Vati Leaks Wild women Jesuits Vati Leaks - Wednesday, March 07, 2012 Comment on this Article During

the 16th Century, a body of women under the leadership of noblewoman, Dame Isabelle Rosello established a grouping called, the Female Jesuitical Institution. Sometime in 1545, they sought permission from Pope Paul III (1534-1549) to take the vows of the Society and form a female branch. He agreed, and because of their public accusations of homosexuality amongst the highest members of the Jesuit Order, including St. Ignatius of Loyola (1492-1556) and St. Francis Borgia (1510-1572), chaos quickly developed as the general populous turned against the male leaders. They were heckled and spat upon in the streets, and stones were thrown at them. In an attempt to overcome the pandemonium, St. Ignatius demanded that the Pope dispense Isabelle from her vows and issue a bull forbidding forever entrance of women into the Order. The banned Jesuit book The general populous said of the women Jesuits; They were more meddling than devoted; they went from place to place, bustling with gossip and causing confusion and scandal throughout the Catholic society they wanted to take control of the Society and oust the debauched ones (Dreadful Jesuits Secrets, Father Pietro Santigo, Spain, 1692; a banned-anti-Jesuit book). The women Jesuits continued to develop and were still in existence more than a hundred years later when Pope Urban VIII (1623-44), after vainly endeavouring to impose upon them some form of discipline, abolished their institution with a papal brief signed on the 21st May, 1631. However, after his death they revived themselves as the Sisters of the Holy Heart, and today much of the history of their organization has been suppressed. Fake Catholic literature (Part 1) Vati Leaks - Tuesday, February 28, 2012 Comment on this Article It is rightly said that history is written by the victors, and that is the case with the Church of Rome. How they did it is one of the great untold stories of all time, and few people today know how freely it is acknowledged in Church circles that popular Catholic versions of the history of Christianity are composed entirely of forgeries. Popes wrote a new Christian history From around the time of Pope Leo X (d. 1521) until more modern times, popes employed internal academic priestly writers to expound untrue Church claims adding academic respectability to false concepts:

'The Pontiff employed interested or mercenary writers to advocate his claims he transformed many points of divinity so as to satisfy his thirst for power, reputation, and gain'. ('Book of the Roman Catholic Church', Dr. and Bishop Charles Butler, 8 Vols. 1825, p. 664) This was just one of many papal schemes used to suppress the truth of Christian origins. Ancient Church records 'corrected' It is a little-known fact that in 1562, Pius IV (1559-1565, Giovanni Angelo de' Medici) established a special Vatican censoring department called the 'Index Expurgatorius' ('Expurgatory Index'), its purpose being to prohibit publication of 'erroneous passages of the early Church fathers' that carried statements opposing modern-day doctrine. When Vatican archivists came across 'genuine copies of the Fathers, they expunged them according to the 'Expurgatory Index' (ibid), and that confession provides researchers with 'grave doubts about the value of all patristic writings released by the Vatican to the public' ('The Propaganda Press of Rome', Sir James W. L. Claxton, Whitehaven Books, Belgravia Square, London, 1942) ('Index Expurgatorius Vaticanus', Edited by R. Gibbings, B.A., Dublin, 1837; For a full and accurate account of the 'Indices', both 'Expurgatory' and 'Prohibitory' the reader is referred to Rev. Mr. Mendham's work, 'The Literary Policy of the Church of Rome', Second Ed., 1840; also, 'The Vatican Censors', Professor Peter Elmsley (1773-1825), Principal of St. Alban's Hall, Oxford) The Vatican's 'Book of the Popes' entirely fictitious Some two decades after the establishment of the 'Index Expurgatorius', Pope Sixtus V (1585-1590) then created an internal Vatican publishing division and retrospectively created a literary past for the Christian religion by producing of a series of unashamedly fictitious books. As a result, a series of illusory books were written to defend and support untrue allegations about Christianity's past: 'Several of these fake books are frequently cited and applied to the defence of Christianity by the Church as true and genuine pieces'. ('A Dictionary of Universal Knowledge for the People', Lippincott and Co. 1877; also, Diderot's 'Encyclopdie', 1759; also, 'The Propaganda Press of Rome', Sir James W. L. Claxton, Whitehaven Books, Belgrave Square, London, 1942) During the 16th and 17th Centuries, the Vatican flooded the world with false books about its supposed 'popes', the most blatant example being the famous, or infamous but 'official' 'Book of the Popes' ('Liber Pontificalis'). Like the 'Liberian Catalogue' discussed in Part 2 of this series, this tome is notorious for its fictitious accounts of early and mythical

