6. The Immense Real Estate Holdings of the Vatican

  1 The letter that Monsignor Viganò wrote to Pope Benedict XVI, defending his actions and criticizing Secretary of State Bertone, is an eloquent document of the dramatic period I am describing: “Most Holy Father, I find myself constrained to make recourse to Your Holiness because of an incomprehensible and serious situation affecting the governance of the Governorate and me personally … My transfer from the Governorate in this moment would cause deep dismay and discouragement among those who believed that it was possible to clean up the many situations of corruption and abuse of power that have long been rooted in the management of various departments … I place in the hands of Your Holiness this letter, which I addressed to His Eminence the Cardinal Secretary of State, so that you may dispose of it in accordance with your august will, having as my only desire the good of the Holy Church of Christ. With sincere sentiments of profound veneration, the most devoted son of Your Holiness.” A few days later, Viganò would deliver to Pope Benedict XVI in person a confidential note describing his actions. Here is an excerpt from that note: “When I accepted the assignment at the Governorate on July 16, 2009, I was well aware of the risks I would encounter, but I never thought I would find myself facing such a disastrous situation. I mentioned this on several occasions to the Cardinal Secretary of State, pointing out that I would not be able to manage through my own forces alone: I needed his constant support. The financial situation of the Governorate, already gravely debilitated by the international crisis, had suffered losses of more than 50–60 percent, also because of the incompetence of the persons who administered it. To remedy the situation, the Cardinal President has assigned the management of two State funds to a Finance and Management Committee, consisting of some major bankers, who ended up acting more for their own interests than for ours. For example, in December 2009, in a single operation they made us lose two and a half million dollars. I reported this to the Secretary of State and to the Prefecture of Economic Affairs, which considered the very existence of this committee to be illegal anyway. Through my constant participation in the meetings, I tried to contain the action of these bankers, with whom I often had to disagree necessarily. More about the conduct of this committee can be related to you by Mr. Gotti Tedeschi, who was a member until his appointment to the IOR, and he is well aware of how much I tried to keep its conduct under control.”

  2 The Sacred Congregation for the Propaganda of the Faith (Propaganda Fide), as it was formerly known, is the pontifical dicastery that leads and handles the general governance of Catholic missionary activity in the world. It currently consists of sixty one members, including cardinals, bishops, and archbishops. The head prefect is currently Cardinal Fernando Filoni, who was appointed in May 2011 by Pope Benedict XVI.

  3 This estimate is for the real estate assets of APSA (approximately 45 percent of the total value of the purchase), pension funds (about 17 percent), and Propaganda Fide (about 10 percent).

  4 If a tenant wished to have his entire apartment renovated at the expense of APSA, he would have to pay a 15 percent surcharge, which would drop to 10 percent if the tenant opted for a partial renovation or if work had already been done by the previous tenant.

  5 The data indicated in the RB audit refer to September 30, 2013.

  6 The data indicated in the RB audit refer to May 21, 2013.

  7 The document forwarded by Cardinal Calcagno highlights the gradual decline in APSA’s power: “Consequently attention should be drawn to the gradual erosion and dilution of the institutional role of APSA, from which many duties have been removed, but even more, which has had (and will continue to have) cognizance of various realities gradually emerging in the Holy See that rob APSA of its administrative duties (art. 172 of Pastor Bonus). All of this has inevitably diminished the power of the Dicastery in those areas that could be granted to it as financial ‘piazzas’ and, above all, it has opened up areas of administrative management that received practically a waiver from any form of oversight and that at times were the source of occasions of ‘hindrance’ with investments also outside of the IOR.”

  8 This is also mentioned in an investigative report published in Europeo in January 1977: “On August 6, 1976, the Holy See accepted a substantial donation from the Mollari siblings: it is twenty-two hectares of land with rural buildings at the locale ‘La Mandria’ on Via Laurentina 1351. There are two novelties about this donation. The first, as in countless other cases, is that the appraisal of the donated assets is unreliable: only 500 million. The second is that the decree by Italian President Leone requires the Holy See to sell everything within five years.”

  9 “Un Vaticano da 10 miliardi,” an investigative report published in issue 29 of July 24, 2014, by Emiliano Fittipaldi.

10 “Diversa SA was founded in Lugano”—Fittipaldi writes—“in August 1942, while the battles of Stalingrad and El Alamein were being fought. Today it is chaired by Gilles Crettol, a Swiss lawyer who manages the interests of the Pope on the other side of the Alps: his name appears at almost every Swiss company.”

11 On July 31, 2013, Profima had to pay more than 98,000 Swiss francs for services contracted to third parties, such as PwC for account auditing (26,924 francs), and 70,000 to the accounting experts of If Sfg not to mention the cost for Diversa SA of virtual office services at the Jordan holding company. If the attendance paid to the six board members was zero francs, this means that Gilles Grettol must have been paid 36,000 francs in 2012.

12 According to the data collected as of January 31, 2014, it appears that the chairman, Robin Herbert, receives gross compensation of 12,357 sterling pounds, while the other four directors receive 8,240 each.