Have you heard about the scandalous writings by the new head of the Vatican’s doctrinal office? No, no: I don’t mean Heal Me With Your Mouth: The Art of Kissing, the 1995 pamphlet that has occasioned so much comment since Archbishop Victor Manuel Fernández was elevated to Prefect of the Dicastery for the Doctrine of … Read more
The Church continues to hit new, dysfunctional lows — and the faithful are noticing. In the last 48 hours there have been two big Vatican stories. First, revelations about the Holy See’s financial crisis; second, and more bizarrely, a furious dispute over statues being thrown into the Tiber. But really it’s all one story, the big story … Read more
Did Pope Francis know? Was he told, five years before the world found out, that the powerful Cardinal McCarrick was a serial sexual abuser? The diplomat who claims to have informed the pope, Archbishop Carlo Maria Viganò, names two dates on which he raised the matter with Francis: June 23 and October 10, 2013. But … Read more
A new watchdog, Better Church Governance, plans to produce a dossier on all the cardinal electors US lay people are launching a new initiative to assess cardinals’ records on combating abuse and corruption. Better Church Governance has signed up former FBI agents as investigators, led by Phil Scala, a former FBI Supervisory Special Agent. Academics, lawyers … Read more
Archbishop Viganò made four major claims. But do the facts support them? Archbishop Carlo Maria Viganò’s testimony, published on Saturday, goes on for 7,000 words and names more than 30 public figures, mostly to denounce them. But at its heart are a small number of very serious allegations about Pope Francis’s treatment of Theodore McCarrick. Since … Read more