The Vatican Exposed
The Vatican Exposed

Author: Paul L. Williams

Publisher: Prometheus Books

Published: 2009-09-25

Total Pages: 248

ISBN-13: 1615921427

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Over 50 billion dollars in securities. Gold reserves that exceed those of industrialized nations. Real estate holdings that equal the total area of many countries. Opulent palaces containing the world's greatest art treasures. These are some of the riches of the Roman Catholic Church. Yet in 1929 the Vatican was destitute. Pope Pius XI, living in a damaged, leaky, pigeon-infested Lateran Palace, could hear rats scurrying through the walls, and he worried about how he would pay for even basic repairs to unclog the overburdened sewer lines and update the antiquated heating system. How did the Church manage in less than seventy-five years such an incredible reversal of fortune? The story here told by Church historian Paul L. Williams is intriguing, shocking, and outrageous. The turnaround began on February 11, 1929, with the signing of the Lateran Treaty between the Vatican and fascist leader Benito Mussolini. Through this deal Mussolini gained the support of the staunchly Catholic Italian populace, who at the time followed the lead of the Church. In return, the Church received, among other benefits, a payment of $90 million, sovereign status for the Vatican, tax-free property rights, and guaranteed salaries for all priests throughout the country from the Italian government. With the stroke of a pen the pope had solved the Vatican's budgetary woes practically overnight, yet he also put a great religious institution in league with some of the darkest forces of the 20th century. Based on his years of experience as a consultant for the FBI, Williams produces explosive and never-before published evidence of the Church's morally questionable financial dealings with sinister organizations over seven decades through today. He examines the means by which the Vatican accrued enormous wealth during the Great Depression by investing in Mussolini's government, the connection between Nazi gold and the Vatican Bank, the vast range of Church holdings in the postwar boom period, Paul VI's appointment of Mafia chieftain Michele Sindona as the Vatican banker, a billion-dollar counterfeit stock fraud uncovered by Interpol and the FBI, the "Ambrosiano Affair" called "the greatest financial scandal of the 20th Century" by the New York Times, the mysterious death of John Paul I, profits from an international drug ring operating out of Gdansk, Poland, and revelations about current dealings. For both Catholics and non-Catholics this troubling expose of corruption in one of the most revered religious institutions in the world will serve as an urgent call for reform.

In the Closet of the Vatican
In the Closet of the Vatican

Author: Frederic Martel

Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing

Published: 2019-02-21

Total Pages: 593

ISBN-13: 1472966155

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The New York Times Bestseller - Revised and Expanded "[An] earth-shaking exposé of clerical corruption" - National Catholic Reporter The arrival of Frédéric Martel's In the Closet of the Vatican, published worldwide in eight languages, sent shockwaves through the religious and secular world. The book's revelations of clericalism, hypocrisy, cover-ups and widespread homosexuality in the highest echelons of the Vatican provoked questions that the most senior Vatican officials--and the Pope himself--were forced to act upon; it would go on to become a New York Times bestseller. Now, almost a year after the book's first publication, Frédéric Martel reflects in a new foreword on the effect the book has had and the events that have come to light since it was first released. In the Closet of the Vatican describes the double lives of priests--including the cardinals living with their young "assistants" in luxurious apartments whilst professing humility and chastity--the cover-up of numerous cases of sexual abuse; sinister scheming in the Vatican; political conspiracy overseas in Argentina and Chile, and the resignation of Benedict XVI. From his unique position as a respected journalist with uninhibited access to some of the Vatican's most influential people and private spaces, Martel presents a shattering account of a system rotten to its very core.

Dark Mysteries of the Vatican
Dark Mysteries of the Vatican

Author: H. Paul Jeffers

Publisher: Citadel Press

Published: 2010

Total Pages: 208

ISBN-13: 0806531320

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Arranged chronologically and thematically, Dark Mysteries of the Vatican sifts fact from fiction and illuminates the truth of what lies in the archives. From murder in Holy Orders to financial scandal and UFOs, this is the definitive volume on the most secretive place on earth. Most books about the Vatican are dense and scholarly, but Jeffers delivers an easy-to-read, fact-driven investigation, covering historical as well as current events.

