The latest on the Pope

I've not been paying as much attention as usual to what's been happening in the church lately, but today I tried to catch up ...

Wednesday Pope Francis said that getting an abortion was like "hiring a hit man" no matter what the reason. Sigh :(

And this week there's been a synod taking place on youth in the church ... young people are leaving the Catholic church in droves. The synod is another example of how Pope Francis fails on the subject of women. The clergy attending the synod are allowed to vote on the issues that are raised - but only if they are male ... About 10 percent of the synod participants are women, all chosen by Pope Francis, and none are appointed with voting rights.

And then there's that pesky allegation made against Pope Francis that he covered up the sex abuse of McCarrick. At first Francis tried the silent treatment, refusing to even address the issue. When the allegations did not die away, his next tactic was to imply his accusers were inspired by the devil. That didn't make the allegations disappear either. The pope's latest effort is to allow a limited look through the Vatican's archives on McCarrick. This is like Trump having the FBI do a limited "investigation" of Kavanaugh to make the bad thing go away - no one is going to take this seriously. Why won't the pope simply say "nope, I didn't do that"? Given the fact that Francis was buddies with McCarrick for years before he became the pope, I think the answer is that he cannot honestly say that. Read more: Analysis: Do Vatican officials see abuse crisis as a referendum on the pope?

Reformer pope? Not so much.