From the AP report on the Pope’s resignation running in hundreds of newspapers.

The German theologian, whose mission was to reawaken Christianity in a secularized Europe, grew increasingly frail as he shouldered the monumental task of purging the Catholic world of a sex abuse scandal that festered under John Paul II and exploded during his reign into the church’s biggest crisis in decades, if not centuries.

Now I could take them to task for the false notion that the abuse scandal ‘exploded’ under Pope Benedict as it went kaboom earlier than that. But leaving that aside, holy run-on sentence batman.

I would say that the reporter, whose mission it is to fairly, accurately, and concisely report the news, grew increasingly foolish as she shouldered the monumental task of reporting to the world about the resignation of a Pope, a story that that should have been simple to write but rather exploded in the hands of this reporter who embarrassed herself for decades, if not centuries.

Nicole Winfield has sometimes been a decent reporter on Church issues in the past. I suppose her editors would not let her submit a piece without numerous mentions of the abuse scandal. Perhaps she wrote that awful sentence as a coded message revealing the gun to her head.

*subhead*Ugh.*subhead*