If you want to know how the reform of Vatican finances is going, two developments are a bellwether: the appointment of Fr Juan Antonio Guerrero SJ to succeed Cardinal George Pell as prefect of the Secretariat for the Economy; and the bizarre, unceremonious end of Swiss layman René Brülhart’s tenure as president of the Vatican’s Financial Information Authority. Either development would, on its own, signal profound crisis. Taken together, the developments indicate that there is really no point in talking about ongoing financial reform efforts in the Vatican.