«Per il rispetto alle somme Chiavi»: storia dello IOR prima dello IOR

[Autom. eng. transl.] The economic importance of the Church certainly represents for Italian historiography an acquired fact of modernity but, at the same time, a question, both descriptive and interpretative, with respect to the transformations that took place in the subsequent phase. For these reasons, the overall question of the relationship between the Catholic Church and the economy in contemporary Italy has been repeatedly indicated by the national scientific community of economic historians as one of the most fruitful and innovative perspectives of the specialist discipline of economic history. Within the historiography on the aforementioned topic, a thematic nucleus of great interest is certainly that relating to the management of Vatican finances. With regard to the path that led the Pontifical Administration for Works of Religion through various transformations, the historical reconstruction today is still extremely incomplete: little or nothing is known about the specific services it performs, the capital it administers and, above all, the reasons that imposed a progressive rethinking of its functioning. The aim of this study is to offer a first contribution in this direction by reconstructing the context, the problems and the internal reflections of the Holy See which, at the beginning of the Thirties, pushed towards the introduction of a statute and other crucial documents for the functioning of the aforementioned Administration.