Bishop Baker: Ad limina inspires ‘hopeful spirit’ for renewal of Church in US

Vatican City, Mar 31, 2021 / 02:01 pm (CNA).- The U.K. court ruling that overturned an account seizure request by Vatican City prosecutors has raised questions about the reliability of the Holy See’s judicial system.

The verdict by judge Tony Baumgartner overturned an earlier decision seizing the British accounts of the Italian broker Gianluigi Torzi. Torzi was involved in the Secretariat of State’s luxury real estate investment in London.

Torzi was arrested by the Vatican last summer on two counts of embezzlement, two counts of fraud, extortion, and money laundering.

In his ruling, Baumgartner often used the words “misrepresentation” and “mischaracterization” in relation to the Vatican’s request for the accounts seizure (known as a “restraint application”).

In his conclusion, Baumgartner noted that “an applicant to this court for a restraint order relying on external requests should be careful in relying upon facts unverified or unsupported by direct evidence, and should not unhesitatingly rely upon assertions that are not properly established on the facts.”

He also pointed out that “applications of this nature often are brought with haste because of the fear of the real risk of dissipation of assets, but the restraint application was not an application prompted by discoveries made in a new investigation, or even in an investigation that was unfolding.”

This is the third time that Vatican prosecutors have received a negative response from authorities abroad.

The first concerned Cecilia Marogna, who allegedly misused Vatican funds intended for humanitarian activities. Marogna, an Italian citizen, ended up in prison in Italy, while Vatican prosecutors also submitted a request to extradite Marogna to the Vatican. A lower court validated the arrest. But the Supreme Court of Cassation canceled the arrest because the request had no specific motive and “lacked the specific cautionary needs.”

The second was the search and seizure in Fabrizio Tirabassi’s apartment. Tirabassi, an official of the Secretariat of State’s administrative section, was one of the five Vatican officials suspended when the London investigation began. Rome’s public prosecutor initially validated the seizures in his apartment following a Vatican request.

But the measure was later declared null since the search and seizures were part of an “out of the ordinary request,” with “evident and substantial” illegitimate actions, such as that the seizure order came directly by the prosecutor without the validation of a judge.
The Baumgartner ruling is more significant than the other two because it is the first time that a third-party judge has looked into the documents and challenged the professionalism of Vatican prosecutors.

Baumgartner wrote that the Vatican’s “non-disclosures and misrepresentations are so appalling that the ultimate sanction” to reverse the assets’ seizure was appropriate.

The prosecutors, Baumgartner said, maintained that Torzi “‘dishonestly and secretly’ decided to issue himself controlling shares in Gutt (one of the societies that intervened in the purchase) to prevent the Secretariat from acquiring the whole of the interest in the Chelsea Property until the Secretariat agreed to pay him a further EUR 15,000,000 [around $17.6 million].”

But the judge concluded that the allocation of 31,000 shares of Gutt “is improperly characterized as secretive and dishonest in the Letter of Request, and that (…) is a misrepresentation of the facts.”
The British judge also noted that “the Letter of Request is conspicuously silent about [senior Vatican Secretariat of State official] Archbishop Peña Parra’s involvement throughout, a matter I find of some surprise given it emerged after the restraint order had been made that he is said to be the subject of the blackmail” — the alleged extortion of the $17.6 million.

The investigation has not yet led to an indictment, but questions have arisen regarding Archbishop Peña Parra: If he was aware of and endorsed the controversial financial operation, why wasn’t he too included in the investigation?

Most importantly, the British judge’s ruling could mark a serious setback for the Vatican judicial system’s credibility on the eve of the Moneyval report on the Holy See.

Moneyval is the Council of Europe’s committee that evaluates if member states are adhering to international standards. Moneyval will issue its fourth progress report on the Vatican at the end of April. This report will discuss the Vatican judicial system’s effectiveness in countering money laundering and the prevention of financing terrorism, so the Vatican prosecutor will be under strict scrutiny.

Many argue that the Vatican prosecutor’s reliability is in question since he conducted his investigation disregarding the rights of the people involved.

This began with Torzi’s arrest at the Vatican. He went with his lawyers for an interrogation but found himself thrown in a cell for 10 days.

Then there was Raffaele Mincione, an Italian citizen taken from a hotel and placed in custody in Italy. He has filed two lawsuits in London against the Holy See.

There are also possible lawsuits at the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg; since some of the defendants have been arrested or subjected to search and seizures without even knowing the charges against them.

Six people were first suspended and then demoted from (or not renewed in) their positions because of the London investigation. They had no notice of the charges against them until the prosecutors had interrogated them. Still, they do not know if they will face trial.

The Holy See is part of an international system and signs declarations, memoranda of understanding, and international conventions. Yet the Vatican state is an absolute monarchy, with a judicial system working under the decisions of an absolute monarch.

What if the activism of the Vatican tribunal backfires against the Holy See? What if any state hostile to religion uses these procedural mistakes and human rights failings to attack the Holy See and the Catholic Church in a broader sense?

