the Pope Leo XIV I’ve taken the biggest step yet to right a wrong Financial decisions More problematic than Pope Franciscancellation of a special fundraising commission for the Holy See that had been announced under questionable circumstances Francisco He was taken to hospital.
On Thursday, Leo XIV formally abolished the fundraising committee, annulled its statute and expelled its members. He decreed that its assets would go to the Holy See as a whole and that the Vatican Heritage Office would oversee the dissolution of the committee.
A new working group will be formed, with the Pope’s approval of its members, to develop fundraising proposals and an appropriate structure for the future, according to the decree.
The decree was the latest sign that, as the end of 2025 approaches, the first American pope in history will complete the work of Francis’s papacy.
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The Vatican announced the creation of the committee, its statute and its members on February 26, while Francis was hospitalized suffering from double pneumonia. He was then visited by senior officials in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
The committee was made up only of Italians who had no professional experience in fundraising. Its head was an adviser to the Secretariat of State, the same Vatican body that Francis had previously stripped of its ability to manage assets after losing tens of millions of euros in a scandalous London real estate deal.
The concentration of power in the hands of the State Department, the lack of qualified fundraising specialists, and the absence of Americans on the council – the United States is the Vatican’s largest donor – immediately raised questions about the committee’s credibility.
To some, the move appeared as if the Italian-led Foreign Ministry was taking advantage of the pope’s deteriorating health to announce a new influx of unrestricted donations into its coffers, after Francis confiscated the sovereign wealth fund’s 600 million euros ($684 million) and transferred it to another entity as punishment for London’s failure.
Therefore, the American Pope’s decree seems like an attempt to start over from scratch. Donations are a crucial source of revenue for the Holy See, and wealthy American donors in particular hoped that Leo XIII, a mathematics graduate, would impose greater transparency and financial accountability on the Vatican’s accounts.