The Vatican newspaper L’Osservatore Romano has argued in an editorial that a Coptic papyrus fragment, which appears to refer to a wife of Jesus, is “a fake.”

The editorial notes that many scholars have questioned the authenticity of the purportedly ancient document, which was introduced by Harvard’s Karen King earlier this month and has received enormous worldwide publicity. Gian Maria Van, the editor of L’Osservatore Romano, said that the scholarly evidence pointed toward an “inept forgery.”...