'successors' of an un-historic 'Pope St. Peter'. This papal fabrication provides a collection of glowing diatribes describing pontificates of docile and devout popes, most of who never existed, and has about it the spurious air of ingenuousness that so often amuses the non-Christian reader. Invented 'popes' The 'Book of the Popes' makes martyrs of thirteen 'popes' of the Third and Fourth Centuries who never existed, for it is known that their names were created in later times and retrospectively inserted into Catholic chronicles to create an illusion of an unbroken succession of popes back to the First Century. Here we see another example of the Vatican forging its own credentials, supported by the fact that all popes down to the year 530, with the benefit of hindsight, were honored as 'saints'. This pretence gave the 'pseudo popes' an elevated Christian status, a kudos, and it concealed their fake nature. The evidence is confessed to by the Church itself: 'The Vatican has now confessed that the 'saintly' distinctions are 'without foundation'. ('The Popes, A Concise Biographical History', Burns and Oates, Publishers to the Holy See, London, 1964, p. 32) That is knows they were retrospectively applied to invented people by later Catholic authors fabricating a false history for Christianity. Starting from 530 onward, the authors then did away with the prefix 'St', and it became rare, and eventually disappeared. The Vatican's frank confession This additional admission of the deceitfulness of the 'Book of the Popes' is found in the 'Catholic Encyclopedia': In most of its manuscript copies there is found at the beginning a spurious correspondence between Pope Damasus and St. Jerome. These letters were considered genuine in the Middle Ages. Duchesne [papal historian, d. 1922] has proved exhaustively and convincingly that the first series of biographies, from St. Peter to Felix III (IV, d. 530) were compiled at the latest under Felix's successor, Boniface II (530-532). The compilers of the 'Liber Pontificalis' ['Book of the Popes'] utilized also some historical writings, a number of apocryphal fragments [e.g. the 'Pseudo-Clementine Recognitions'], the 'Constitutum Sylvestri', the spurious Acts of the alleged 'Synod of the 275 Bishops under Sylvester', etc., and the fifth century 'Roman Acts of Martyrs'. Finally, the compilers distributed arbitrarily along their list of popes a number of papal decrees taken from unauthentic sources, they likewise attributed to earlier popes liturgical and disciplinary regulations of the sixth century. The authors were Roman ecclesiastics, and some were attached to the Roman Court in the 'Liber Pontificalis' it is recorded that popes issued decrees that were lost, or mislaid, or perhaps never existed at all. Later popes seized the opportunity to supply a false pontifical letter suitable for the occasion, attributing it to the pope whose name was mentioned in the 'Liber Pontificalis'.

('Catholic Encyclopedia', Farley Eds., Vol., v, pp. 773-780; ix, pp. 224-225, passim; also, 'Annales Ecclesiastici', Folio xi, Antwerp, 1597, Baronius; ('De Antiqua Ecclesiae Disciplina', Bishop Lewis Du Pin (Folio, Paris, 1686) The falsity of the 'Book of the Popes' is thereby shown, and the intentional presentation of a fictitious papal lineage is revealed. The summations of popes are decorated with the official halo of sanctity but a hagiographic scholar and a member of the Bollandists, Father Hippolyte Delehaye (1859-1941), a leading Catholic investigator of this kind of Vatican literature, frankly admitted: There is no evidence whatever that the papal genealogies [in the 'Book of the Popes'] are based upon earlier sources'. ('The Legends of the Saints', Father H. Delehaye, Fordham University Press, 1962) The Vatican again admitted that its papal biographies in the 'Book of the Popes' are not a candid digest of men of considerable erudition, but are untruthful fabrications: 'Historical criticism has for a long time dealt with this ancient text in an exhaustive way especially in recent decades and established it historically untenable'. ('Catholic Encyclopedia', Farley Eds., Vol., v, pp. 773-780; ix, pp. 224-225) Thus, the Holy See confessed that its 'Book of the Popes' is a phony record, compiled in the typically fraudulent manner of all Christian literature. Fine-tuning the records In 1947, and to the amazement of Catholics worldwide, Pope Pius XII announced that he had deleted six 'popes' from the Vatican's 'official' list because 'a mistake had been made for they never existed' (New York Times; also Philadelphia Inquirer, Jan. 19th, 1947). He also authorized the falsification of the dating of 74 popes, and removed the 'sainthood' of four others. In reality, the Vatican amended its fabricated list of popes, and fine-tuned for itself a false papal inventory back to the First Century. These 'popes' were vested with an aureole of sanctity so, in the eyes of believers, the miraculous 'holiness' of the 'early popes' is safe, overlooking Vatican confessions that it knows nothing about them except what is written in the 'official panegyric' that the Holy See invented for itself. The 'Book of the Popes' is a bizarre Catholic publication that is so deceptive, sophistical, doctrinal and prejudiced that in the interests of revealing historical facts, it is not worthy of reference in any serious work, yet Christian dictionaries, particularly the 'Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church' constantly expand upon its fictions and reference the forged book as if its entries were historically true. Here we see another example of false information making its way into Christian encyclopedias and dictionaries and used today

