Bombshell book alleges a gay subculture at Vatican

PARIS — A gay French writer has lifted the lid on what he calls one of the world’s largest gay communities — the Vatican.

He estimates most of its prelates are homosexually inclined and he attributes much of the current crisis in the Catholic Church to an internal struggle.

In the explosive book, “In the Closet of the Vatican,” author Frederic Martel describes a gay subculture at the Vatican and calls out the hypocrisy of Catholic bishops and cardinals who in public denounce homosexuality but in private lead double lives.

Aside from the subject matter, the book is astonishing for the access Martel had to the inner sanctum of the Holy See.

Martel writes that he spent four years researching it in 30 countries, including weeks at a time living inside the Vatican walls.

He says the doors were opened by a key Vatican gatekeeper and friend of Pope Francis who was the subject of the pontiff’s famous remark about gay priests, “Who am I to judge?”

In an interview Friday in a Paris hotel, Martel said he didn’t tell his subjects he was writing about homosexuality in the Vatican.

But he said it should have been obvious to them since he is a gay man who was researching the inner world of the Vatican and has written about homosexuality before.

He said it was easier for him, as a gay foreigner, to gain the trust of those inside the Vatican than it would have been for an Italian journalist or Vatican expert.

“If you’re heterosexual it’s even harder. You don’t have the codes,” he told the Associated Press. “If you’re a woman, even more so.”

Martel says he conducted nearly 1,500 in-person interviews with 41 cardinals, 52 bishops or monsignors, and 45 Vatican and foreign ambassadors.

Martel said he was assisted by 80 researchers, translators, fixers and local journalists, as well as a team of 15 lawyers.