Monday, March 18, AD 2024 11:28pm

PopeWatch: Dictator

The book Dictator, among its many passages, has this interesting section:

 

 

In contrast, the dedicated but politically hapless Benedict XVI, it emerges, was deceived in more ways than one by his power hungry, avaricious long-time secretary, Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone. Among other achievements, Bertone, without his former boss’s knowledge, allowed more than 400,000 euros from the papal children’s hospital to be streamed into the restoration of his vast apartment.

Bertone duped Benedict to the last, when the former pope entrusted him with the task of lobbying for the tough, orthodox patriarch of Venice, Angelo Scola, to succeed him as Pope when he resigned in February 2013. Bertone did not want Scola and ignored the instruction. It opened the way for Cardinal Jorge Bergoglio of Buenos Aires, who, in a curious twist, appears to have been expecting Benedict’s abdication. He had been subtly lobbying US cardinals for some time and he had the backing of the “St Gallen mafia’’, a liberal, anti-Ratzinger cabal of European cardinals.

Pope Benedict had his gifts, but red capped thieves at the Vatican were apparently running rings around him.

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Greg Mockeridge
Greg Mockeridge
Tuesday, December 12, AD 2017 9:33am

“Pope Benedict had his gifts, but red capped thieves at the Vatican were apparently running rings around him.“

If you recall Don, I said this very thing a couple of years ago.

Penguins Fan
Penguins Fan
Tuesday, December 12, AD 2017 4:34pm

Benedict did not have it in him to run those thieves out of town. Instead they took over and installed the Argentine Caudillo.

They will have to explain this to God.

Michael Dowd
Michael Dowd
Wednesday, December 13, AD 2017 2:57am

One would like to expect better of these people since they are engaged in the religion business where virtue is supposed to be their stock in trade. Well, that may be true but, in so many ways, they are just ordinary people–like us.

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