VATICAN CITY – Pope Francis on Tuesday tightened control and oversight of Vatican-based foundations and associations in another step in his campaign to impose international accounting and governance standards on the offices of the Holy See and its affiliated entities.
A new law seeks the Holy See to comply with the recommendations of the Council of Europe’s Moneyval committee, which in April 2021 pointed out as problematic the lack of a general law governing the creation and administration of foundations registered in Vatican City.
These foundations collect donations from the faithful, but until recently were subject to very little oversight or accountability.
The new law establishes strict governance, administration and accounting standards for foundations, which are subject to final supervision by the Vatican’s Secretariat for the Economy. Its accounting books are subject to review by the auditor general.
The same Moneyval report that highlighted the lack of oversight of foundations included as an example the well-known scandal of the Vatican’s pediatric hospital’s charitable foundation, Bambino Gesu, which receives donations from around the world.
In 2017, the Vatican criminal court convicted the former president of the hospital for diverting $500,000 in donations to the foundation to renovate the apartment of former Vatican number two Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone.
Bertone was not charged, and the original embezzlement charge was reduced to abuse of office. The president’s lawyers argued that the intent was to invest the funds to benefit the hospital because the apartment would be used for fundraising events.
Several foundations and associations have their legal headquarters in Vatican City. Pope Francis has created several of them, dedicated to previous pontiffs and papal initiatives.
Elected in 2013, Francis has dedicated himself to cleaning up the Vatican’s murky finances and bringing them up to international standards and transparency and accountability. This reform has taken years and generated several scandals, including an ongoing criminal process for a real estate investment in London.
Recently, the Jesuit priest credited with helping to bring order to the Holy See’s budget as prefect of the Ministry of Economy, Father Juan Antonio Guerrero Alves, resigned for health reasons. His second, the secular economist Maximino Caballero Ledo, was appointed to succeed him.