World Finance Executives Warn Vatican: Don’t Change A Thing – UPDATED

UPDATED 12/12/2014 – Though I tagged this as “Satire” apparently it was mistaken for actual news. My apologies. One of the officials I originally “cited” requested I pull his name, as apparently the article was generating concerns from readers who thought the poor guy had in fact contacted the Holy Father. I gamely substituted a different randomly-chosen character to fill the slot. I assure you, even if world financial leaders are urging the Pope to reconsider this “financial transparency” thing, they aren’t copying me on their memos.

ROME – Financial officials around the globe are reeling at the news that the Vatican found “Hundreds of Millions of Euros” during a recent financial overhaul. In a sternly-worded memorandum to Pope Francis, Douglas Elmendorf, Director of the Congressional Budget Office, warned the Holy Father, “Hide that money fast. Once people know about it, it’s gone.”

German Finance Minister Wolfgang Schäuble held an emergency press conference in which he declared, “There is evidence that a European nation — admittedly a very small European nation — is solvent. We must examine the situation and see if there is anyway Germany, too, can have secret accounts full of money.”

Responding to Cardinal Pell’s comments that “Problems were kept ‘in house’ . . . Very few were tempted to tell the outside world what was happening,” Schäuble observed, “It might be better if EU nations stopped talking to each other, too. It could solve financial governance problems and save on travel and translation expenses as well.”

Meanwhile, the Pontifical Council for Inter-religious Dialogue confirmed it passed on to Cardinal Pell an erroneously-directed message from Saudi Minister of Finance Ibrahim Abdulaziz Al-Assaf. “We thought it was a follow-up to the Holy Father’s visit to Turkey, but it turned out to be something else entirely. It was a quickly-scrawled note — almost desperate you might think, with PELL!! on the top, and then, WE NEED TO TALK.”

Saudi officials did not confirm the report, but off the record a member of ministry staff allowed, “As one theocratic monarchy to another, there are some tips we can share on how to quickly get that money stored for safekeeping.”

Cardinal Pell declined to comment, other than to say, “Hey look, I found a quarter. Did anyone drop this?”