The Bad News

I. Bad Stewardship

• https://www.ncregister.com/blog/report-vatican-set-to-lose-more-than-100-million-on-failed-london-property-deal

The Vatican stands to lose about £100 million ($136 million) when it completes the pending sale of a London property at the center of an ongoing fraud trial at the Vatican, according to a report in the Financial Times ($136,000,000 dollars! That's a lot of food for families, a lot of medicine for hospitals, a lot of beds for the homeless).

II. Bad Behaviour

• https://www.pillarcatholic.com/p/location-based-apps-pose-security

The use of location-based hookup apps by officials or employees of Church institutions could present serious security problems for the Church, even at the level of the Holy See’s diplomatic and international relations. [...]

The use of any hookup app within the Vatican City State’s secured areas could pose a security risk for the Holy See. And use of the Grindr app among Vatican residents and officials and within the non-public areas of Vatican City State could present a particular diplomatic security risk for the Holy See in its dealings with China. (So, while priests are supposed to be praying, they are preying... on each other.)

III. Bad Pastoral Oversight

• https://www.catholicnewsagency.com/news/249526/vatican-liturgy-chief-traditional-latin-mass-was-abrogated-by-pope-st-paul-vi

The Vatican’s liturgy chief has said that the Traditional Latin Mass was “abrogated by Pope Saint Paul VI.”

In a letter to the world’s bishops accompanying Summorum Pontificum, Benedict XVI wrote that the pre-conciliar liturgy was “never juridically abrogated.” “As for the use of the 1962 Missal as a Forma extraordinaria [extraordinary form] of the liturgy of the Mass, I would like to draw attention to the fact that this Missal was never juridically abrogated and, consequently, in principle, was always permitted,” he said in the letter dated July 7, 2007.

(Need anything else be said?)

At a time when much of the rest of the world is starting to wake up to the repression, mendacity, and dangers of the Chinese Communist Party regime, the Vatican is getting even deeper in bed with it. And at a time when that regime is intensifying repression of religion—including Catholics—in China, Pope Francis is renewing an accord with Beijing that has yielded no benefits yet save for President Xi Jinping and only disunity and suffering for the Catholic Church.

• https://foreignpolicy.com/2020/09/17/china-francis-vatican/ 

IV. Bad (Social) Science

• https://www.pillarcatholic.com/p/cleveland-priest-gets-life-victims
• https://www.ncregister.com/news/the-formation-of-a-new-priest-who-abused-minors-how-did-he-slip-past-seminary-screening-policies

This was a priest chosen and educated in the wake of the Church’s clergy sex-abuse scandal, someone who had undergone an intensive, detailed vetting process and seminary training steeped in teaching about sexual ethics and appropriate boundaries (How did a predator slip past the screeners? The same way predators slipped past psychologists in the past. They are smarter than their inspectors who lack(ed) basic commonsense and who should have (had) a better understanding of fallen human nature. That, and the egos of some psychologists blinded them to the fact that predators are smarter than they are. Some wolf in sheep's clothing makes all nice and people equate 'nice' with virtue.)

Failure

1. A lack of prudential judgment? Correct.
2. Corruption? Definitely.
3. Disdain toward Catholic heritage and identity? Sadly, yes.
4. Psychological testing is fallible? Very much so.

Fidelity

A wise monsignor I knew once said that it takes only one saint to turn around a parish. We need saints at the Vatican. We need saints at schools. We need saints in every parish. We need saints. We need people who refuse to work out their salvation in fear and trembling (Philippians 2:12) to get with the program (St John 14:15), lest they place themselves in a very dark place for all eternity.