Efforts to reform and professionalize Vatican financial services and oversight continued as Pope Francis dismissed the all-Italian five-member board that oversees the Vatican’s financial watchdog agency on June 5, in a move widely interpreted as a blow to the Vatican old guard. According to a Vatican statement, the pope named five experts from Switzerland, Singapore, the United States and Italy to replace those who were removed from the board of the Financial Information Authority (A.I.F.), the Holy See’s internal regulatory agency. The five outgoing members had been expected to serve five-year terms ending in 2016. The sole American on the new board is Juan Zarate, a senior adviser at the Center for Strategic and International Studies and visiting lecturer at Harvard Law School. The pope has taken a hard line on cleaning up the Vatican finance system. According to a report by the Italian news agency ANSA, two senior officials at the bank have also been eased into early retirement after reports by two separate ad hoc committees appointed by Francis to study Vatican finances.
Vatican Finance Reform Continues
Show Comments ()
1
Comments are automatically closed two weeks after an article's initial publication. See our comments policy for more.
Dan Hannula
9 years 11 months ago
Why doesn't his Holiness go all the way and make the bank part of history like the Army of the Papal States?
The latest from america
An important international conference in Rome on May 21 marks the 100th anniversary of the first Plenary Council of the Catholic Church in China. Here’s what you need to know.
During an audience with a delegation from Loyola University Chicago at the Vatican on May 20, Pope Francis said, “Education happens on three levels: the head, the heart and the hands.”
The proclamation comes just two weeks after the Jesuit priest who founded Homeboy Industries received the Presidential Medal of Freedom from President Joe Biden.
Argentina has been in a state of economic upheaval for years with two constants—a continuous increase in poverty and corresponding efforts by the Catholic Church to respond to that need.