As Pope John Paul II visits communist Poland, his defiance stuns the KGB. Behind the scenes, Calvi is financing the Pope's covert war on communism. Nicolo tracks down Francesco Pazienza, a spy who collaborated with Calvi. But then, a shocking call: “They’ve just shot the Pope!” Calvi senses danger closing in—who’s next? Friends of the Pod get early access to the entire first season of Shadow Kingdom: God's Banker before it drops for everyone else—ads included. Get early access to the full season now by joining Crooked’s Friends of the Pod at crooked.com/friends. Hear this episode in Italian by subscribing to Il Banchiere di Dio wherever you get your podcasts. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Chapter 1: What is the premise of 'God’s Banker I 4. The Priest and the Spy'?
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— Good evening. The pope is in Poland. The leader of the Roman Catholic Church has returned home, home to a nation that is both communist and devoutly Catholic.
Chapter 2: Why was Pope John Paul II's visit to Poland significant?
— It was a hot day in 1979 when Pope John Paul II's plane touched down on the Polish runway. Half the world was monitoring the plane's itinerary on television.
No pope has ever visited a communist country before. It is a profound religious and political event.
He'd been pope only eight months, the first non-Italian pope in over 400 years. And as a proud Polish citizen, he was returning to his homeland for the first time since taking on the papacy. But it wasn't just a homecoming. It was an incredibly dangerous political act.
Most members of the Polish Communist Party Presidium had strong objections to the Pope's visit, but realized there was little they could do to prevent it.
Because Poland at that time was 90% Catholic, and Poles were desperate to see their beloved son come home. But Poland was also communist, part of the Soviet bloc. And communist leaders saw religion, and the Catholic Church in particular, as a threat, a rival. They'd been trying to banish Christianity in Poland for decades.
In the 70s, protests and strikes were breaking out in multiple cities across the country. And now, here were over a million pro-Christian and likely anti-communist citizens all together lining the streets of Warsaw, amped up for their pope.
A crackdown seemed inevitable, if not by Polish authorities, then by the Soviet army.
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Chapter 3: How did the Polish people react to the Pope's visit?
Though Polish officials didn't want to allow the Pope's visit, denying his entry meant that they'd face a possible riot. No other Pope had managed to slip behind the Iron Curtain before, but this Pope, the Polish Pope, he made his way in, which was unbelievable. Christ had breached the Iron Curtain. The West had breached the Curtain.
Every Catholic who grew up during the Cold War probably knows about this trip. It was like a grudge match. The Pope facing off against the communists. At stake was the fate of Poland.
...shaping up as the greatest demonstration of church loyalty ever seen in a Soviet bloc country.
I've heard this story from my grandmother, who watched the scene from her television in Rome, but I never actually saw the images until now. In front of millions, and I mean millions, of Poles, Pope John Paul II strode confidently on a platform that was half altar, half Monsters of Rock stage, He was calm, like he knew exactly what he was doing.
He knew that his next move could change the course of Polish history and really world history. Would he encourage Poles to rise up against communism and risk their lives? Or would he play it safe?
with police and spies for the KGB watching in the wings, John Paul didn't explicitly tell his country folk to fight, but he did tell them to keep living the life that God wanted for them, to keep going to church, keep supporting trade unions in defiance of Soviet policies.
John Paul's call is clear. Embrace God and choose him, not a communist doctrine. Have faith.
Then the Pope looked out into the crowd and paused. I assumed that there'd be mass arrests erupting at this point, but no. At the end of the homily, the Polish crowds began to sing.
Frequent long applause interrupted him and once led spontaneously to an old Polish song they sang with their pope's amplified voice in unison, changing the Soviet-approved words, God bless our independent Poland, to the words, God bring an independent Poland.
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Chapter 4: What role did Roberto Calvi play in the Vatican's financial dealings?
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That is L-U-M-E-N dot M-E slash kingdom for 20% off your purchase. Thank you, Lumen, for sponsoring this episode. So the Pope needed a banker to make his money disappear, and Calvi, whose name had been outed in a secret Masonic conspiracy, needed a high-powered patron to bounce back. And they, the Pope and Calvi, would come together via a six-foot-two rugby-playing bishop.
