Lawyer for Vatican’s ‘Romeo and Juliet’ claims firing is ‘null’ and ‘illegitimate’

ROME – A lawyer representing the Vatican’s “Romeo and Juliet,” shorthand for a young couple fired from the Vatican bank because their marriage violates a new regulation barring such relationships among employees, has filed an appeal asserting that the dismissal is “null, illegitimate and gravely damaging to the fundamental rights of persons and workers,” and thus is “devoid of any effect.”

Lawyer Laura Sgrò announced the appeal in an Oct. 2 press release, after the couple had received formal notice of their termination the day before.

Although the names of the couple have not been made public, their case came to light after the “Institute for the Works of Religion,” better known as the Vatican bank, issued a new set of regulations intended to bring the institution into compliance with generally accepted industry norms.

Among the new measures was a ban on marriages among employees, intended as a way of preventing conflicts of interest and promoting workplace harmony – a special concern, officials say, in an entity with just 105 employees all working in one central location, without any branch locations.

As it turns out, a couple working at the bank, with three young children, had announced their plans to marry shortly before the new regulation came into effect. In August, according to Sgrò, the couple made an appeal to Pope Francis requesting a dispensation from the new rules, but to date, she said, they haven’t had a response.

In her statement, Sgrò emphasized that neither of the two spouses had any management responsibility at the bank, and neither had access to confidential data on clients. She also said they worked in different departments of the bank and didn’t have any professional interaction.

Neither spouse, she said, got an offer from the bank to move to a different department or to another entity within the Vatican – and, in any event, Sgrò noted, such moves would also be barred by the new regulations.

She also said that couple was directed to leave their place of employment immediately, and also to surrender their ID cards, allowing them to enter and exit the Vatican, as well as their credit and debit cards from the bank itself.

At the moment, observers believe the most likely scenario seems to be that Sgrò’s appeal will end up before the Vatican’s civil tribunal, led by presiding Judge Giuseppe Pignatone. Sgrò is also involved in several other high-profile Vatican cases, including representing the family of Emanuela Orlandi, the “Vatican girl” who disappeared in 1983, as well as the mother of a Swiss Guard member found guilty of shooting his commander and the commander’s wife in 1998 before committing suicide.

Since the “Romeo and Juliet” case come to light, it’s generated backlash and protest among people who believe the Catholic church ought to be doing everything it can to support marriage, not to discourage it. Among those objecting is the Association of Lay Employees, the closest thing in the Vatican to a labor union.

“What hurts the church the most, and all of as Catholics who serve the church with our daily work, is the bitter realization that the sacrament of marriage, which by now has been debased throughout the world, instead of being defended and supported has become an motive for losing one’s job,” the group said in an Oct. 2 statement.

Such a penalty, the group said, treats marriage as an offense “on a par with gravely illicit acts, such as the revelation of office secrets.”

“It seems clear to us that the bank’s provision went beyond all human rights, but above all subjected the sacred institution of marriage to legal quibbles, compromising the image of the Church,” the group, vowing “concrete initiatives of protest” to support the couple, though without specifying what they might be.

Longtime observers say there’s never really been a “strike” in the Vatican, even if it’s an extremely common step in Italian labor/management relations generally. It’s not clear what other “initiatives of protest” an employees’ association might be able to mount.

In any event, lay employees group said it’s time for the Vatican to turn over a new leaf.

“We believe that in the Vatican, a season should be opened in which labor law is based on universally recognized principles and not on unilateral interpretations,” the statement said. “The deafening silence of the institutional bodies, and the apparent lack of humanity, is striking.”