...they practice triple entry bookkeeping!
...one for the public,
another for the church,
and one for themselves.
Francis like Eva Peron wants to keep the money rolling!
The report the Vatican shows the public is its annual budget. This is the non-profit part of the books which is expected to break even, sometimes it shows a small profit, but most often it shows a deficit. The for-profit part of the Vatican's books is called the comprehensive annual financial report or something similar to it. In this is listed all the assets of the Holy See, land, stocks, bonds, etc... The kicker here is the Vatican depreciates many of their assets away so it appears as if they don't have the amount of assets that they possess in reality. One example, the pension funds. The assets controlled by the Vatican in the pension fund show up as assets but they deduct what they estimate they will have to pay out over say the next 50 years and subtract the whole amount now. Viola you have a near-deficit! With Francis bringing his revolution to the bookkeeping of Vatican finance don't expect transparent workings or full accountability. All this is at the end of the day, is a power grab sold to the public as reform. Expect those in the pews to continue to make-up the "short fall" for the foreseeable future.
