VatiLeaks

Those of us living here in the God-fearing United States of America, coming off a long holiday weekend and, as a people, also generally ignorant and/or suspicious of pretty much everything that goes on outside our borders, probably missed this bomb dropped in the middle of Vatican City last week. And if we did hear anything, it was probably of the Pope's butler was arrested!!! type of article and not the implications of the arrest.

Basically, the Pope's butler, a guy named Paolo Gabriele (married, not a priest), was found to have secret Vatican documents in his home. But before that, an Italian journalist, Gianluigi Nuzzi, began publicizing similar secret documents he had received beginning in January. What Nuzzi exposed then was that one of the Vatican's administrators, who had been ferreting out corruption, was abruptly reassigned as ambassador to the USA. Monsignor Carlo Vigano was not thrilled at all about this reassignment and asked for it not to happen.

Then, in mid-May, Nuzzi published a book called "His Holiness," which included a lot more documents and hushed-up scandals. The Vatican came slightly unglued about it, because it aired out a lot of dirty laundry that the Pope and his people would have preferred to shove in the Tiber. The arrest of the butler is part of that whole drill. Some people think that Gabriele is merely the tip of the iceberg and the real "criminal" is one of the red hatted cardinals. Who knows?

Anyway, it's not likely this scandal will get huge coverage here in the USA, if only because we tend to cut religious leaders LOTS and LOTS of slack (not that they deserve it), but I'm sure my favorite English-language newspaper The Guardian (UK) will cover it at least in slightly more detail than the US papers. I will keep an eye on this since the Vatican and its deputies in the USA seem hell-bent on influencing OUR politics.