God's Bankers
God's Bankers

Author: Gerald Posner

Publisher: Simon and Schuster

Published: 2015-02-03

Total Pages: 752

ISBN-13: 1439109869

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A deeply reported, New York Times bestselling exposé of the money and the clerics-turned-financiers at the heart of the Vatican—the world’s biggest, most powerful religious institution—from an acclaimed journalist with “exhaustive research techniques” (The New York Times). From a master chronicler of legal and financial misconduct, a magnificent investigation nine years in the making, God’s Bankers traces the political intrigue of the Catholic Church in “a meticulous work that cracks wide open the Vatican’s legendary, enabling secrecy” (Kirkus Reviews). Decidedly not about faith, belief in God, or religious doctrine, this book is about the church’s accumulation of wealth and its byzantine financial entanglements across the world. Told through 200 years of prelates, bishops, cardinals, and the Popes who oversee it all, Gerald Posner uncovers an eyebrow-raising account of money and power in one of the world’s most influential organizations. God’s Bankers has it all: a revelatory and astounding saga marked by poisoned business titans, murdered prosecutors, and mysterious deaths written off as suicides; a carnival of characters from Popes and cardinals, financiers and mobsters, kings and prime ministers; and a set of moral and political circumstances that clarify not only the church’s aims and ambitions, but reflect the larger tensions of more recent history. And Posner even looks to the future to surmise if Pope Francis can succeed where all his predecessors failed: to overcome the resistance to change in the Vatican’s Machiavellian inner court and to rein in the excesses of its seemingly uncontrollable financial quagmire. “As exciting as a mystery thriller” (Providence Journal), this book reveals with extraordinary precision how the Vatican has evolved from a foundation of faith to a corporation of extreme wealth and power.

Operation Gladio
Operation Gladio

Author: Paul L. Williams

Publisher: Prometheus Books

Published: 2015-02-03

Total Pages: 384

ISBN-13: 1616149752

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This disturbing exposé describes a secret alliance forged at the close of World War II by the CIA, the Sicilian and US mafias, and the Vatican to thwart the possibility of a Communist invasion of Europe. Journalist Paul L. Williams presents evidence suggesting the existence of “stay-behind” units in many European countries consisting of five thousand to fifteen thousand military operatives. According to the author’s research, the initial funding for these guerilla armies came from the sale of large stocks of SS morphine that had been smuggled out of Germany and Italy and of bogus British bank notes that had been produced in concentration camps by skilled counterfeiters. As the Cold War intensified, the units were used not only to ward off possible invaders, but also to thwart the rise of left-wing movements in South America and NATO-based countries by terror attacks. Williams argues that Operation Gladio soon gave rise to the toppling of governments, wholesale genocide, the formation of death squads, financial scandals on a grand scale, the creation of the mujahideen, an international narcotics network, and, most recently, the ascendancy of Jorge Mario Bergoglio, a Jesuit cleric with strong ties to Operation Condor (an outgrowth of Gladio in Argentina) as Pope Francis I. Sure to be controversial, Operation Gladio connects the dots in ways the mainstream media often overlooks.

Shroud of Secrecy
Shroud of Secrecy

Author: Luigi Marinelli

Publisher:

Published: 2000-01

Total Pages: 255

ISBN-13: 9781552631423

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Centuries have passed and secularism seems to have a stronghold on our world view, but the Vatican still rules the practices and doctrines of more than a third of the earth`s people with arguably the same iron fist it always has. After all this time, the all-powerful Vatican remains a complete mystery to all those outside its walls. Until now. A small group of Vatican prelates felt they could not participate in the code of silence that has allowed corruption and hypocrisy to flourish within the seat of power of one of the world`s biggest, most influential religions. This group, which has referred to itself as the Millenarians, has preferred anonymity for fear of repercussions from the publication of this book. One of the group, Luigi Marinelli, was compelled to step forward, and his livelihood and life have been threatened in the balance. "The book was an act of love for the Church," Marinelli has been quoted as saying. He and his fellow Millenarians strongly believe that the Church they love cannot survive if the ruling powers are mired in bureaucracy, rampant careerism, corruption and lack of accountability. The anecdotal evidence they provide is shocking, at the very least.

