Denver Catholic

22 MARCH 9-22, 2019 | DENVER CATHOLIC I n December 1894, Captain Alfred Dreyfus of the French Army was convicted of treason on the grounds that he had given military secrets to France's mortal enemy, Germany. The charge was false; Dreyfus, a Jew, was framed. His trial was surrounded by mass hysteria and people with no grasp of the facts celebrated when Dreyfus was condemned to life impris- onment on Devil's Island in French Guiana, the horrors of which were viv- idly captured in the fi lm Papillon. The Dreyfus Až air roiled French politics for the better part of a gener- ation, pitting "Dreyfusards" (mainly secularist and republican) against anti-Dreyfusards (primarily roy- alist and Catholic). The stench of anti-Semitism hung over it all; one Catholic who refused to succumb to that ancient psychosis was Pope Leo XIII, who told the editor of the Paris newspaper Figaro that Dreyfus's suf- fering reminded him of Calvary. In 1906, the Dreyfusards saw their man vindicated, but the wounds in French society caused by the Dreyfus Až air remained open and festering long after Dreyfus returned to the army and served honorably in World War I. The conviction of Cardinal George Pell in December 2018 on charges of "historic sexual abuse" is this genera- tion's Dreyfus Až air. Ever since those charges were laid a year and a half ago, an atmosphere of public hysteria, fueled by secularist anti-Catholicism, has surrounded the case. That hysteria was intensifi ed by the global Catholic sex abuse crisis, despite the fact that Cardinal Pell had been the leading Australian bishop fi ghting sex abuse. It is inconceivable that this Dreyfus-like public atmo- sphere did not have a distorting ež ect on Cardinal Pell's two trials. Though the trials were held under an Aus- tralian media blackout, irrationality and venom, stoked by media bias, had already done their work. The cardinal's fi rst trial last fall ended in a hung jury that voted 10-2 for acquittal (the jury foreman wept on reporting the deadlock). The second trial, amazingly, ended with a 12-0 verdict for conviction: even though the accuser's charges were never corroborated by anyone; even though police incompetence in investigating the alleged scene of the crime was fully demonstrated; and even though the cardinal's defense showed that 10 implau sible things would had to have occurred simulta- neously, within a carefully controlled space of Melbourne's St. Mary's Cathedral, for the charges to be true. There are obvious dissimilarities between the Dreyfus až air and the Pell case: Dreyfus's was defended by secular people, while the attacks on George Pell over the past quarter-cen- tury have come, in the main, from aggressive secularists. The unhinged loathing of French royalists and anti-Semites for the Jewish bogeyman Alfred Dreyfus is, however, ominously similar to the unhinged loathing of secular progressives for the bogeyman George Pell. Dreyfus embodied the fears and hatreds of royalist French- men still fi ghting against the French Revolution; Cardinal Pell embodies what the cultural and political left in Australia fears and hates: Chris- tian doctrinal and moral orthodoxy, including the robust defense of the right to life from conception until natural death and a commitment to marriage rightly understood. Further, Pell compounded his ož enses in the eyes of his enemies by relishing public debates in which he challenged the shibboleths of the politically correct on everything from climate change to the New Atheism. To the anti-Dreyfusards, Captain Alfred Dreyfus had no business in the French Army and was unfi t to partic- ipate in a properly ordered French society, so he had to be destroyed. According to those who created a rancid public atmosphere in Austra- lia, in which a 10-2 verdict for acquit- tal could be fl ipped to a unanimous verdict for conviction on uncorrobo- rated and unproven charges, Cardinal George Pell must be destroyed, so that Australia's revolution of lifestyle libertinism and political progressiv- ism can proceed, unimpeded. Cardinal Pell is now in jail awaiting sentencing, after which he will appeal his unwarranted and unjust convic- tion. Anyone who cares about justice, be they religious or not, must hope that the appellate panel of judges concludes that Pell's conviction was what Australian law calls an "unsafe verdict" — one the jury could not rationally have reached on the evi- dence. Yet even if justice is done and Cardinal Pell is freed, Australia, and the rest of the West, is going to have to think long and hard about how this travesty could have happened — just as France did after the Dreyfus Až air. Perspectives The Catholic Diš erence George Weigel is a distinguished senior fellow of the Ethics and Public Policy Center in Washington, D.C. GEORGE WEIGEL F or many of us, marriage is the messy battleground where holiness must be forged, broken, and then re-forged again. But because it takes place amid the daily grind of doing dishes, picking up kids from school, and remem- bering that we said we'd give our spouse a back- rub Wednesday night, it is easy to forget that an epic war for your soul (and your spouse's) takes place each and every day during the mundane moments of life. One practice that I train the cou- ples I work with to do is a spousal examination of conscience (and to be clear, this means that you explore your conscience, not your spouse's!). When you think about why things are going wrong in your relationship, it is easy to blame the other person, but years of marriage will teach you that if there is anything in life you don't have control over, it is your spouse. When we try to control things that we can't, we end up feeling frustrated and helpless. A good question to ask yourself in marriage is: "Do I want to be right, or do I want to be happy?" The spouse who wants to be right is convinced that he is the "better one" in the rela- tionship. The spouse who wants to be happy places his spouse and the marriage as a whole above his own personal pride. If you focus on con- trolling yourself rather than others, and if you would be joyful rather than right, you are beginning to live out a covenantal marriage. If you take this practice up, real changes will begin to happen because you are being more intentional about improving your own weaknesses with the help of God's grace and insight from the Holy Spirit. And who knows, you may even be right … once in a while! Refl ect on these points during Lent and see just how things can improve when you focus on fi xing yourself, and not your spouse. 1. Did I make my spouse the highest priority in my life after God today? How so? How can I improve upon this tomorrow? 2. Was I forgiving of my husband/ wife, or did I harbor resentment towards his or her shortcomings? Did I make my home more like a confessional or a courthouse today? When my spouse made a mistake or was imperfect did I quickly and joyfully ož er forgiveness? 3. When I fell short today, even in small matters, did I seek forgive- ness from my spouse? 4. Did I work hard today to show my spouse just how much God loves him/her? How so? 5. Did I truly listen to my spouse today? Did I take the time to com- municate clearly and openly? 6. When things went wrong, did I focus on how I contributed to the problem, or on how my spouse "messed up?" 7. Did I serve my spouse today in both big and small ways? 8. Have I prayed for my spouse today? Have I prayed with him/ her today? 9. Did I prefer to be "right" today, or did I prefer to be "happy?" 10. Have I given my spouse the benefi t of the doubt today, trusting that he/she also wants to have the best marriage possible? 11. Did I treat my spouse like my best friend today, or simply as a part- ner or roommate? 12. How have I fallen short in helping him/her get to heaven? Dr. Jim Langley is a licensed clinical psychologist and the director of St. Raphael Counseling under Catholic Charities of Denver. Visit straphaelcounseling.com. DR. JIM LANGLEY An examination of conscience for spouses Cardinal Pell: Our Dreyfus Case

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