with great profit to blatantly fool people into believing something about Christianity's past that is untrue. To be continued Vati Leaks Fake Catholic literature Part 2 Vati Leaks - Monday, March 26, 2012 Comment on this Article In pursuance of the cover-up of Christian origins, Vatican hierarchs have demonstrated a record of centuries of unparalleled corruption and criminality, and to hide this fact, the Holy See relentlessly provided itself with a series of concocted books about its past that Major Joseph Wheless termed 'salutary fictions' ('Christian Forgeries', Major Joseph Wheless, USA Judge Advocate, Idaho, 1930). There are hundreds of such books, and in Part 1 of this series, the fictitious nature of the lineage of popes presented in the Vatican's 'Book of the Popes' was revealed as a confessed compilation of fake narratives authorized by popes with the intention of misleading people about the earlier development of the Christian religion. Papal schemes to suppress Christian past In a similar vein, there is yet another contemptuous manipulation of the faithful with a strange Vatican-produced book that again falsely tried to establish a line of popes back to earlier centuries. Called the 'Liberian Catalogue', it appeared in the 16th Century and purported to record a lineage of popes 'from St. Peter to Pope Liberius' (366 CE). This forgery was designed to give credence to the Church's claim of an early foundation, and it sought to push the origins of uniformity back to the early First Century. Forged under the name of Bishop Eusebius, it drew up a list of earlier bishops that alleged to trace a line back to Mark, and so to Peter. However, in the sequence of names, invented predecessors were consciously introduced, and their 'legendary' names were subsequently transformed into a series of monarchical bishops who never lived in history. A 'sad' priesthood confession Various attempts were made to substantiate the list of names, but the Vatican confessed that the genealogy attributed to Bishop Eusebius 'had no precise status and could not be deemed trustworthy' ('Annales Ecclesiastici', tome vi, Fol. Antwerp, 1597, Cardinal Caesar Baronius). Catholic historian, Bishop Louis Dupin (d. c. 1725), added to the deception, saying: 'Sadly, the catalogues of Bishop Eusebius are forgeries or inventions of later times'. ('De Antiqua Ecclesiae Disciplina', Bishop Lewis Dupin (Folio, Paris, 1686)

By such forged documents does the Vatican claim 'apostolic succession', and clerical insiders know the assertion is false. Investigation of Church records shows that its claim to a continuous ministerial succession from 'apostles' of the Gospel Jesus Christ to Pope Benedict XVI today is fictitious because there were no apostles and no Jesus Christ until Constantine created the concept after the closing of the Council of Nicaea in the Fourth Century. The Church frankly admits that, with the soundest scriptural basis for its conclusion, 'the whole [Gospel] story of apostles is fictitious' ('Encyclopedia Biblica', iii, p. 2987), adding that 'the number twelve was symbolical, corresponding to the twelve tribes of Israel' ('Encyclopedia Biblica', i, p. 264). Those 'tribes' were personifications of the twelve signs of the Zodiac, and an excellent description of Jacob's sons portrayed in the terms of the Zodiac is found in the Book of Genesis (Gen. 49). More papal shame Pope preserves fictions Later, Pope Benedict XIII (d. 1730), to preserve acknowledged forgeries in the Gospels and other Christian writings, issued these orders, not only to the Vatican publishing house, but to all Christian publishers: 'The editorial corruptions of antiquity are forbidden to be excluded from the records, by order of the Roman Inquisition'. ('Liberty', Bishop Jeremy Taylor, Vol., ii, p. 22, Heber's Ed., 1822; also, 'Delineation of Roman Catholicism', Rev. Charles Elliott, D.D.,1844; also, 'The Vatican Censors', Professor Peter Elmsley (1773-1825), Principal of St. Alban's Hall, Oxford) Thus, fake narratives were knowingly published by Catholic publishing houses established by popes and passed on to unsuspecting future generations who have been deceived by these fraudulent 'pseudo' writings composed by the Church itself. More ecclesiastical forgeries Thus, confessed forgery and fraud taint to the core the 'unauthentic' record of Christian 'histories', and reveal that the 'successors' of 'Pope St. Peter' are papal fakeries, but there is more deceptions to be addressed. For centuries, Christians were assured that the 'Apostles' Creed' was composed by 'apostles' mentioned in the Gospels, but in reality it was manufactured by unknown authors some seven or eight centuries after the supposed time of 'apostles'. It was then restructured in the 15th and 16th Centuries, and is to be added to the patristic list of falsely presented and worthless Vatican documents. Of the 'Apostles' Creed', and after a decade of research into its origins, a pious but disappointed Catholic author, Joseph Berington lamented: 'It is not known who wrote it or when it was written, but almost every article of the 'Apostles' Creed' has been vitiated by the additions or perversions of the papal hierarchy'. ('The Grounds of the Catholic Doctrine', Joseph Berington, 1687)

