After lowering their salaries due to the economic crisis caused by the pandemic, Pope Francis has today taken another step against the privileges of the cardinals and has ordered that from now on they must pay the rent out of pocket. In a new savings measure at the Holy See, Francis has decided to eliminate free or low-cost rentals in Vatican-owned houses for cardinals, bishops and other senior leaders.
The new norms are included in a document of the new prefect (minister) of Economy of the Vatican, the Spanish Maximino Caballero Ledo, which was hung in the central courtyard of the Vatican. The note, known as a "rescriptum", indicates that the Pope has ordered that senior Vatican officials make an "extraordinary sacrifice to allocate more resources to the mission of the Holy See, also increasing income from the management of real estate." .
The document cites the need to "face the growing commitments that the fulfillment of the service to the universal Church and to those in need requires in an economic context such as the current one, of particular gravity", in a decision that was made after a meeting between the minister, a layman, and the Pope on February 13. According to the latest known data, and despite the various cuts already applied, the Vatican Curia closed the year 2021 with a deficit of 10 million euros.
Francis thus establishes that property owners must apply to their tenants "the same prices applicable" to those who do not have an office in the Holy See or in the State of Vatican City, new rules that will affect all "cardinals , cardinals, heads of departments, presidents, secretaries, undersecretaries, executives, auditors and equivalent, of the Court of Broken Rome, of the buildings owned by the curial Institutions and of the bodies that refer to the Holy See”.
There may be exceptions, but they must be personally approved by the Pontiff. The same will happen in the Casa Santa Marta, the residence inside the Vatican where the Pope and other prelates live, but which many visitors use as a hotel without paying. From now on they must pay the established fees. All existing contracts will continue until they expire and then these new rents will apply, although it is not yet clear how they will be calculated. Especially those that are located inside the Vatican walls, many of them decorated with frescoes.
The savings will surely not please the cardinals, who already had to tighten their belts in 2021, when the Argentine pope ordered a 10% cut in their salaries in salary reductions aimed at guaranteeing the jobs of the thousands of employees who work in the Holy See and the Governorate of Vatican City State, and not having to lay off anyone after the economic crisis stemming from the pandemic.
The salaries of the cardinals who work in the Vatican and live in this territory or in Rome are not public, but it is believed that they earn around 4,000 euros per month. Many of them live in these apartments, between 75 and 200 square meters around Saint Peter's Square. The Holy See has more than 4,000 properties in Italy and some 1,120 abroad – not including embassies. In Italy, about 30% of them are for these subsidized rentals for employees.