He is a man of great power, the governor of Vatican City and the head of the Vatican Bank.
Marcinkus is roughly the Vatican's number three. He is also a kind of chief bodyguard for the Pope, the burly figure you see next to John Paul on foreign trips.
Archbishop Paul Marcinkus was an American from the outskirts of Chicago. Author Gerald Posner shared more.
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Chapter 5: Who is Archbishop Paul Marcinkus and what was his involvement?
Which meant less cash in Calvi's bank. This created a problem for Calvi. The money that he would normally use to keep his operation going was drying up. If he was in the Pope's good graces, perhaps he could leverage that trust to gain more support for his bank.
He needed to make sure that the church kept the investments they already had in his bank, Banco Ambrosiano, as other investors were jumping ship. And so, Calvi got to work. But soon after, Calvi received word from a spy who said he knew all about his plans with the Vatican and he wanted to meet with Calvi or else. Espresso, pre-interview espresso is being made.
It's the summer of 2023, another sweltering day in Italy, and I'm in what looks like a pool house at a villa waiting for an espresso to be made before my source is willing to talk to me. He didn't give me his address until a few minutes before the interview, which I'm getting used to at this point. Do you have a favorite place to sit somewhere? I put my ass wherever I want.
You put your ass wherever you want? Yeah. He lights up his pipe and will continue to do so, refilling and lighting throughout our five-hour interview.
My name is Francesco, but everybody call me Frank.
Francesco, Frank, Pazienza is a jack of all trades. He was a medical doctor, a hard-nosed businessman, and most importantly, Pacienza used to be a spy, working for the Italian version of the CIA.
Posner told me that if I wanted to understand how Calvi and the Pope were working together to send money behind the Iron Curtain, I had to talk to Pacienza, because at the time, he was spying on the Vatican. You see, one of the dirty secrets I've learned about the Vatican was that cardinals and bishops were all spying on each other.
One rival cardinal apparently hired Pacienza to dig up dirt on Archbishop Marcinkus. And so what do you, he tells you this, he implies, fuck Marcinkus. What are you thinking? What's going on in your head?
I was thinking, I was thinking, I said, something funny is going on over there. But I had the idea that I was living probably one of the most important situation of the world. So I say, I have to find the documents.
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Chapter 6: How did Francesco Pazienza become involved with Calvi and the Vatican?
I only report to you. Only report to you.
And we agree on my steps.
This sounded unbelievable, except that it was confirmed in every book, every article I've read about Patienza's hiring. In early 1981, he became Calvi's fixer for about a half a million dollars a year. Instead of fucking over Marcinkis, Patienza quit being a spy and went to work for the covert Marcinkis-Calvi Cold War slush fund syndicate. What did that actually involve?
Well, Calvi normally moved through loans and wire transfers. But to ensure that the money was untraceable, the best way here was to go with literal cash, gold, preferably, moved across borders. One story that Pazienza told me was about a call he got from Archbishop Marcinkis. He said that the Pope wanted to transport $3 million in gold across the Iron Curtain to a Polish anti-communist group.
If you send me, I will send you three million. A gram, two gram, etc., etc.
Pazienza flew the money to Calvi's associates in Switzerland, where the currency could be converted to small ingots of 99.99% pure gold. Pazienza then brought the gold back into Italy, and then to the border of Italy and Yugoslavia. There, he met a priest who would drive the gold to Poland in a small car.
This is the car, the most expensive car in the world, I say, because it's a $3 million car. So I let check in, the brake, everything.
Pacienza said he checked every inch of this beat-up Soviet car, then he put a false bottom for the gold.
When the car was ready, I said, Monsignor, how long will you take? He said, listen, I drive day and night, a couple of days. Okay. He said, this is the number you have to call from Danzica. When you arrive in Danzica, you call me and say... Happy birthday. I understand that you arrived. Okay.
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