Did the new Secretariat for the Economy established by Pope Francis earlier this year really “discover”’ some “hundreds of millions of dollars” in hidden funds in the Vatican, as Cardinal George Pell wrote in an article for the Catholic Herald, a UK weekly, on December 4, and the media reported worldwide?
In reaction to this news, an internal document was prepared in the Vatican which examines and disputes this claim. The seven page text, which has not been made public but which America’s Vatican correspondent has seen, provides important background history, information and clarification regarding the funds in question and states clearly that, far from being "discovered," the information about them had already been made available to the group of lay experts appointed by the pope last year for the reorganization of Vatican finances, before the Secretariat for the Economy came into existence.
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