From the Sunday Times:
OPUS DEI, the conservative Catholic organisation, has paid a rare and fulsome tribute to Gianmario Roveraro, an Italian banker who was found murdered last week, chopped into pieces beneath a motorway bridge.
The statement is as close as the group’s secretive policy allows to admitting that the pious financier was a member of the movement.
The kidnapping of Roveraro, whose remains were found on Friday after he was cut up with a chainsaw, has intensified the scrutiny of Opus Dei and echoed a scandal over the 1982 murder of Roberto Calvi, “God’s Banker”, who was found dead under Blackfriars Bridge in London. Calvi had had links to Opus Dei and was allegedly killed by the Sicilian mafia.
Opus Dei formally declined to confirm newspaper reports that he was a “supernumerary” or member.
However, Giuseppe Corigliano, its spokesman, said that Roveraro had “already received from God the reward for his many virtues”. These included “the courage to seek the truth, firmness in living the faith, dedication to his family, friends and anyone he came into contact with”.
