Foreign News: Assurances

Month ago Pope Pius XII, alarmed by the apparent imminence of war, secretly sent peace appeals to the heads of European States, first step, perhaps, of a plan to mediate in frightened Europe. Although widely heralded in the world’s press, the Vatican kept mum, issued no statement.

Last week, the Pope made his first public declaration concerning his peace efforts: “Toward the beginning of last month we thought it timely, after mature deliberation, to make known to some statesmen of the great European nations the anxiety the situation was causing us at that moment. . . . We received assurances of good will and of determination to maintain peace.”

None of the “statesmen” was named. Neither the Anglo-French lineup, which lost its shirt last time it sat down at a conference table with Herr Hitler, nor the militant Fascist powers warmed to Papal intervention. But the Pope has evidently not given up hope for a Vatican get-together, as he conferred with British Minister to the Vatican Francis D. G. Osborne and sent messages to London, Paris, Berlin, Rome, Warsaw. What he said to Minister Osborne remained a secret.