When you run a religion for a thousand years, you are bound to have vast wealth, an insane amount of influence globally, and a massive intelligence-gathering network. The Vatican is an unusual place where traditional laws do not apply and the banking is more secret than the Cayman Islands.
There are a few groups that are within the orbit of the Vatican that do some of the dirty work that the church can’t put its name on. These groups are never mentioned in the mainstream media for obvious reasons, but we know them as the Knights of Malta, Opus Dei, and Le Cercle, and their cover story is that they are doing God’s Work.