Free Republic

Eyeing 2025 Jubilee, Vatican opens shopping mall just off St. Peter’s SquareROME – Perhaps it was inevitable that the most storied church in Christendom eventually would be flanked by a chapel to that other defining Western creed, consumerism. Fulfilling that bit of destiny, the Vatican opened its very own shopping mall on March 16, located immediately adjacent to St. Peter’s Square.The idea behind the new 120,000 square foot “Caput Mundi” Mall, using a traditional saying about Rome as the “capital of the world,” is to appeal not only to the four million visitors who move through the Vatican every year,...

Pope’s Order of Malta reforms ‘illegal’ under UK charity law, says senior knight The Pope’s reforms of the Order of Malta are illegal under UK law and has placed the organisation on a collision course with the Charity Commission, a senior British knight has said.Richard Fitzalan-Howard, a recently-retired President of the British Association of the Sovereign Order or Malta (BASMOM) and a Bailiff Grand Cross, also broke his silence to tell members that the Order’s sovereignty has been “severely damaged” by papal reforms unveiled early last month.In a letter to all members of the BASMOM, Mr Fitzalan-Howard said that...

Order of Malta would be 'subject' of Holy See under new constitutionCenturies of diplomatic independence for the Sovereign Military Order of Malta could come to an end if a new Vatican-drafted constitution for the order is put into effect. The new constitution could see the religious order lose its permanent observer status at the United Nations, and would imperil its bilateral diplomatic ties.The new constitution, which would explicitly define the order as a “subject” of the Holy See, would end nearly a millennia of sovereign independence for the religious order, have sweeping implications for its diplomatic relationships with more than...