Vatican City, Dec 17, 2019 / 10:02 am (CNA).- For more than a year, CNA has been following a Vatican financial scandal involving a bankrupt Italian hospital, a potentially illicit loan from the Vatican’s central bank, and a controversial grant request to an American charitable foundation.
The financial scandal is one of several unfolding at the Vatican, and covered by CNA. Having trouble keeping them straight? You’re not alone. This is the first in a series of CNA explainers, designed to help you keep track of the money trails in and out of the Vatican.
Here’s the IDI scandal in a nutshell:
In 2012, an Italian hospital, owned by a religious order, went bankrupt, because its administrators had run up large debts while embezzling millions of dollars. The Vatican Secretariat of State then created a for-proft partnership with the religious order that had owned the hospital. The partnership agreed to purchase the hospital. To do so, it received – through a complex series of transactions – 50 million euro, through a loan from the Vatican central bank, APSA, despite the fact that APSA had agreed with European banking regulators not to make commercial loans.
In an attempt to take the loan off APSA’s books, officials in the Secretariat of State then asked the Papal Foundation, a U.S.-based charitable foundation, for a $25 million grant, which they reportedly requested under misleading or ambiguous pretenses. The grant was approved, but subsequent questions from board members ultimately led to controversy and opposition. The Vatican’s secretary of state, Cardinal Pietro Parolin, has said he organized the loan and the grant.
Here are the major figures and developments in the ongoing story of the IDI hospital:
IDI hospital – The Istituto Dermopatico dell’Immacolata (IDI), an Italian dermatological hospital. After a series of embezzlement scandals drove the hospital into bankruptcy, it was purchased by a for-profit partnership created between the Vatican’s Secretariat of State and the religious order that had owned and managed the hospital.
IOR – The Vatican’s commercial bank, also known as the Institute for Religious Works, or the Vatican Bank. In 2015, the IOR rejected a request for a 50 million euro loan to a for-profit partnership created between the Vatican Secretariat of State and a religious order with the intention of purchasing the bankrupt IDI hospital. IOR board members determined that the hospital would never be able to repay the loan.
APSA – The Vatican’s central bank, similar to a federal reserve. Under 2012 European regulatory agreements, APSA cannot make commercial loans. However, after the IOR in 2015 rejected a 50 million euro loan request to purchase the bankrupt IDI hospital, APSA approved the loan, raising questions of whether it violated European regulations in doing so. Officials with the Vatican Secretary of State then asked the U.S.-based Papal Foundation for a grant to help remove the loan from APSA’s books. That grant fell through, and APSA has now reportedly written off most of the loan.
Papal Foundation – A U.S.-based group that gives grants to causes endorsed by the pope, often in developing nations and typically of $300,000 or less. The Papal Foundation was asked in June 2017 for a $25 million grant to help with a temporary cash shortage at the IDI hospital. The funding was initially approved, with cardinal board members who supported the grant outnumbering lay board members who opposed it. However, some lay board members continued to object to the grant, questioning whether it was actually intended to cover the bad APSA loan. Amid increased scrutiny, the grant collapsed. $13 million of the grant has already been paid, which the Vatican Secretary of State now says is being treated as a loan that will be repaid through discounts against future grant requests.
Cardinal Angelo Becciu – Formerly the number two official at the Vatican Secretariat of State. Multiple Vatican sources have told CNA that Becciu, along with Cardinal Giuseppe Versaldi, was key in organizing the effort to acquire the IDI hospital and to pressure the Papal Foundation into approving a $25 million grant to help offset the potentially illicit APSA loan, removing it from the books. Becciu denies any involvement, saying he had lost interest in the project by the time of the Papal Foundation grant.
Cardinal Pietro Parolin – Vatican Secretary of State. Parolin told CNA that he was responsible for arranging the 2014 loan of 50 million euros from APSA, the Vatican’s central bank, to partially fund the purchase of the bankrupt IDI hospital. He said the arrangement was “carried out with fair intentions and honest means,” although the loan appears to violate 2012 regulations prohibiting APSA from making commercial loans. He also said that he had devised a plan, along with Cardinal Donald Wuerl, to ask the U.S.-based Papal Foundation for the money to cover APSA’s bad loan.
