, Vatican expert of L’Espresso magazine.
The best guide through this troubling affair is Dr Robert Moynihan, one of the most respected of all commentators on Vatican affairs and the author of a new book about Pope Francis. I receive his email newsletter, the Moynihan Report, in which he sets out the sequence of events:
Ricca, a 57-year-old Italian prelate is a career Vatican diplomat who … in the past year, has directed the Domus Santa Marta, where the Pope is now living. In his post at the Secretariat of State, Ricca was in charge of accounting for all financial expenditures in all the nunciatures of the world. So he has a certain competence in economic matters.
His staff confirm that he is a considerate, thoughtful man. I myself, during recent stays in the Domus, have spoken with him several times, and he has spoken eloquently of the need for Christians to live out the Christian faith, especially through acts of charity toward the poor and needy.
During these years, Ricca got to know Cardinal Jorge Bergoglio [who] came not only to know Ricca, but to trust him.
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