“Be careful what you wish for,” as the saying goes, “because you will surely get it.” In light of a couple of recent Vatican stories, the corollary also seems to apply: Be careful what you try to avoid, because it might actually be good for you. A stringent European money laundering exam in July and Read more
I’ve lost track of the number of times people have told me about the ‘enormous wealth of the Vatican’. Some are confused: they think the Vatican owns all the Church’s worldwide real estate, lock, stock and barrel. Others think that all that art could be sold for the poor without adverting to the difficulty of Read more
After passing a financial transparency audit by European bank inspectors, the Holy See says it is still working towards a robust and sustainable system to combat money laundering and the financing of terrorism. The audit by Moneyval, a department of the Council of Europe, followed a request by the Holy See last year for an Read more
In an effort to lift the veil from decades of secrecy and suspicion, the Vatican Bank has been opening its alarm-triggered doors to give bishops, ambassadors and journalists a rundown on how it operates. This rare show of public relations savvy follows recent scandals such as the ousting of the bank’s president, Ettore Gotti Tedeschi, Read more
If a report in Italy’s leading daily is accurate, it’s a rare bit of good news lately for the Vatican: apparently, the Vatican is poised to pass a looming European anti-money laundering evaluation, touted by friends and foes alike as the first real measure of whether Benedict XVI’s financial reforms are for real. According to Read more
The Vatican may fail to pass transparency tests next month carried out by the Council of Europe, an Italian newspaper said Sunday. Moneyval, the Council of Europe’s anti-money laundering experts, is due to rule at the beginning of July on the whether the Holy See has cleaned up its act to international monetary standards. According Read more
Anti Mafia prosecutors have asked the secretive Vatican Bank to disclose details of an account held by a priest in connection with a money laundering and fraud investigation, it emerged on Sunday. The official request was made more than a month ago but so far the Vatican Bank, known as the Institute for Religious Works, Read more
The Holy See, a sovereign state, has hit back at Italian authorities for taking documents intended for the Pope, during a raid on the home of ousted Vatican Bank chief, Ettore Gottti Tedeschi. Calling for Italy to respect the law of an independent state, the Vatican says it expects Italian authorities to respect the Vatican’s status in Read more
Italian police searching the home and office of Ettore Gotti Tedeschi, the former head of the Vatican’s bank, have found a confidential dossier relating to his three-year tenure as the bank’s president, a judicial source said on Thursday. The dossier appeared to have been put together by Gotti Tedeschi to defend himself from allegations over Read more
The home of the recently ousted president of the Vatican bank was searched Tuesday as part of a corruption investigation into Italy’s state-controlled aerospace and engineering giantFinmeccanica, prosecutors said. Prosecutor Francesco Greco told The Associated Press that the search had nothing to do with Ettore Gotti Tedeschi’s role as head of the Vatican bank and Read more