The Dispatch

The biases of a Royal Commission

June 17, 2020 George Weigel 11

A brief dip into Latin helps us understand how preconceptions can lead to biased judgments that falsify history — as they did when an Australian Royal Commission on sexual abuse recently impugned the integrity of […]

Essay

Audrey Donnithorne: Woman of Valor

June 12, 2020 George Weigel 7

The first two sentences of Audrey Donnithorne’s autobiography, China in Life’s Foreground, suggest something of her character, independence of mind, and dry sense of humor: I am an Overseas Brit and a Sichuan country girl. […]

The Dispatch

The Vatican’s Choice: Jimmy Lai or Xi Jinping?

June 3, 2020 George Weigel 4

In mid-May, Chinese leader Xi Jinping unveiled a plan to bypass Hong Kong’s legislature and impose draconian new “national security” laws on the former British colony. Putatively intended to defend Hong Kong from “secessionists,” “terrorists,” […]

Analysis

The Anatomy of a Pathology

May 25, 2020 George Weigel 38

Those who imagined that the sliming of Cardinal George Pell would stop as of April 7, when a unanimous decision of the High Court of Australia acquitted him of “historical sexual abuse,” did not reckon […]

The Dispatch

Games intellectuals play

May 20, 2020 George Weigel 13

Shortly after President John F. Kennedy’s cabinet met for the first time, Vice President Lyndon Johnson waxed enthusiastic about the best and the brightest to his mentor, Speaker Sam Rayburn. They were all so brilliant, […]

The Dispatch

On John Paul II’s centenary

May 13, 2020 George Weigel 4

As the world and the Church mark the centenary of the birth of Pope St. John Paul II on May 18, a kaleidoscope of memories will shape my prayer and reflection that day. John Paul […]