'Nobody will speak the truth anymore!’ Pope Francis sends ‘warning sign’ with ‘ill-advised’ Cardinal Burke decision

In 2014, a year after Francis was chosen, the Pope removed Burke as head of a Vatican tribunal and moved him to a largely ceremonial post several days after Burke said the Church under Francis was "like a ship without a rudder".

Francis told the heads of Vatican offices last week about his decision to punish Cardinal Burke because he was a source of “disunity” in the church, according to The Associated Press, which based its report on an unnamed official who attended the meeting.

Talking about the decision, Gloria told GB News host Jacob Rees-Mogg: "Cardinal Burke is a victim. I'm sure that they have badmouthed him a lot in Rome and it was very ill-advised to send him away because of course now all the cardinals are very scared to to say anything they believe.

"You can't give your opinion anymore without having to fear that you're getting stripped of all your belongings.

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"Because don't forget, these people don't have an income if the Pope strips them of an income, they have to go and beg because they have nothing else to live on.

"He stripped his apartment. He stripped his pension, so he needs to find good people who will support him, and that's a warning sign for any cardinal. But what does that mean? .

"It means that nobody will speak the truth anymore because they fear they will offend the Pope and the Pope will react with these relentlessly strict and unjust measures."

She added: "You will be very astonished, but I like Pope Francis very much. The only thing about him is that he is a total chaos and he has extremely incompetent people around him to advise him.

"But he's a very lovable man and he means well. Meaning well is sometimes or more often the contrary of right, so he's a bit stuck, but as a person, he is a nice man."

Rees-Mogg argued in response: "Most importantly, the Pope needs to be a holy man before being a good administrator."

Princess Gloria disagreed, stating: "I am not sure about that. I think at this point in time we need a very thorough and good administrator and not a holy Pope.

"A holy Pope you can afford when everything runs smoothly. Now you need a decision-maker and a toughy. He is tough, but the decision-making is not so fabulous."

Rees-Mogg then asked if in a now "secular world", shouldn't supporters need a church that is "really strong about what it believes in".

Princess Gloria agreed, explaining: "Yes, it has, but it could do more on that sector. I feel that we are now in a phase where the Church is very much looking to mainstream and to sort of go along with the power of the world.

"And I think we need a Pope like Pius the 9th, who was a very good Pope because he took decisions and because he was tough in a politically difficult time."