Dermot Ahern says a senior Vatican official sought him out to make an agreement in 2004. In the agreement, Ireland would indemnify the Catholic Church against legal actions for compensation by clerical child sexual abuse survivors.

Ahern named the official as Cardinal Angelo Sodano, who was at that time the Vatican Secretary of State.

Mr Ahern says he was "completely taken aback' by Sodano's suggestion which was made during celebrations in Rome marking the 75th anniversary of diplomatic relations between Ireland and the Holy See.

"I got the impression he [Sodano] had just come from the United States, that there had been a major settlement costing millions which, he said, was over and above their moral responsibility.

"As the conversation went on, it was quite clear he was referring to some sort of an indemnity, or part indemnity, from the Irish taxpayer in relation to anything that might come down the tracks."

[He said this was] "particularly in the context of the educational connection that priests have with our educational system."

Ahern says he told Sodano "on no account could I give such an undertaking and that it was a matter that would have to be decided by the government anyhow.

"I was very annoyed" he added.

Source

• Crux
• Talk of the Town
• Image: Independent

During Msgr Giovanni Carrù's 20 years as pastor in a Turin parish, many paintings, statues, furniture and other objects were lost and then found in private homes.

Two candelabra ended up being among the possessions of former Vatican Secretary of State, Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone, according to a National Catholic Reporter article by investigative journalist Jason Berry.

These were returned by the cardinal.

The NCR story was based on a report in a Rome daily newspaper.

A special division of the Italian police charged with the protection of cultural heritage had two investigators focused on Msgr Carrù and missing religious property.

Authorities worked with disgruntled parishioners in the monsignor's native region of Piedmont.

Msgr Carrù is currently secretary of the Pontifical Commission for Sacred Archaeology, a job that oversees the catacombs.

He worked at the Congregation for Clergy between 2003 and 2009, where he was an under-secretary.

Some sources say he got the job courtesy of former Vatican secretary of state Cardinal Angelo Sodano, who also came from Piedmont.

Part of Msgr Carrù's role was there was to manage correspondence concerning sales of church properties and items of high value, in cases where bishops had to seek Vatican permission.

This saw him involved in a type of insider-trading scheme with an American company, the Follieri Group, the NCR article stated.

During a period when US bishops were closing churches at a rate of more than a one a week, Msgr Carrù was "instrumental" in "identifying prospective churches to buy and resell".

A vice-president of the Follieri Group at the time was a nephew of Cardinal Sodano.

The NCR article stated Msgr Carrù is considered an unindicted co-conspirator by the FBI for his role in the 2008 criminal scheme to sell American church property.

The Vatican Bank was used to wire payments in the scheme, which saw company founder Raffaello Follieri eventually convicted and imprisoned for five years.

Msgr Carrù was forced to leave the Congregation for Clergy in 2009.

Sources

• National Catholic Reporter
• Image: Addicting Info

The first term of comparison is the tension between Archbishop Jose Gomez of Los Angeles and his predecessor, Cardinal Roger Mahony. On Jan. 31, Gomez announced that Mahony would "no longer have any administrative or public duties" because of failures to protect children from abuse, documented in files released by the archdiocese. That triggered an open letter to Gomez from Mahony acknowledging mistakes, but insisting he went on to make Los Angeles "second to none" in keeping children safe.

Mahony remains a priest and bishop in good standing, and he really hasn't had any administrative role since stepping down in March 2011. The practical effect of the action thus is limited, but symbolically it amounts to what Jesuit Fr. Tom Reese has called a "public shaming."

So far, the Vatican hasn't said much other than it's paying attention and clarifying that the action applies only to Los Angeles.

Behind door No. 2 lies the highly public spat in 2010 between Cardinal Christoph Schönborn of Vienna, Austria, and Italian Cardinal Angelo Sodano, a former Secretary of State and still the dean of the College of Cardinals.

For those whose memories may have dimmed, a series of clerical abuse scandals exploded across Europe in early 2010, which among other things cast a critical spotlight on Benedict XVI's personal record. Sodano created a media sensation in April 2010 by calling that criticism "petty gossip" during the Vatican's Easter Mass.

In a session with Austrian journalists not long afterward, Schönborn not only said Sodano had "deeply wronged" abuse victims, but he also charged that Sodano had blocked an investigation of Schönborn's disgraced predecessor, Cardinal Hans Hermann Gröer, who had been accused of molesting seminarians and monks and who resigned in 1995. Schönborn reportedly said that then-Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, now Pope Benedict XVI, wanted to take action, but he lost an internal Vatican argument to Sodano. Continue reading

Sources

• John L Allen Jr in National Catholic Reporter
• Image: Daily News Los Angeles

John L Allen Jr is NCR senior correspondent.