Such is the nature of Christian writings, and after centuries of Vatican assertions that the apostles of the Gospel Jesus Christ penned the 'Apostles' Creed', the Church itself has known for more than three centuries that it is just another priesthood forgery. The 'acceptance' of Christianity rests solely on papal forgeries The same can be said about the celebrated 'Athanasian Creed of the Church', attributed to St. Athanasius (d. c. 373 CE) and so promoted by the Church 'until the seventeenth century' ('Catholic Encyclopedia', Farley Ed., Vol. ii, p. 34) when it was revealed to be another ecclesiastical forgery of no 'importance. The 'Athanasian Creed' is a fabricated ancient crudity of about forty verses in two sections, and Gennadius, patriarch of Constantinople (d. c. 471), was so amazed by this extraordinary composition that he pronounced it 'the work of a drunken man' ('Petav. Dogmat., Theologica', tom. ii, 1, vii, c. 8, p. 687; Gibbon, p. 598). That applies to all Christian literature, including the Gospels and every book of the New Testament. Doubtful New Testament writings There is yet another document that the Vatican presents as something that it is not and it is called the 'Apostolic Constitutions'. Christians were told up until modern times that it was the 'Ordinances of the Holy Apostles', but the Vatican knew it was composed centuries after the time it says 'apostles' lived, and its applied title is another example of similar dishonest endeavours designed to give authority to un-authoritive literature by forging names to them. The 'Apostolic Constitutions' is a collection of ecclesiastical documents outlining prayer formularies and pastoral practice and includes the 'Apostolic Canons' that list a series of writings to be accepted in both Old and New Testaments as official to the Catholic Church. The 'Apostolic Constitutions' provides conflicting information about canonical Christian literature, and exposes the fluctuations and variations in the New Testament writings and how indifferent were the stories making-up Christian belief. Conflictingly, the New Testament canon of today omits ten books certified in the 'Apostolic Constitutions', those being, James, First and Second of Peter, First, Second and Third of John, the Second and Third of John, Jude, and Revelation (They are the 10 (of 27) New Testament books that the Vatican admits are 'questionable'; 'Catholic Encyclopedia', Farley Ed., Vol., iii, p. 274). Fake Catholic literature Part 3 Vati Leaks - Thursday, April 19, 2012 Comment on this Article After a bitter Conclave lasting three months, Fabio Chigi became Pope Alexander VII (1655-1667), and his relatives came in droves to Rome to receive their high-paying ecclesiastical appointments. It was this pope who established a Vatican publishing Society known as the Bollandists, a body of people who spent around 300 years creating thousand of invented saints that the Holy See presented to believers as heroic, factual humans.

The invention of thousands of fake saints Founded by Ioannes S. J. van Bolland of Belgium, its official task was to publish books containing the lives and acts of every saint in the Holy Roman Calendar. The saintlibrary of the Society carried over 150,000 volumes, and that monumental work, the Acta Sanctorum of the Bollandists, has become the foundation of all investigation in hagiography and legend (Catholic Encyclopedia, Farley Ed., Vol., ix, p. 129). Arranged in order of dates of their feast days, so numerous was the contents of the Acta Sanctorum that up to the month of October over 25,000 officially authenticated saints were created, and the lying wonders of falsified fiction (Christian Forgeries, Major Joseph Wheless, USA Judge Advocate, Idaho, 1930) recorded in those volumes were, without exception, presented by the Vatican as actual verities of its past. Another Vatican confession The Bollandist movement was a papal structure, and its members purposely created deliberate inventors of fictions (Christian Forgeries, Major Joseph Wheless, Associate Editor (Comparative Law) of the American Bar Association Journal, 1930). Major Wheless added that they were nothing but a collection of sinister lies of priestcraft and unimpeachable evidence of the fraudulent pretensions of the Church of Christ (ibid). The Vatican agreed, saying: Needless to say that they [the legends of the saints] do not embody any real historical information and their chief utility is to afford an example of the pious popular credulity of the times. (Catholic Encyclopedia, Farley Ed., Vol., i, p. 131) The Acta Sanctorum collection is another Catholic fantasy presented to the world as fact, and the Bollandists were still industriously creating their forgeries in the 1930s. Today, access to the Acta Sanctorum is not easily obtained, and one suspects that the Vatican is withholding these volumes because of the embarrassment their invented nature would cause if released into the hands of the media or judicious modern-day authors. This monumental work, the Acta Sanctorum of the Bollandists, has become the foundation of all investigation in hagiography and legend (Catholic Encyclopedia, Farley Ed., Vol., ix, p. 129), and like everything else in Christianity, it is entirely fictitious. Untrue saint-legends and the death of common sense During the 12th to 14th Centuries, the Vatican developed a formal procedure of honouring past miracle-makers and during that time a vast number of incredible and false miracles, as well as other fables, have been forged and invented by the worst of churchmen and these sonnets grieve me they are unworthy of God and man the stories of saints were written by false brethren who

had an iron mouth and a leaden heart the miracles of Benedict contains not less than twenty-four lies to this day I could never see one story which I could allow to be told. (Petrus Cluniacensis, lib, v, epist, xxix (Peter, Abbot of Cluny), c. 1310) In finding a miraculous reason to glorify and then canonize a Third Century presbyter, Dionysius of Paris, the 14th Century Church settled on the marvel that he walked two miles with his severed head in his hands (Elliotts Delineation of Romanism, 1884, p. 553). In 1592 a French ecclesiastic, after reading of Dionysius dilemma, gravely observed that the saint had found some difficulty in first setting off; I can easily believe that, replied a priest who was present, for in such cases it is only the first step that is any trouble (ibid). Such is the nonsense of the Christian religion. Fools in Christ The Church acknowledged the holiness of fabricated miracles, and retrospectively applied the title saint to churchmen who were originally called holy fools or fools in Christ, simply because their lives could not be easily distinguished from the retarded, the demented and like (Historical Dictionary of the Orthodox Church, Entry, Fools in Christ, p. 133). Thus, a category of Christian saints became a brotherhood or guild of fools. Indeed, the Church held an annual Feast of Fools for many centuries, but eventually it became too embarrassing as Europe became more enlightened. The celebration was then suppressed by decree at the Council of Basle in 1435, and died out by the time of the 18-year long Council of Trent (1545-1563). Conclusion The extent of papal forgeries reveals the true nature and motives of the men in charge of Christianity, and the truth of their actions is a cold challenge to Vatican ethics and its pretensions. Simply put, the Acta Sanctorum of the Bollandists and the official Liber Pontificalis, like the Apostles Creed, the Apostolic Constitutions and the Liberian Catalogue (of Parts 1 and 2 of this series), are all capital forgeries, created by popes to give the Vatican and its Gospel story a pretended existence back to the First Century. The leaked Vatican documents Vati Leaks - Tuesday, June 05, 2012 Comment on this Article Over the past few days, hundreds of people have contacted Vatileaks asking where they can read the papal documents recently leaked from the Vatican that created the scandal that lifted the lid on a world of Catholic clerical intrigue and bitter rivalry in the Holy See. They are found in a new book by Italian journalist Gianluigi Nuzzi called, 'His Holiness: The Secret Papers of Benedict XVI'. At this stage, it is published only in the Italian language, but maybe soon it will be translated into English so the internal workings of the Vatican can be absorbed by an even larger audience.

