Authors: David Yallop
Some three months earlier Archbishop Paul Marcinkus had departed from all earthly office. He died in Phoenix, Arizona, in February 2006. He had resisted to the end all attempts by the Italian Courts to have him returned to Rome to testify in the trial of the five accused of the murder of Roberto Calvi. The death of Marcinkus left unresolved the accuracy of an extra-ordinary allegation made during the lifetime of the Archbishop by a member of the Mafia that Marcinkus had been present at a meeting when the decision was taken to ‘suicide’ Calvi in a Masonic manner.
Over the decades the real identity of the ultimate head of P2 was a question that exercised many. A repeated whisper invariably settled on one particular man, Giuilo Andreotti. But surely the figurehead of Italian politics for over fifty years, seven times Prime Minister and Life Senator could not possibly also be the real Puppet Master? The sceptics suffered a severe jolt when in 2002 Andreotti was found guilty of complicity in the murder of the investigative journalist Mino
Pecorelli. The Italian magistrates also had abundant evidence that linked Andreotti to a world of illicit financing. The magistrates established that people ‘close to Andreotti’ had met with Pecorelli shortly before his murder in an attempt to persuade him not to publish further ‘embarrassing material’. The former Prime Minister was sentenced to twenty-four years’ imprisonment. Because of his age, he was 83 years old at the time, it was decided that he would not serve the sentence. After a series of appeals Andreotti was cleared of having connections with the Mafia and in October 2003 he was cleared of complicity in the murder of Pecorelli the man who had ensured that a list of senior members of the Roman Catholic hierarchy who were allegedly also members of the Masonic lodge P2 had been sent to Albino Luciani.
Pope John Paul I
Described by the Vatican as ‘a fantasy’ this book continued to be vindicated by further realities. One of my allegations that had particularly infuriated the Vatican was the assertion that the body of the murdered Pope John Paul I had been discovered by Sister Vincenza. It was an assertion that many within the Church condemned as a wicked lie. Among their number was Father John Magee, who continued to claim that it had been he who had found the Pope’s body. In 1985, I was flying back to London from Dublin, and chanced to find that I was sitting next to Father Magee’s brother. He assured me that he had questioned his brother closely on this aspect and that Father Magee had insisted that I was wrong and his version was correct.
In September 1988, Father John Magee finally admitted that he had lied, not only to his brother, but along with his fellow Papal secretary Father Diego Lorenzi and numerous other Vatican officials, to the world since 1978. He confirmed that it had indeed been Sister Vincenza and not he that had found the body of the dead Pope. Magee had therefore, by such admittance, finally confirmed the first crucial stage of the Vatican cover-up.
This aspect had in fact been confirmed, albeit grudgingly and very obliquely by the Vatican, four years earlier in June 1984. Within weeks of the initial publication of this book apart from denouncing it as ‘infamous rubbish’ a memorandum created by the Commission for Social Communications, the media and public relations arm of the Vatican, was distributed to Episcopal Conference. It attempted in typical Vaticanese to address several of the many issues raised within this book. One of these concerned the identity of who had found the body of Pope John Paul I.
The memorandum while aspiring to minimize the issue admits that it was Sister Vincenza.
While it makes no difference whether the Pope was found by a sister, or as the Vatican communiqué said, by the private secretary of the Pontiff, in fact, the secretary instantly ran to the bedside of Pope John Paul I when he was summoned by the sister who suspected that something might be wrong. The secretary touched the Pope to awaken him and discovered that he was dead. The secretary then called Cardinal Villot.
If, as the Vatican memorandum asserts, ‘it makes no real difference’ then why where the Papal secretaries obliged to take a vow of silence on this and other issues? Why did both secretaries continue to lie for years? Lie both before the Vatican Memorandum and for years afterwards. If those responsible for the Vatican Memorandum had questioned the author Camilo Bassotto, a close personal friend of Pope John Paul I for many years, they would have received confirmation that the account within this book describing how Sister Vincenza discovered the body of the Pope is entirely accurate. Prior to her death in 1983 Bassotto had twice interviewed the nun. The account she gave Bassotto of her grim discovery is the same as that previously given to me. The various reforms detailed within this book that Pope John Paul I had been planning to implement was another aspect which that Vatican Memorandum addressed. ‘Pope John Paul I did not have in mind to make revolutionary changes in the Vatican hierarchy, as can be seen from the following facts’.
