HIDDEN CHARGE.

Auckland Star, Volume LXXI, Issue 309, 30 December 1940, Page 7

HIDDEN CHARGE.

POPE'S PEACE POINTS. Hitler And Mussolini "In The Dock." British Official Wireless. (Reed. 9.30 a.m.) RUGBY, Dec. 29. The orkshire Post," commenting on the Pope's five peace points, recalls his statement a year ago and says:— "Between these two pronouncements, separated by 12 months of shattering events, there is a significant difference. A year ago the Pope was chiefly concerned to emphasise the principles which the outbreak of war violated; in this year's Christmas message he turns hie eyes towards the future.

"He speaks, as Hitler often boastfully speaks, of a 'new order for Europe.' But It is soon obvious that between Hitler's new order and the Pope's a bottomless gulf is fixed. The first principle of the Pope's new order is a triumph over hatred and a renunciation, therefore, of the systems and practices from which that hatred constantly receives fresh nourishment. Is .this one of .Hitler's triumphs? Ask the suffering Jews and tortured Poles, ask the prisoners in concentration camps, listen to the torrent of hatred and lies Goebbels pours out daily across the world.

"The Pope's second principle is a triumph over mistrust, which is an eternal barrier to that fidelity to the observance of pacts, without which It is impossible for nations to live safely together. In October, 1933, Hitler sai(i, 'I am willing to sign anything, Why should one not please others and facilitate matters for oneself by signing pacts if others believe something is thereby accomplished or regulated! Why should I not make an agreement in good faith to-day and unhesitatingly break it to-morrow if the future of the German people demands it.'

"The Pope's third principle speaks of a triumph over the germs of conflict in the field of world economy. Here, indeed, is a vital task to which all countries must set themselves most earnestly after the war, but Hitler dreams of accomplishing it by a method of his own. His world economy would be a world-wide system of slavery with vassal peoples toiling for the benefit of their German masters."

The 'Tost" concludes: "The world will say the Pope has passed sentence on certain unnamed criminals, but that there is no mistaking who stands in the dock. His five principles are the principles which Hitler and Mussolini have constantly defied. By the Pope's Christian standard, the dictators are decisively condemned."