The article presented here is by John L. Allen Jr., an American journalist based in Rome who specializes in news about the Catholic Church. He is senior correspondent for the National Catholic Reporter and vaticanologist of CNN and NPR. This is his learned summary of 'His Holiness: The Secret Papers of Benedict XVI'. Pondering the 'what', not the 'who', of Vatileaks John L. Allen Jr. on Jun. 01, 2012 All Things Catholic National Catholic Reporter While the arrest of the pope's butler has triggered feverish speculation about the "who" of the Vatican leaks scandal, there's been less attention so far to the "what" of the revelations contained in the sensational new book His Holiness: The Secret Papers of Benedict XVI, published by journalist Gianluigi Nuzzi. In part, that's because the scores of documents in the 326-page book are complex and highly diverse, often composed in dense ecclesiastical Italian; in part, that's because a Vatican whodunit is tough to resist. Yet the substance of the leaks obviously merits consideration, so below, I present a sampling of the highlights, including material likely to interest English-speaking readers. Later, I'll roll out more. First, this caution: The mere fact that a document exists does not automatically make its content credible. Some official documents, even if they're stamped "top secret," do little more than record gossip, spin or self-serving opinion. Each purported revelation has to be evaluated on its merits. Overview The Secret Papers of Benedict XVI contains 11 chapters, two concerning Nuzzi's sources and the genesis of the project, and nine devoted to the documents themselves. Nuzzi quotes from the documents throughout the text, and an appendix contains reproductions. The nine content chapters cover the following subjects: The Dino Boffo case Controversies surrounding Archbishop Carlo Maria Vigan, currently the papal ambassador in Washington, D.C. Vatican finances The Vatican's role in Italian politics The Vatican security forces Controversies surrounding Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone, the Vatican's Secretary of State Communion and Liberation, the Legionaries of Christ, and the Lefebvrists Globalization and its economic impact on the Catholic church Vatican diplomacy

Nuzzi opens by describing the clandestine circumstances under which he met his principal source, whom he refers to under the code name "Maria." In light of debate over whether the pope's butler acted alone (assuming he's involved at all), it's interesting to note that Nuzzi describes "Maria" not as an isolated whistle-blower, but a conduit for a larger faction in the Vatican. Nuzzi points to "a small group of persons with different functions and roles, in various entities of the Holy See, but united in the same choice ... to preserve papers which reveal unknown plots, controversies and affairs of the church, in every corner of the world." In terms of motive, Nuzzi describes this group as composed of reformers fed up with "crooks and power games" who believe Benedict XVI wants change but who have lost confidence in the people around him to implement it. The decision to leak, Nuzzi writes, is thus motivated by a desire to "accelerate the action of reform undertaken by Ratzinger." The Boffo case For Italians, the story of Dino Boffo, a prominent lay Catholic journalist, is already the stuff of legend. There's now even an Italian phrase, the "Boffo method," as a short-hand for a style of character assassination. At one time the editor of l'Avvenire, the highly influential daily of the Italian bishops' conference, Boffo resigned amid personal scandal in September 2009. A newspaper owned by the brother of Italy's then-prime minister, Silvio Berlusconi, had published a judicial decree from 2004 that found Boffo guilty of telephonic harassment, along with a set of purported judicial notes indicating Boffo is "a known homosexual who has already come to the attention of the police for this kind of activity." It turned out, however, that while the harassment decree was real, the judicial note calling him a "known homosexual" was a fake. That discovery triggered massive speculation about who had sabotaged Boffo, all of which was amply -- some would say, excessively -- reported at the time, mostly through anonymous sources. Nuzzi adds a bombshell: two lengthy letters written by Boffo himself, addressed to Monsignor Georg Gnswein, the priest-secretary of Pope Benedict XVI. With no hesitation whatsoever, Boffo directly accuses Secretary of State Bertone and Gianmaria Vian, editor of the Vatican newspaper, of orchestrating the plot against him. Boffo asserts that Bertone resented his support for "continuity" in the Italian bishops' conference between its former president, the ultra-powerful Cardinal Camillo Ruini, and its current head, Cardinal Angelo Bagnasco. (At the time, Bertone aspired to replace the Italian bishops as the primary interlocutor with the Italian government.) "I don't believe, to be honest with you, that Cardinal Bertone was informed of the details of the action conducted by Vian," Boffo tells Gnswein, "but [Vian] perhaps could count, as in other situations, on accurately interpreting the mind of his superior."

