Monday, October 24, 2011

Pope Joins #OccupyWallStreet: "Vatican calls for global financial authority"

I know resurrections are more common in Jerusalem but maybe Il Papa thinks he can get Banco Ambrosiano up and running again.
From Foreign Policy's Passport blog:

Has the Pope joined #OWS?
The Vatican called on Monday for the establishment of a "global public authority" and a "central world bank" to rule over financial institutions that have become outdated and often ineffective in dealing fairly with crises. The document from the Vatican's Justice and Peace department should please the "Occupy Wall Street" demonstrators and similar movements around the world who have protested against the economic downturn.
"Towards Reforming the International Financial and Monetary Systems in the Context of a Global Public Authority," was at times very specific, calling, for example, for taxation measures on financial transactions....MORE
From Wikipedia:
Banco Ambrosiano was an Italian bank which collapsed in 1982. At the centre of the bank's failure was its chairman, Roberto Calvi and his membership in the illegal Masonic Lodge Propaganda Due (aka P2). Vatican Bank was Banco Ambrosiano's main shareholder, and the death of Pope John Paul I in 1978 is rumored to be linked to the Ambrosiano scandal, giving one of the subplots of The Godfather Part III. Vatican Bank was also accused of funneling covert United States funds to Solidarity and the Contras through Banco Ambrosiano....MORE
On June 19, 1982 the BBC reported on 'God's Banker'
The body of a top Italian banker has been found hanging from Blackfriars Bridge in London. 
The Guardian updated the story in 2003's "Who Killed Calvi".

Prior to that the Institute for Works of Religion (aka The Vatican Bank) laundered Gambino Family heroin profits.

More recently we had this Dec. 2010 headline "Vatican Bank hit by financial scandal... again"

So the Pope, Queen Elizabeth and Lloyd Blankfein walk into a bar...