 |
Cardinal Bertone--just because
Pope Francis wants to rough it,
why should the rest of us suffer.
|
While other prelates have
begun—often for some with embarrassment and for others with reluctance—to scale
down their princely residences, one brave soul among the College of Cardinals
has decided to raise the banner of resistance and flaunt his ecclesiastical
princedom right in the face of the Holy Father.
Cardinal Tarcisio Pietro Bertone, SDB, former papal Secretary of State,
has taken over two apartments—each somewhat spacious in its own right—in the Vatican
San Carlo Palace to create a supreme Vatican bachelor pad for himself. Bertone was brought in by Pope Benedict XVI
in 2006 to replace Cardinal Angelo Sodano as Vatican Secretary of State. Sodano’s administration had been tarnished by
allegations of corruption on various levels, most notably failures to deal
effectively with issues of clerical sexual abuse and financial issues concerning the Vatican Bank,
and Bertone was seen as a “reform” candidate.
Benedict sincerely wanted to clean up the Vatican mess but was unable to
do so as was demonstrated by the episode last year of the papal butler stealing incriminating documents from
the pope’s desk to leak them to journalists. Bertone turned out to have no
cleaner hands than his predecessor, however, and had strong ties to Ettore
Gotti Tedeschi, the former head of the Vatican Bank, who was ousted in
2012. The bank’s integrity was called
into question under Tedeschi’s administration for money laundering and lack of
transparency. Bertone was also anxious
to restore Italian control over the Curia and his appointments to key posts
tended to advance disproportionately his fellow Italians. In a
similar vein, he also has been accused of a sort of nepotism for having
advanced a remarkable number of
Salesians of Don Bosco—the religious congregation to which he himself
belongs—to posts in the hierarchy.
Bertone was considered a
quite possible successor to Benedict in the Conclave of 2013 and when Cardinal
Bergoglio was elected as Francis I, Bertone “took an early retirement.” In fact he was pushed out in Francis’ determination
to clean out the “old-boys” network in the Roman Curia, a network built in part
by Bertone as Secretary of State. This fall
from power delighted Cardinal Sodano whose own forced retirement from the Secretariat
of State had made room for Bertone and who never forgave Bertone for his own loss
of place. In fact, as a sort of
ecclesiastical Cheech and Chong, both these men tarnished the office once held
by such notable Secretaries of State as Eugenio Pacelli (Pius XII), Mariano
Rampolla, Dominico Tardini, Amleto Cicognani, and Pietro Gasparri. But they had all belonged to an age of
diplomats and statesmen and a Church had had not only the trappings of royalty
but ministers that could equal a Metternich or a Talleyrand or a Pitt. Of course, what Jesus would think of that is
another question, but the above named were all great Secretaries of State.
Having lost his post, Bertone
is no admirer of Pope Francis and once his new home is renovated—and will be
ten times the size of Francis’ suite—he will be able to look
down—literally—from his roof-top terrace on the humble papal hotel room where
the Successor of the Apostles sleeps at night.
Now most Cardinals, Bishops, and priests—including Archbishop Myers and
Bishop Tebartz-van Elst—do not have a vow of poverty. Only members of religious orders take a vow
of poverty. The Holy Father is a
religious—a Jesuit—and has a vow of poverty.
Cardinal Bertone also is a member of a religious congregation—the Salesians
of Don Bosco—and as such has a vow of poverty.
This new 6500 square foot “apartment” is not a shabby home for this son
of Don Bosco with a “vow of poverty.” I wonder
what Don Bosco would think of it? I wonder
if that even every crossed the good Cardinal’s mind.
No comments:
Post a Comment