Palestine Commissioner Received by the Pope

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XLIX, Issue 35, 7 September 1922, Page 33

Palestine Commissioner Received by the Pope

Sir Herbert Samuel’s private audience with the Pope (says Catholic News Service, London) has aroused a great deal of interest in all quarters in Italy, both those that are Catholic as well as the purely political. The High Commissioner for Palestine passed through Rome on his way from-London to Jerusalem, and in view of the recent visit of the Latin Patriarch of Jerusalem to London, as well as the presence there at the present time of the Italian k oreign Minister, an unusual importance is, attached to the private conversation between the Holy Father, and the head of the Palestine Administration, The audience was extremely formal so far as the outward circumstances were concerned. Sir Herbert Samuel was accompanied to the Vatican by the British Minister, Count de Salis, and both were received at the . Apostolic Palace with full military honors by the Papal troops. The* High Commissioner was received by the Pope in the private library of his Holiness, and the conversation lasted for half an hour. At the conclusion of his audience with the Pope, Sir Herbert Samuel paid the usual visit of ceremony to the Cardinal Secretary of State, where lie remained closeted with Cardinal Gasparri for an unusually long time. Nothing, of course, is known of what took place at either of these two audiences; but some of the Roman. newspapers express the opinion that an understanding between the Holy See and the British authorities is not impossible of realisation. The Holy See has never opposed the Jewish National Home-in Palestine, as such, and provided that the Christian, interests in the Holy Places are adequately safeguarded and the Holy Land is mot permitted to become a Jewish political State, it appears that there ; are no insuperable obstacles in the way of an understanding. At any rate, since the Holy Father and the Palestine High Commissioner have conversed face to face, there is removed any grounds for a misunderstanding of the actual position,