These are the reasons why the Baumgartner ruling sends an alarm signal that the pope cannot ignore.

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Vatican City, Jan 26, 2018 / 10:04 am (CNA/EWTN News).- Pope Francis met with the members of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith Friday, affirming the dignity of every person and emphasizing the Church’s task of accompanying the ill and suffering, especially in the face of increasing support for euthanasia.

Pain, suffering, and the meaning of life and death are all problems the contemporary mind does not know how to face with hope, the Pope said Jan. 26, and therefore “this is one of the duties that the Church is called to render to contemporary man.”

“It is clear that where life is valid not for its dignity, but for its efficiency and productivity, [euthanasia] becomes possible. In this scenario it must be reiterated that human life, from conception to its natural end, has a dignity that renders it inviolable.”

Pope Francis met at the Vatican’s Clementine Hall with the members of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith at the conclusion of their plenary session, praising their study of “the sensitive issues” surrounding the accompaniment of terminally ill patients.

Secularization and the emphasis on self-determination and personal autonomy have increased the demand for euthanasia, he noted, and many people believe that the “voluntary interruption of human existence [is] a choice of ‘civilization.’”

Therefore, authentic pastors have an opportunity to accompany people in difficult circumstances, with an accompaniment that does not “abandon man to himself, nor leave him in the grip of his disorientation and his errors, but with truth and mercy,” brings him back to the good, Francis said.

“Authentic pastoring therefore is every action aimed at taking man by the hand, when he has lost the sense of his dignity and his destiny, to lead him with confidence to rediscover the loving fatherhood of God, his good destiny and the ways to build a more human world.”

The Pope also expressed his appreciation for the congregation’s commitment to protecting the faith and the sanctity of the sacraments.

In particular, he pointed to their work examining cases concerning graviora delicta, external violations against faith and morals or in the celebration of the sacraments; and applications for the dissolution of the matrimonial bond in favor of the faith.

This is especially important today, he said, as man’s understanding of self becomes ever more fluid and changeable, influencing his existential and ethical choices.

“The man of today no longer knows who he is and, therefore, struggles to recognize how to act well.”

“In this sense, the task of your Congregation appears decisive in recalling the transcendent vocation of man and the indivisible connection of his reason with truth and goodness, which introduces faith in Jesus Christ,” he said.

“Nothing helps man to know himself and God’s plan for the world like the opening of reason to the light that comes from God.”

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Vatican City, Feb 6, 2018 / 10:15 am (CNA/EWTN News).- On Tuesday the Congregation for the Causes of Saints approved the second miracle needed for the canonization of Blessed Pope Paul VI, allowing his canonization to take place, possibly later this year.

According to Vatican Insider, the Congregation for the Causes of Saints approved the miracle by a unanimous vote Feb. 6. The next step is for Pope Francis to also give his approval, with an official decree from the Vatican. Then the date for the canonization can be set.

The miracle attributed to the cause of Paul VI is the healing of an unborn child in the fifth month of pregnancy. The case was brought forward in 2014 for study.

The mother, originally from the province of Verona, Italy, had an illness that risked her own life and the life of her unborn child, and was advised to have an abortion.

A few days after the beatification of Paul VI on Oct. 19, 2014, she went to pray to him at the Shrine of Holy Mary of Grace in the town of Brescia. The baby girl was later born in good health, and remains in good health today.

The healing was first ruled as medically inexplicable by the medical council of the congregation last year, while the congregation’s consulting theologians agreed that the healing occurred through the late pope’s intercession.

Today’s meeting with cardinals was the final step before Cardinal Angelo Amato, head of the congregation, will take the miracle to Pope Francis, who has the final say in its approval.

After the Pope issues a decree approving it, the date of the canonization will be announced during a consistory. According to Vatican Insider, the canonization may take place in October of this year, during the Synod of Bishops on the youth.

The miracle for Paul VI’s canonization echoes that of his beatification. That first miracle took place in the 1990s in California. A then-unborn child was found to have a serious health problem that posed a high risk of brain damage. Physicians advised that the child be aborted, but the mother entrusted her pregnancy to Paul VI.

The child was born without problems and is now a healthy adolescent. He is considered to be completely healed.

Pope Paul’s cause for canonization was opened in 1993. In December 2012, Pope Benedict XVI recognized the “heroic virtue” of Paul VI, giving him the title “venerable.” He was beatified in Rome on Oct. 19, 2014.

Paul VI was born Giovanni Montini in 1897 in the town of Concesio in the Lombardy region of Italy. He was ordained a priest at the age of 22. He served as Archbishop of Milan before his election as Pope in 1963. He died in 1978.

As pope, he oversaw much of the Second Vatican Council, which had been opened by Pope St. John XXIII. He also promulgated a new Roman Missal in 1969.

Paul VI published the encyclical Humanae Vitae in 1968, which reaffirmed the Church’s teaching against contraception and reaffirmed the merits of priestly celibacy.

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