The ‘facts’ including his re-appointment of Cardinal Villot, his confirmation of the various Cardinal heads of departments and Secretaries of the Curia are not in dispute and are recorded within this book. The Memorandum’s comments about the late Pope’s prudence, his habit of reflecting, meditating and allowing his thinking to mature before taking decisions could well have been taken directly from my text, as could the comments on his ability after that process had been completed of acting ‘firmly and decisively’. The evidence within this book that details fact after fact that led to the various reforms that were about to be implemented at the time of Albino Luciani’s death is not addressed or considered. Also ignored is the fact that the late Pope’s decisions had not been based merely upon a one-month investigation but on knowledge acquired over a six-year period.
The only aspect of this section of the Memorandum, which is in conflict with this book concerns the heated discussion that Luciani had with Cardinal Baggio regarding the Pope’s desire to send Baggio to Venice as his successor. In June 1984 six years after the confrontation Baggio denied being asked and declared that if he had been he ‘would have gone there – flying’.
I only became aware of this Vatican Memorandum while preparing this postscript. Not only are both Luciani and Baggio dead but so are my primary sources. It is the only proposed change that is specifically challenged. It is reasonable therefore to assume that those responsible for the Vatican Memorandum were unable to find anyone or any evidence that refuted the many other changes that Albino Luciani planned to make that are recorded within this book.
The Memorandum then turns to the question of the papers found in the dead Pope’s hands ‘The pages found in the hands of Pope John Paul I after his death could not, therefore, have been lists of the prelates to be transferred’. It would have immeasurably assisted the Vatican’s position if they had then identified the precise content of these pages. This they fail to do. They quote Father Magee ‘indicating’ that it was the ‘Pope’s custom to review points of sermons and meditations for Wednesday audience discourses and Angelus talks on Sundays’. Demonstrably Magee had no knowledge of what the Pope was reading on that fatal evening or what happened subsequently to those documents.
The most glaring deficiency in this exercise conducted by the Vatican was their failure to talk to others still alive in June 1984 who knew the truth concerning the ‘revolutionary changes’ that Pope John Paul I was about to implement. The failure to talk to these crucial witnesses or if they were spoken to, the failure to report what they said is highly significant.
Father Germano Pattaro brought from Venice by Pope John Paul I as an adviser has stated that among the documents that the Pope was studying were his notes covering the range of changes he had discussed with Cardinal Villot a few hours before retiring for the night. The previously mentioned Camilo Bassotto, is also on record as having discussed with Luciani the various changes he was proposing to make. Then there were others. Men such as Archbishop Giuseppe Caprio who had taken a leading role in the investigation ordered by the late Pope, or Monsignor Giovanni Angelo Abbo, the man chosen by the Pope to replace Marcinkus, or Cardinal Ugo Poletti, the man that the Pope planned to place in charge of the Florence archdiocese.
Archbishop (later Cardinal) Caprio was at the time of Luciani’s
death the deputy head of the Secretariat of State and as such if asked he would have been able to make available to the Vatican spin doctors responsible for the Memorandum a copy of the crucial dossier that the late Pope was studying shortly before his death. If there was ever within this entire affair a smoking gun it is the Vagnozzi dossier.
As of September 1978 Cardinal Egidio Vagnozzi knew more about the inner workings of Vatican finances than anyone else in or out of the Vatican. From 1967 he had been in control of the Prefecture of the Economic Affairs of the Holy See. His role was comparable to that of the Chancellor of the Exchequer in the United Kingdom or the Auditor General in the United States. Vagnozzi had intimate knowledge of the Sindona and Calvi relationships with the Vatican and their various dealings with the Holy See. As recorded earlier within this book in 1968/69 Vagnozzi was still struggling to prise out many of the Vatican’s financial secrets that lay buried but long before Pope John Paul I was elected he had the answers.
