VATICAN CITY
Irish Independent
NICK SQUIRES – 12 NOVEMBER 2013
Pope Francis has delivered a fiery sermon against corruption, quoting a passage from the Bible in which Jesus said some sinners deserved to be tied to a rock and thrown into the sea.
In one of his strongest homilies since he was elected in March, the Pontiff said Christians who led “a double life” by giving money to the church while stealing from the state were sinners who deserved to be punished.
Quoting from the Gospel of St Luke in the New Testament, he said: “Jesus says it would be better for him if a millstone were put around his neck and he be thrown into the sea.”
While he did not allude directly to corruption within the Roman Catholic Church, his remarks yesterday came just days after a scandal erupted inside an ancient religious order linked to the Vatican, and as he forged ahead with a determined effort to root out cronyism within the Holy See and financial irregularities in the scandal-tainted Vatican bank.
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