Pope's new encyclical to be released in a matter of days?!

The report, however unlikely (read: very), comes out of India's Economic Times:

MUMBAI: The Vatican, the seat of the Catholic Church, has decided to lend a helping hand to governments across the globe that are trying to tackle the menace of cross-border tax evasion. It will soon come out with an Encyclical denouncing tax evasion and the tax havens that deprive many governments of resources for social justice.

According to the reports in the foreign media, the Encyclical, an official statement of the Pope issued periodically by the Catholic Church, will be released within a few days. The office of the Archbishop of Mumbai said it will be able to comment on the issue only after the Encyclical is released.

It makes sense that Indian presses would be particularly involved in speculation regarding the new encyclical's subject matter and release date. As I understand it, India is particularly notorious for its problems with tax evasion, where actually paying one's taxes to the government is the exception: most people find some way around the laws ("In fact, money flowing into Swiss bank accounts from India is estimated at $500 billion.")

Tax evasion will also be a political issue during our upcoming elections. The release time of this encyclical, whatever it is, will be interesting in the context of those accompanying debates. The local inspiration for the encyclical could well be the recent crackdown on tax evasion in Italy, led by Romano Prodi [source], himself a practicing Catholic who has called upon the Church to speak out on this issue. 1/3 of Italians, it is known, heavily evade their tax debts, creating a huge deficit problem for the government [source]. The time frame, of course, also coincides nicely with the 40th anniversary of Paul VI's encyclical Populorum Progressio [source].

What do we know for sure about the Encylical? One, that it is being worked on during the Pope's vacation [source: Msgr. Ganswein & Fr. Lombardi] Second, the subject matter will include the topics of globalization, tax evasion and offshore banks, as well as outline just guidelines for world trade, with care for the poor [source].

Already the debate over the wisdom of the Pope's perceived position is getting hot, and I guess that it would be too much to ask that people cool off until the time when we actually have a published text to read.

Until then, I'll be watching the ticker tape.