Gnswein called Boffo after receiving the letter, after which Boffo wrote him again, this time largely to assure the pope's secretary that he's not a homosexual. Nuzzi adds a letter Boffo wrote to Bagnasco in September 2010, this time requesting rehabilitation. Boffo explicitly repeats his charges against Bertone and Vian. Noting that he had received numerous requests to give interviews, Boffo wrote he had declined because, "If I speak, it's not as if I can skip over the part played by Bertone-Vian." One month later, his rehabilitation arrived, when Boffo was hired to run the massive SAT2000 broadcast empire of the Italian bishops. Nuzzi draws this conclusion: We now know Boffo accused both the Cardinal-Secretary of State and the editor of the Vatican newspaper, by name, of very serious crimes -defamation of character, as well as falsifying a legal document. According to Nuzzi, if Boffo's accusations were judged credible, then Bertone and Vian should have been prosecuted. If his accusations were considered false, then Boffo was a strange candidate indeed for another high-profile church job. Nuzzi thus implies that Boffo's story amounts to a case in which the desire to paper over a public mess and to keep everyone happy (or, at least, equally unhappy) prevailed over establishing the truth. Vatican finances Nuzzi's book offers several nuggets about the dollar-and-cents dimension of Vatican life. On page 89, he summarizes a receipt for donations during one of Benedict XVI's general audiences in spring 2006. The haul that day was $62,000, of which $51,000 came in cash and the balance in checks. Nuzzi estimates a typical audience nets between $50,000 and $185,000, depending on the size of the crowd and other factors. If that's correct, the annual intake from the general audiences would come to roughly $3 million. Those funds, he writes, are deposited in a Vatican Bank account to be used at the pope's discretion, usually for charities or other purposes, with Gnswein being the designated administrator of the account. Nuzzi also provides details on how personalities in and around the Vatican use money, sometimes subtly and sometimes less so, to try to influence decisions. In 2006, Italian layman Angelo Caloia, at the time the president of the so-called "Vatican Bank," offered a gift of more than $60,000 to Benedict XVI. Nuzzi publishes the note Caloia attached to the gift: "Holy Father, these days of Easter and your lofty messages have filled our hearts with joy. The first anniversary of your call to the Throne of Peter has been, for us, a confirmation of the great gift the Lord Jesus has made. In offering heartfelt thanks to the

Most High for the grace in which he continually allows us to participate, and with the thought of being able to continue to enjoy your paternal benevolence, I wish to express to you, personally and in the name of all the personnel of the Institute, a deep sentiment of gratitude and heartfelt wishes that the Holy Spirit will always assist you in your ecclesial ministry. Please accept, Holy Father, a modest gesture to help your good works, and bless all of us and our families." Nuzzi notes that it's unclear whether Caloia's gift came out of his own pocket or bank funds -- if the latter, it wasn't much of a gift, since the money belonged to the pope anyway. In any event, Nuzzi observes that since Caloia hoped to be reappointed bank president, the gift might not have been a completely selfless act. (Caloia remained in his position until 2009.) Nuzzi also publishes an October 2011 note to Gnswein from Domenico Gianni, the head of the Vatican gendarmes, passing along a list of people who wanted to see the pope's secretary. Among them were officials of Renault about a helicopter with "advanced technological systems" they planned to donate to the pope for his trips back and forth to his summer residence in Castel Gandolfo, and Mercedes, about potential upgrades to the popemobile. In another chapter, Nuzzi reveals confidential memos written for Gnswein, to be passed on to the pope, by economist Ettore Gotti Tedeschi, who replaced Caloia in 2009 at the Vatican Bank, about the impact of globalization on the church. (Gotti Tedeschi was removed last week in what the supervisory council of the Institute for the Works of Religion, the formal name of the "Vatican Bank," described as a personnel move related to erratic personal behavior and poor job performance.) Among other things, Gotti Tedeschi warned the pope that the rise of Asian powers like China and India and the relative decline of the West could mean less money for the church. "The major consequence is that the resources which traditionally have contributed to the needs of the church (donations, investment income) may diminish, while the requirements of evangelization will go up. Further, 'secularism' could take advantage of the situation to create a second 'Roman question' in aggression directed at the goods of the church (through taxes, ending privileges, exasperated controls, etc.) The 'Roman question' of the 21st century will not lie in the expropriation of the church's goods, but in the loss of their value, in reduced contributions due to the impoverishment of the Christian world, and eventually in the end of privileges and in predictably higher taxes on those goods." Gotti Tedeschi recommended the creation of a centralized Vatican agency to study the protection of the church's assets in a new globalized world. Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone

