'God's Bankers' — New Book Offers a Detailed Look Inside the Mysterious and Powerful Vatican Bank

Image: Simon and Schuster

Corruption, money laundering, dealing with the Mafia and doing business with the Nazis — those topics and more are addressed in a recently-released history of the Vatican Bank.

Speaking about his new book, "God's Bankers: The History of Money and Power at the Vatican," author Gerald Posner appeared on Saturday's edition of Pure Opelka on TheBlaze radio.

Posner, a Catholic, talked about the unvarnished nature of the reporting in his book, calling it, "a history, a straight-forward presentation of the facts."

"God's Bankers" details the connections between the financial empire behind the world's largest religion and some of the darkest moments in history.

When asked about reported links between the Vatican Bank and the Nazis, Posner explained, "What I discovered is news, but it shouldn't be surprising."

Posner's extensive research uncovered how the Vatican Bank, through a layman, "invested in German and Italian insurance companies that were operating mostly in Eastern Europe."

The author is quick to point out, just because the Vatican bank invested with these companies, it did not mean they wanted the Nazis to win, Posner declared the Vatican bankers to be "equal opportunity profiteers."

He adds, "The Vatican was technically neutral, so they did what you would expect businessmen to do, they invested in both sides."

When asked by some if the book could be considered "anti-Catholic," Posner responds, "No, I'm Catholic, I'm writing this history as a Catholic. If you are writing the history of Germany as a German, you can't leave out the Holocaust because you think it's bad."

After chronicling some of the scandals and sketchy past of the Vatican Bank, Posner's book wraps up talking about the changes and transparency that Pope Francis is attempting to bring to the centuries-old institution.

The author candidly states, "There are a lot of low points in here, but as you know, it ends on a note of hope, because of [Pope] Francis."

Listen to the interview below:

__

Follow Mike Opelka (@Stuntbrain) on Twitter.