Word: marcinkus
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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...Vatican, citing its status as a sovereign state, has so far declined to cooperate with the Italian authorities, and Marcinkus has remained inside the Vatican, where he cannot be questioned by the government. But Agostino Cardinal Casaroli, the Vatican's Secretary of State, has named three respected international bankers, all prominent Catholic laymen, to examine the I.O.R.'s role in the scandal.* Casaroli has pointedly not suggested that Marcinkus did anything illegal. At the same time, however, the Archbishop of Florence, Giovanni Cardinal Benelli, a former Vatican Under Secretary of State, has told the Italian magazine Il Sabato...
...impoverished Lithuanian parents who immigrated to Cicero, Ill., Archbishop Marcinkus had enjoyed a steady rise in the Vatican hierarchy before the scandal broke. After taking a degree in canon law at Rome's Pontifical Gregorian University, Marcinkus joined the Vatican's State Secretariat in 1952 and soon caught the eye of Archbishop Giovanni Battista Montini, who was to become Pope Paul VI in 1963. The new Pontiff made the tall (6 ft. 3 in.), burly American cleric part of an intimate circle of papal advisers. In 1964 the Pontiff selected Marcinkus, a born organizer, to be his advanceman...
Noting the pending investigations, Marcinkus has declined to discuss the Ambrosiano affair in detail. After contacts with top Vatican officials and conversations with Marcinkus, TIME Correspondent Wilton Wynn reports that the Vatican claims its relationship with Calvi and Banco Ambrosiano involved only normal banking operations. As for Marcinkus, he is still at his Vatican bank post, expressing confidence that the storm will pass. Says he: "The old archbishop is tranquil. His conscience is clear...
...Whether Marcinkus has good reason for such tranquillity may not be immediately known. The investigation to determine just what Calvi did with the huge sums his banks borrowed and to figure out who is liable for the losses that resulted is likely to last for weeks. But the outlines of the scandal have already begun to emerge...
...Sindona introduced Calvi to Marcinkus. Sindona and Calvi hoped to use Marcinkus for their own purposes, and the bankers and the churchman obviously found it advantageous to do business together. Although the Vatican bank denies it had much to do with either Sindona or Calvi, the I.O.R. eventually became Banco Ambrosiano's fourth-largest stockholder, acquiring over the years at least 794,390 shares, or 1.589% of the bank's stock. A few months after Sindona and Calvi set up the Bahamian bank in 1971, a "Mr. Paul Marcinkus" was listed as a director. "We used his name...