It's long been clear that Secretary of State Bertone is a controversial figure. Many people, including some Vatican insiders, fault Bertone for what they see as a series of administrative missteps during Benedict's papacy. Nuzzi's book confirms that the existence of such internal resistance is not a product of overheated journalistic imagination. One example dates to early 2009, around the time of the lifting of the excommunications of four traditionalist bishops, including one who's a Holocaust-denier. In roughly the same period, Benedict XVI was also putting the finishing touches on his social encyclical, Caritas in Veritate, which would be released that summer. Nuzzi publishes a Feb. 5, 2009, letter to Benedict XVI from Cardinal Paolo Sardi, formerly a principal ghostwriter for John Paul II and still consulted on Benedict's texts. Sardi complains that Bertone was mishandling consultations on Benedict's encyclical, in part because of his frequent trips out of the country. Toward the end of the letter, Sardi adds a stinging observation. "A final, painful annotation: For some time in various parts of the church, including among people extremely faithful to it, critical voices have been raised about the lack of coordination and confusion which reins at its center. I'm saddened by that, but I can't avoid recognizing, from my own modest angle of vision, that there's some foundation to it. For instance, I'd like to note that I was not consulted on the editing of the decree about the Lefebvrite bishops (and I could have given some suggestions which wouldn't have been useless). Moreover, yesterday the text sent to Your Holiness on the same subject by the substitute was not shown to me until a few minutes before the deadline, when Monsignor Gnswein yelled [at me] over the telephone to get it back. I'm trying to see in these situations (which, to tell the truth, are numerous) the benevolent intervention of Providence, that wants to prepare me to leave the Secretariat [of State] without regrets." Nuzzi also includes the text of a lengthy memo from an unnamed senior Vatican official, presumably at the Prefecture for Economic Affairs, written for Gnswein in spring 2011. The memo ticks off a series of alleged problems with Bertone's leadership, including ignoring the Vatican's own internal checks and balances, "demoralization" of personnel, and the appointment of people "who lack the adequate competence" in important jobs. The conclusion is unequivocal: "The problematic situations are numerous and of notable gravity, above all because they could have devastating effects in the future, even if they can't been seen right now and everything looks fine. My direct superiors, with whom I've spoken repeatedly, for now don't believe it's opportune to do anything. They say that our principal point of reference is the Secretary of State, yet in many cases he's precisely the problem. Conscience requires that I present these matters to the Holy Father."

Communion and Liberation and the Legionaries 1. Communion and Liberation Founded by Fr. Luigi Giussani in Italy, Communion and Liberation is arguably the new movement in the church closest to Pope Benedict XVI. Then-Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger volunteered to celebrate Giussani's funeral Mass in 2005, and four female members of Memores Domini, a body of consecrated laity linked to the movement, serve in Benedict's personal household. Recently, Communion and Liberation has been caught up in controversy in Italy, related to scandals surrounding high-profile politicians linked to the movement. Giussani's successor, Spanish Fr. Julian Carrn, published an open letter in which he apologized, saying that if people see Communion and Liberation as caught up in money and power, "we must have given them some pretext." A more combative side of Carrn comes through in a lengthy private letter to Benedict XVI from March 2011, published in Nuzzi's book. Asked to provide his thoughts on who should succeed Cardinal Dionigi Tettamanzi as the archbishop of Milan, Carrn wrote, "the only candidate that I feel in conscience able to present to the attention of the Holy Father is that of the Patriarch of Venice, Cardinal Angelo Scola." Although it's hard to say how decisive Carrn's opinion was, Scola, who comes out of Communion and Liberation, was named to Milan in June 2011. Carrn presents a blistering indictment of the Milan archdiocese under both Tettamanzi and his predecessor, Jesuit Cardinal Carlo Maria Martini, a hero of the church's liberal wing. "The first important fact is the profound crisis of faith of the People of God, in particular of the Ambrosian tradition. In the last thirty years we've seen a rupture in this tradition, accepting on principle and promoting in fact the characteristic fracture of modernity between knowledge and faith. ... Theological instruction for future priests and for laity, with notable exceptions, moves away on many points from tradition and the magisterium, above all in Biblical studies and systematic theology. A sort of 'alternative magisterium' to Rome and the Holy Father is often theorized, which risks becoming a consolidated feature of what it means to be 'Ambrosian' today." Carrn also blasts the political orientation of the church in Milan under Martini and Tettamanzi, protesting "a certain unilateralism of interventions on social justice, at the expense of other fundamental themes of social doctrine" as well as a "systematic" bias in favor of the political center-left rather than more conservative parties and politicians (some of whom, especially in the Milan area, have ties to Communion and Liberation).

