Commentaar van Vaticanisten op toestand ten Vaticane

Van The Independent:

"It makes me laugh to think that the Vatican is now asking for help from Italian magistrates even though it has never responded to demands asked of it on many events, such as these," said Mr Nuzzi in an interview with the Micro Mega magazine at the weekend regarding Vatican claims that he had acted illegally.

For Valerio Gigante, a vaticanologist at the Adista religious news website, the church is suffering a moral crisis. "The contradiction at the heart of the church grows greater all the time. It exists for moral reasons but also generates huge amounts of money and is ever more occupied with political and economic power," he said.

Another Vatican watcher, Robert Mickens of The Tablet, has a simpler take the Holy See's woes. "It's arrogance. The people in charge still think the Vatican is above ordinary laws."

He says last week's sacking of the Vatican bank chief Ettore Gotti Tedeschi was another example of this. Mr Gotti Tedeschi is believed by many to have fallen foul of Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone, the Vatican's number two and the Pope's chief of staff, by insisting on more stringent anti-corruption rules.
The respected financier's card was probably marked, too, when he last year failed to support the Vatican's planned €250m rescue package for the bankrupt, scandal-ridden San Raffaele teaching hospital founded by the wheeler-dealing catholic priest Don Luigi Verzè".