Pope Francis’s landmark conference on Catholicism in the Amazon has taken a vindictive twist after indigenous Amazonian fertility statuettes were stolen from a church near St Peter’s Basilica and hurled into the Tiber.

The theft was carried out by ultra-conservative Catholics who viewed the figures as pagan.

The four statuettes depicted pregnant native women holding their bellies, Mother Earth figures that were brought to Rome from the Amazon for the Vatican summit.

Conservatives are also furious the Vatican is discussing the possibility of allowing married men in Amazonia to be ordained as a way of addressing the dearth of priests in the region.

The four wooden statuettes were stolen before dawn on Monday from Santa Maria in Traspontina Church, a few hundred yards from St Peter’s Square, with the thieves filming the raid and then uploading it to YouTube. LifeSite News, a conservative Catholic website, carried a statement from activists who said they were behind the theft.

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