2. The Legionaries of Christ Critics have long asserted that the Vatican had all the information it needed to act against Fr. Marcial Maciel Degollado, founder of the Legionaries of Christ, well before it sentenced him to a life of "prayer and penance" in 2006. Charges of sexual and financial misconduct by Maciel became public in the 1990s, though Vatican officials have insisted those reports were not confirmed until later. Nuzzi's book adds another detail, producing the brief notes taken by a papal secretary on Oct. 19, 2011, after a half-hour meeting with Fr. Rafael Moreno, a Mexican priest who served as Maciel's private assistant for 18 years. The full text of the unsigned note reproduced by Nuzzi, written on letterhead of the "Particular Secretary of His Holiness," is as follows: 19 October 2011 Meeting 9:00-9:30 am By me Meeting with Fr. Rafael Moreno, priv.sec. of M.M. Was for 18 years private secretary of M.M.; from this was [word is illegible] Destroyed proof against him (incriminating material) Wanted to inform P.P. II in 2003, but he didn't want to hear them, didn't believe Wanted to inform Card. Sodano, but he didn't concede an audience to them Card. De Paolis had too little time Nuzzi writes that in all probability, "P.P. II" refers to John Paul II. Cardinal Velasio De Paolis, meanwhile, is the Vatican official Benedict XVI has tapped to oversee a reform of the Legionaries. For Nuzzi, the failure to take Moreno seriously in 2003 is especially damning, given that his testimony came "not from a victim, perhaps motivated by hatred, but the best possible witness: the secretary who for 18 years followed the founder of the congregation day after day, and who, therefore, knew of his double and triple life, the most secret aspects." Nuzzi also publishes a lengthy September 2011 report from De Paolis to Benedict XVI, updating the pope on what's happening in the Legion. In it, De Paolis asserts that progress is being obstructed by a minority who want a root-and-branch reform, including replacing any leaders with personal ties to Maciel. "They continue to engage in propaganda of discouragement and denigration of the process, creating some division and difficulties," he writes. "In reality the number of opponents ... is rather small, but they're very fierce." In a similar vein, Nuzzi publishes a report by Cardinal Domenico Calcagno, president of the Apostolic Patrimony of the Holy See and a veteran Vatican financial expert, on the economic condition of the Legion. While Calcagno writes that the order is suffering from serious debts, "situations of illegality or abuse have not been found." (Calcagno does recommend reducing the role of a group called "Integer," a controversial holding company for properties belonging to the Legion and its lay branch, Regnum Christi.)

Perhaps most explosively, Calcagno's report advises against giving in to demands for large-scale financial compensation for Maciel's victims. Calcagno says reconciliation with some victims "has not been difficult," but it's more complicated with regard to "those who demand, in the name of justice, enormous sums that the Legion absolutely cannot afford, and which in fact cannot be based on claims of justice." "A concession in this area," Calcagno writes, "beyond being unjust, could provoke an avalanche of equally unsustainable requests." Other Nuggets Nuzzi's book contains two other items of special interest to English-speaking readers. 1. Bishop William Morris Bishop William Morris of Toowoomba, Australia, was removed from office in 2011 on charges of favoring women priests, collective absolution, and other deviations from official teaching and practice. Nuzzi publishes a set of November 2009 notes on the Morris case, written by Benedict XVI himself and addressed to Cardinal Giovanni Battista Re, at the time the prefect of the Congregation for Bishops. The notes were written after a June 2009 meeting between Benedict and Morris, and after Morris had written a letter objecting to the way his case had been handled. Among other things, Benedict writes that Morris' "theological formation ... is not adequate for his office," citing his views on women's ordination and the possibility of Anglican ministers leading Catholic liturgies. In his letter, Morris accused the Vatican of a "lack of care for the truth," in part for implying he had agreed to step down. Benedict appears to take responsibility for that point, blaming it on a problem of language. "Obviously there was a misunderstanding, created, it seems to me, by my insufficient knowledge of the English language," Benedict writes. "In our meeting, I tried to convince him that his resignation was desirable, and I thought he expressed his willingness to renounce his functions as bishop of Toowoomba." "From his letter, I see this was a misunderstanding," Benedict writes. "I acknowledge that, but I must say decisively that this isn't a case of 'a lack of care for the truth.'" In the end, Benedict writes, "there's no doubt of his very good pastoral intentions," but "the diocesan bishop must be, above all, a teacher of the faith, since the faith is the foundation of pastoral activity."

Benedict tells Re to recommend that Morris accept "free renunciation of his actual ministry, in favor of a ministry more consistent with his gifts," and asks Re to "assure him of my prayers." 2. Illinois Gov. Pat Quinn Nuzzi's book also includes an encrypted 2011 cable from the papal embassy in Washington back to the Secretariat of State, relaying a request from Cardinal Francis George of Chicago that the Community of Sant'Egidio, a Rome-based movement active on peace and justice issues, be asked to withdraw an award it planned to bestow on Gov. Pat Quinn of Illinois for suppressing the death penalty. According to the cable, George objected to Quinn's positions on abortion and gay marriage, including policies about serving same-sex couples, which effectively put Catholic adoption agencies in Illinois out of business. The cable was signed by Monsignor Jean-Francois Lantheaume, the embassy's charge d'affairs. The full text is: From: Washington To: Decryption Off., Decr. N. 300 Date of encryption: 03/11/2011 Date of decryption: 03/11/11 His Eminence Cardinal George, Francis, Archbishop of Chicago, has informed this pontifical embassy that the Community of Sant'Egidio has plans to present an award to the Governor of Illinois, Mr. Quinn, for suppressing the death penalty in that state. Attested that Mr. Quinn is of the Catholic faith, the bishops and Cardinal George retain that this recognition is inopportune for the following reasons: He promoted the law on homosexual marriage; He is in favor of abortion; He withdrew from the Catholic church the right to contract with federal agencies for the adoption of minors. Cardinal George courteously requests an intervention with the authorities of the Community of Sant'Egidio so that the decision will be reconsidered. On the part of this embassy, a nulla osta [no objection] to what is proposed by His Eminence the Arc