Theodore McCarrick – Former cardinal who has now been laicized for sexually abusing minors. McCarrick met with the secretary of APSA in July 2017. He later pressured lay board members of the Papal Foundation to support the grant, suggesting that questioning the Vatican funding request was inappropriate and would challenge the integrity of the foundation itself.
Cardinal George Pell – Former head of the Prefecture for the Economy, charged with overseeing the Vatican’s financial accountability. In this role, Pell reportedly objected to the APSA loan to buy the IDI hospital. After lobbying from Becciu, Pope Francis withdrew oversight authority of APSA from Pell’s office in 2015. Pell is currently in prison in Australia, convicted on controversial sex abuse charges, which he is appealing.
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Most of them are heterodox leftists more interested in turning the Church into a secular NGO. Pathetic.
True.
Francis visits one more assault on the People of God. As if they need one more reason to turn from him and turn to Him. No matter how much more Francis justifies himself, many more will refuse to listen. We simply won’t hear any more. If he’s thinking of pulling out his megaphone, we suggest he fugghitaboutit. We’ve already tuned to the gospel channel which isn’t his.
Agreed
McElroy, the man best known for kicking sand on doctrines that offend modern sensibilities (and pelvises!), is now a cardinal. It’s been fairly clear for the past six years or so that Bergoglio is stacking the next conclave with men of this caliber. No surprises here, sadly.
Say Rich: Yeah, I agree. If the next Pope is like Bergoglio, I very much believe there will be a Schism
Yes, and very repulsive.
Um, McElroy? Right… Typical..a great archbishop in LA & other good, faithful candidates… But this guy… Really?
a great archbishop in LA
If Gomez is “great” then the bar is set awfully low.
Wishing the 21 new cardinals to be, God’s blessings.
Amen to that.
The homosexualization of the church proceeds apace.
Is that so? Can you tell me why you consider Card Roche to be pro-homosexual? Or the Indians, South Americans and Africans in the list to be what you label them to be?
Roche and McElroy.
Sure looks like he is “stacking the deck”. Church will have a hard time recovering from this blatant power grab.
It is difficult to say who is the worst pick in this rogue’s gallery of dissidents, leftists, and homophile protectors of pederasts. But my money is on McElroy as absolutely the WORST American prelate whose name is not Cupich.
Precisely.
Typical Francis.
Ignore San Francisco and the orthodox. Promote the heterodox.
McElroy…really?
How much longer, Lord?
Outrageous that he names the most pro-choice bishop in the US a cardinal.
What a slap in the face for faithful Catholics.
McElroy and Roche? That’s the best Francis can do?
Lord, help us.
It says something that such milquetoast liberal prelates like Gomez and Dolan, let alone Chaput and Cordileone, are unacceptable to Francis. Ted McCarrick remains the most influential and powerful Catholic in America.
Looks like a crop of good shepherds and bishops to the College. Well done, San Diego.
The train wreck continues.
My money is on Cardinal Cupich as the likely next pope (not that I like the idea one bit!)
From the Papacy of Paul VI, the steady and faithful helmsman of the Barque of Saint Peter, to the election and brief papacy of the “smiling” John Paul I; from the astounding, dramatic and world altering papal period of the orthodox, secure and crystal clear, faithful teacher of the faith, John Paul II (the Great); from the timid, but courageous yet unjustly maligned, theological guru and faithful papal teacher Pope Benedict XVI (future Doctor of the Church) to the present state of utter papal and eclesial confusion…. HOW IN GOD’S NAME DID WE GET HERE??????
I believe that the confusion is concocted. The Holy Spirit, I believe, is always in charge of our Lord’s Church. Jesus assured us of that, and I do trust him.
You might want to rethink that. The confusion is not concocted, you are simply trying to defend the indefensible. Although it’s a sweeping generalization, it’s safe to say that the Holy Spirit is probably not involved in appointing progressives to positions of authority in the church.
Mal is right. If the confusion isn’t self-inflicted, it can be a stubborn unwillingness to read Pope Francis and other church documents and think for oneself. The Holy Spirit is always with the Body. One ideology or another has nothing to do with it
The Catholic Church in America that McCarrick helped build with its support of active homosexuality is still with us. The Spirit of McCarrick alive!
