In a Rome clinic last week lay Myron Charles Taylor, 66, slowly convalescing from his second gallstone operation in a twelvemonth. Despite his efforts as special ambassador to Pope Pius XII, World War II had spread further than ever. Reports were persistent that Mr. Taylor would resign when he was well enough.
Mr. Taylor started with a strike against him when U. S. Protestants hotly protested his appointment, cried that it encroached on the historic separation of Church & State. Last week the U. S. Evangelical and Reformed Church added its official outcry to those of the Methodists, Presbyterians, Lutherans, Baptists and Seventh Day Adventists. Strike two was Italy's entry into the war, which fouled the Pope's peace efforts, left Mr. Taylor no one with whom to cooperate.
Third strike and out on Mr. Taylor—the Catholic Church's tacit participation in the spoils of Fascist victory—last week became a distinct possibility. To Il Duce went a telegram from 30 Italian Bishops, urging him to crown "the unfailing victory of our Army" by planting the Italian flag over Jerusalem. In England, the Manchester Guardian reported that the Axis powers plan to turn Palestine over to the jurisdiction of the Vatican and transport Palestine's Jewish population to Ethiopia.
Under the plan, said the Guardian, the Pope will care for the holy places in Palestine, let Italy run the country.