Free Merchants in the Temple by Gianluigi Nuzzi

operators to be provided with all the documentation, on paper and in digital format, pertaining to the attached list. As you well know, we are working on a very tight schedule; we therefore request that this documentation be made available by January 10. While remaining available for any needs you may have, and thanking you already for the cordial collaboration that we know will be forthcoming, I avail myself of these circumstances to confirm my utmost devotion to your most reverend Excellency.
    Monsignor Vallejo Balda
    Attached to the letter Parolin found a long list of twenty-five entities on which documentation was requested. 6 The Pope’s task force was particularly interested in the last two points:
    We have not yet received: the list of bank accounts, stocks and the like, held or managed by the Secretariat of State (or any other activity) and a full vision of the management of funds collected (expenditures, investments, etc.) of the Peter’s Pence and other sources of revenue.
    The Chairman of the Commission, Zahra, was well aware that the information provided was still insufficient. He waited impatiently for a reply from the Secretariat of State. Without that information it would be impossible to have a clear picture of the situation and propose a credible reform. After waiting in vain yet one more time, on January 16 he drafted an alarming letter to Francis:
    Your Holiness,
    I regret to inform you that your Commission is unable to complete the consolidated financial position of the Holy See due to the lack of fundamental information. We have requested from Monsignor Parolin a list of bank accounts held by the Secretariat of State, and of the investments made into bonds, funds and stock, as well as information on other accounts such as the Peter’s Pence, but they never arrived. We realize that the Secretariat might wish to maintain confidentiality on some of these accounts, but it is not willing to make available financial information about any of them.
    Without a complete picture of the financial situation of the Holy See, your Commission will not be able to evaluate the various risks present in the economic administration of the Vatican. This is a vital part of the work of the Commission and the members cannot complete their assignments if the evaluation of the risks for the Vatican is not taken into consideration. We would be most grateful if you could instruct us on this matter, since we do not wish to disappoint Your Holiness by not providing [analyses] of this important sector of our mission. We ask for your blessing.
    On January 30, an answer finally arrived, either thanks to the direct intercession of Francis or the pressures of Xuereb on Parolin. The Secretariat of State delivered a twenty-nine page dossier bearing the grandiloquent title: “The Venerated Financial Report.” In the first confidential document that I was able to read, it emphasized that
    the Peter’s Pence consists of the traditional gathering of offerings collected on the feast day of Saints Peter and Paul at all the dioceses of the world and of all the offerings delivered during the celebrations to the direct collaborators of the Holy Father or his envoys. It is entrusted to a special office of the general affairs division of the Secretariat of State that is in charge of managing the collection of offerings for the charitable works of the Holy Father and for the Holy See.
    The Secretariat of State then went on to specify that this information was protected by the utmost secrecy:
    While on the one hand an analytical report on the revenue relative to the Peter’s Pence is published annually, on the other absolute confidentiality has been maintained to date, in compliance with Superior instructions, on how the report is used, since it is excluded from the consolidated financial report of the Holy See.
    In practice, to date, the offerings for the poor are still a black hole: absolute secrecy on how the money is spent