Not that you’d know this from the Roman Catholic leadership.

Unquestionably, the abuse and corruption of children by sexually predatory Catholic priests and its concealment by church leaders long precedes the rise of Pope Francis. Nevertheless, as has been noted by Archbishop Carlo Maria Vigano, former Vatican ambassador to the United States, this rot reaches to the highest echelons of the Church leadership.

Thus, Vigano concludes, the Pope must resign.

This lifelong Roman Catholic agrees wholeheartedly.

The idea that the Pope was ignorant of what has occurred stretches credibility to the snapping point. But even if he was ignorant, his resignation would be a powerful symbolic expression of the Church’s resolve to repent of the evil that it has permitted for decades.

In all candor, though, there are still other reasons for why Francis should resign:

Simply put, by way of exploiting his office and influence toward the end of promoting, not traditional Church teaching, but a leftist political agenda that prominently features “climate change” and “[illegal] migrant’s rights,” Francis has injected confusion and division into the church.

The infusion of leftist ideology into the church became glaring this past weekend when the newly appointed Archbishop of Chicago, Cardinal Blasé Cupich, a defender of Pope Francis, remarked that Francis is not going to be distracted from his “bigger agenda” by going down the “rabbit hole” of the child sex scandal that’s rocked the church.

And what is this agenda? Cupich explains himself: The Pope has “got to get on with other things, of talking about the environment and protecting migrants and carrying on the work of the church” (emphasis mine).

While the Pope and his allies and defenders within the Church hierarchy fight such unspeakable evils as “climate change” and the desire of Western peoples to exercise control over the borders of their countries, they say remarkably little, if anything, about the systematic slaughter and oppression of Catholics and other Christians throughout the non-Western world.

For example, do you recall ever having heard Pope Francis condemn the abductions, the rapes, the beatings, the tortures, and murder to which, say, Nigerian Christians in the north of that African country are routinely subjected by members of the Islamic majority? The question answers itself.

Just a couple of days ago, on August 28, International Christian Concern reports that Fulani Herdsmen raided multiple villages in “the Barkin Ladi Local Government area of Plateau State” in Nigeria.

The “attack lasted for over four hours before security personnel arrived on scene. This was well after the attackers had razed much of the villages of Abonong and Zyiat, and looted valuables such as mattresses, food, electronics, and domestic animals.”

And three churches came under fire.

Seven people—a reverend, his wife, two other men, and _three children—_were murdered.

One of Reverend Adamu Gyang Wurim’s three surviving children was interviewed.

“_I’m a 300 level civil engineering student at University of Jos. I was in school when the incident happened. I got to know about the attack when I saw a post on Facebook that Abonong village [his home] was under attack. Immediately, I placed several calls trying to get in touch with my family members, but none rang through. When I called a friend to find out about the situation, the report I received was very devastating; I couldn’t believe that all my family members have been engulfed in the pogrom. On reaching home, I saw my daddy and younger ones burnt beyond recognition. The sight of the gory incident broke me down._”

Note: As the victims’ son correctly observes, the attack on Nigerian Christians by members of the Islamic majority is nothing more or less than a pogrom.

What’s worse is that in the estimation of the victims, the government of Nigeria is not only failing to protect besieged Christians; the government is aiding and abetting the perpetrators. Mr. Gwom Pam Dusu, a financial secretary of the Roman Catholic Church of Ziyat village, remarked:

“We were going out for surveillance, having received local security information about an impending attack planned by Fulani herdsmen with their hired mercenary. We heard heavy gunfire all over Ziyat and other neighboring villages.” Dusu forwarded the information to security personnel who were stationed nearby.

Yet they “didn’t do anything to avert the terrorist attacks.”

No doubt, the Pope’s leftist allies in the Church, like Cardinal Cupich in Chicago, think that the wholesale slaughter of Christians at the hands of Muslims (and some others) is a “distraction” that threatens to deter the Pope’s attention from such “crises” as “climate change” and national sovereignty.