I was astonished to see McElroy’s elevation but shouldn’t have been. Proof that it really does pay to be a worthless servile flatterer. So glad that for logistical reasons (new installation, Covid) neither of my children had their Confirmation from him. I’m not sure it would even be valid.
Diluting the teachings of the Catholic Church certainly seems to be Francis’ goal. He has been preparing worldwide Catholics for this since his election, and making cardinals of like-minded men instead of those who would stand firm on the foundation of Christ is the means to that end. It’s too bad that he didn’t make good on his promise of a short pontificate. He has created a crisis for the Catholic Church on his own, and seems hell-bent on undermining Her. He tests the Holy Spirit.
If this is true that the Pope passed over Bishop Cordileone over his suspension of Holy Eucharist for Pelosi and chose a Bishop who supports Pro-Abortion “catholics” receiving of the Eucharist then what as the faithful are we to believe any longer? Truth is truth, Belief in the tenets of our faith are Truth, there is no grey area, there is no “walking a fine line”. Sin is sin, we are all sinners but if I have mortal sin on my soul I cannot and should not receive the Eucharist and if I pronounce my Mortal Sin, support it in word and/or action publicly I should not receive and be suspended from receiving. Where are our Cardinals our Bishops our Priests that took vows to shepherd the flock and teach them Truth. Sadly there is schism coming to our Church, it is from those who are not faithful to Church teaching and instead is simply secular, political and evil. What are we to do? Where are we to go if the successor to Peter plays games and favors that which is not good but supports evil?
It’s seriously doubtful that San Francisco excommunication had any influence at all on naming this batch of cardinals, which was probably in the works for weeks, if not months. American politics is interesting to some Americans. Likely not to the Holy Father or most any others in Rome.
I also don’t understand the bellyaching about Pope Francis “packing” the College of Cardinals. Nobody seemed to complain about it heading into the 1990s. It’s a feature of the office. There are no Republican Senators in Rome to clog the drain of moving governance along. Thank goodness.
So what if it has been going ‘along for months’?
The difference in the ‘90’s was not having a Pope who refuses to clarify his own encyclicals and exhortations.
As a Democrat, you have a constant data stream – including a three year corrupt and fraudulent effort to bring down a sitting president from the top politicians in your Party – with your Democrats ‘clogging the drain of moving governance along’.
fake news, sir. I am a political independent and always have been. I can also read Vatican documents and find nothing “confusing” in the Holy Father’s writings. As for so-what, it kind of torpedoes the notion that naming one guy to the College is somehow an insult to other bishops, be they two, four-thousand, or some number in between.
There are books written years ago that have suggested this would happen in the Church, from Clowns of God to the Final Conclave. All along with the heresy taking place in the Church in Germany, in places of So. America and certainly in the USA with Cardinals and Bishops like Cupich, Gregory, McElroy and others and then we have those prelates in power like Dolan who prefer to smile and “brush off” his brethren’s wrong teaching. Wonder why the Church is losing faithful, look no further than those who prefer to teach wrongly; wonder why some diocese and parishes are thriving look no further than their Holy Bishops and Priests who follow Christ!
David, if this is the long predicted turning point of loss of faith, apostasy we know Christ remains with us, within the faithful of the Mystical Body, as you’re aware. Were that worse case scenario to occur we’ll be strengthened by Our Lord to endure. A moment to come ever closer to Christ and to give him greater glory by our steadfast witness.
As it seems now with the Synod on Synodality, its leadership, these questionable appointments et al we’re not, at least those who are swept along – headed for a good place. Except those of us blessed with a living faith. We should, as our mission offer prayer, what we can for the many who are beguiled.
Rod Dreher sums up the 2013 fraud:
https://www.theamericanconservative.com/dreher/
The most evident mark of God’s anger and the most terrible castigation He can inflict upon the world are manifested when He permits His people to fall into the hands of clerics who are priests more in name than in deed, priests who practice the cruelty of ravening wolves rather than the charity and affection of devoted shepherds. –St. John Eudes