When Albino Luciani sought an urgent investigation the information that Vagnozzi had acquired over a decade ensured that a highly detailed dossier was soon in the Pope’s hands. Immediately after the discovery of the Pope’s body the Vagnozzi report along with the papers covering the various changes were removed by Cardinal Villot, whose deputy Caprio was most certainly aware of the contents of that report. An indication of just how explosive the contents were can be gauged by the fact that Roberto Calvi subsequently became aware of the Vagnozzi report and its contents and after being offered a copy by a Vatican contact for three million dollars haggled the price down to one point two million dollars then kept the copy close to himself for the rest of his life.
Finally the first two paragraphs of the Vatican Memorandum of June 1984 deserve to be quoted in full. They have assisted immeasurably in the growth of a myth that is still vibrant twenty-eight years later.
‘While the death of Pope John Paul I came as a great surprise only a month after his election to the papacy, the Cardinals who gathered in daily meetings in preparation for the (next) Conclave saw no reason to question the report of Dr Renato Buzzonetti, Director of Vatican Health Services, that the death of Pope John Paul I was attributable to natural causes.
In addition, there was the fact that the Pope’s health had been rather frail. Some time previously, he had complained of swollen ankles. His close relatives did not have any doubts regarding the naturalness of his death, but cited no less than three cases of similar
deaths of relatives.’
Dr Buzzonetti had never been Albino Luciani’s doctor. His sole medical experience of the late Pope had been to establish cause of death. His conclusion that the Pope died from myocardial infarction – a heart attack – has been dismissed not only by members of the medical profession in Italy, the US, Australia, New Zealand and the United Kingdom but also by other Vatican doctors including the man who had co-signed Luciani’s death certificate, the Head of the Vatican Medical Service Professor Mario Fontana who subsequently observed ‘If I had to certify under the same circumstances, the death of an ordinary, unimportant citizen. I would quite simply have refused to allow him to be buried’.
Albino Luciani’s condition was far from frail as a study of his factual medical history would have confirmed. Buzzonetti was offered that medical history by Dr Da Ros, the Pope’s physician for more than twenty years. Astonishingly the Vatican medical staff refused to consider that history, a course of action that would have resulted in a very severe medical censure in a great many countries. Quite a number of Cardinals did indeed question Buzzonetti’s ‘report’ including Cardinals Benelli, Felici, Willebrands, Pironio Lorscheider, and there were others. Confronted with the implications of this book in 1984 ‘close relatives’ of the dead Pope recalled three relatives who had ‘similar deaths’ events that lay forgotten in 1978 and again between 1980-1984 when I was engaged in active research. For example the Pope’s brother Edoardo’s response in 1978 when asked if Albino had ever had heart trouble was ‘As far as I know absolutely none’.
Once the allegations contained within this book became public knowledge the memories of a number of the people that either I or my researchers had interviewed underwent remarkable transformations. This phenomenon occurred on both sides of the Tiber. Albino Luciani in fact was in excellent health at the time of his sudden death and his ankles were not swollen. The reader may wish to re-read the factual medical history of Pope John Paul I contained in Chapter Six. A detailed medical history that the Vatican has ignored for nearly three decades.
In late 1988 my literary agent was contacted by a journalist named John Cornwell. He told her that he was preparing a major two-part article on my book and that he was the European Editor of the Sunday
Observer
who would be publishing the articles. He wished to interview me. We met in early January 1988 and he at once confessed that he had lied about the reason for the interview. Contrary to what he had pitched repeatedly to my agent and then to me he was not working on
a two-part article for the
Observer
either about me or
In God’s Name.
He was, he admitted, working with the ‘Vatican’s full permission and unlimited co-operation’ on a full-length book on the death of Albino Luciani.