Merchants in the Temple
Merchants in the Temple

Author: Gianluigi Nuzzi

Publisher: Macmillan + ORM

Published: 2015-11-10

Total Pages: 236

ISBN-13: 1627798641

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From a bestselling author with unprecedented access to Pope Francis, an investigative look at the recent financial scandals at the highest levels of the Vatican A veritable war is waging in the Church: on one side, there is Pope Francis’s strong message for one church of the poor and all; on the other, there is the old Curia with its endless enemies, and the old and new lobbies struggling to preserve their not-so-Christian privileges. The old guard do not back down, they are ready to use all means necessary to stay in control and continue the immoral way they conduct their business. They resist reforms sought by Pope Francis and seek to delegitimize their opponents, to isolate those who want to eliminate corruption. It’s a war that will determine the future of the church. And if he loses the battle against secular interests and blackmail, Pope Francis could resign, much like his predecessor. Based on confidential information—including top secret documents from inside the Vatican, and actual transcripts of Pope Francis’s admonishments to the papal court about the lack of financial oversight and responsibility—Merchants in the Temple illustrates all the undercover work conducted by the Pope since his election and shows the reader who his real enemies are. It reveals the instruments Francis is using to reform the Vatican and rid it, once and for all, of the overwhelming corruption traditionally encrusted in the Roman Catholic Church. Merchants in the Temple is a startling book that will shock every reader. It’s a story worthy of a Dan Brown novel, with its electrifying details of the trickery and scheming against the papacy—except that it is real.

All the Pope's Men
All the Pope's Men

Author: John L. Allen, Jr.

Publisher: Image

Published: 2007-12-18

Total Pages: 402

ISBN-13: 0307423492

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A fascinating and enlightening look at the world’s oldest and most mysterious institution, written by an American journalist with unparalleled knowledge about the Vatican's past and present. The sexual abuse scandals that shook American and British Catholicism in 2002 brought to light a long-standing cultural gap between the English-speaking Catholic world and the Vatican. In Rome, the crisis was often seen as an attack on the Church mounted by money-hungry lawyers, a hostile press, and liberal activists who used it as a way to turn attention on such concerns as celibacy, women’s ordination, and lay empowerment. When the Vatican struck down the U.S. bishops’ draft for handling allegations of sexual abuse, many saw it as an attempt to curb an independent American Catholic church. Yet, as time passed, it became clear that the Vatican’s well-founded concerns about due process were shared by most liberal U.S. bishops and canon lawyers. ALL THE POPE’S MEN is a lucid, in-depth guide to the sometimes puzzling, often incomprehensible inner workings of the Vatican. It reveals how decisions are made, how papal bureaucrats think, and how careers in the Roman Curia are shaped. It debunks the myths that have fed the distrust and suspicions many English-speaking Catholics harbor about the way the Vatican conducts its business, explains who really wields the power, and offers entertaining profiles of the personalities, historical and present-day, who have wielded that power for good and for bad. A thoughtful analysis of the recent sexual abuse crisis sheds light on how the Vatican perceives the Church in the United States. Balanced, lively, and filled with Vatican history and lore, ALL THE POPE’S MEN provides the general reader with an authoritative picture of the highly charged relationship between the Vatican and the richest, most influential national Catholic church in the world today.

Mortal Sins: Sex, Crime, and the Era of Catholic Scandal
Mortal Sins: Sex, Crime, and the Era of Catholic Scandal

Author: Michael D'Antonio

Publisher: Macmillan

Published: 2013-04-09

Total Pages: 414

ISBN-13: 1250034396

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A Publishers Weekly Best Nonfiction Book of 2013 A Kirkus Reviews Best Book of 2013 An Edgar Award for Best Fact Crime Nominee An explosive, sweeping account of the scandal that has sent the Catholic Church into a tailspin -- and the brave few who fought for justice In the mid-1980s a dynamic young monsignor assigned to the Vatican's embassy in Washington set out to investigate the problem of sexually abusive priests. He found a scandal in the making, confirmed by secret files revealing complaints that had been hidden from police and covered up by the Church hierarchy. He also understood that the United States judicial system was eager to punish offenders and those who aided them. He presented all of this to the American bishops, warning that the Church could be devastated by negative publicity and bankrupted by its legal liability. They ignored him. Meanwhile, a young lawyer listened to a new client describe an abusive sexual history with a priest that began when he was ten years old. His parents' complaints were downplayed by Church officials who offered them money to go away. The lawyer saw a claim that any defendant would want to settle. Then he began to suspect he was onto something bigger, involving thousands of priests who had abused countless children while the Church had done almost nothing about it. The lawsuit he filed would touch off a legal war of historic and global proportions. Part history, part journalism, and part true-crime thriller, Michael D'Antonio's Mortal Sins brings to mind landmark books such as All the President's Men, And the Band Played On, and The Informant, as it reveals a long and ferocious battle for the soul of the largest and oldest organization in the world.