PRIMATE IN HOLY LAND

THE Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr. Ramsey, stressed his hopes for Christian unity during his visit to the Holy Land last week to preside at a meeting of Anglican clergy.
He preached on the unity theme in St. George's Anglican Cathedral in Jerusalem: and he described a reception given for him by the Rev. Peter Schneider. head of the Anglican community, which was attended by Catholic and Armenian Orthodox Patriarchs as "an ecumenical reunion forecasting the unity we all hope for".
Bishop Kaldany, vicar for Israel of the Latin-rite Patriarchate of Jerusalem, kissed the Anglican Primate's episcopal ring, and learned that it was the one the Pope had slipped from his finger and given to Dr. Ramsey in Rome.
Among the Archbishop's many engagements e as a visit to a Samaritsin community on Mount Gerizim, 41) miles from Jeru
salem, where he was received by the High Priest of the 345 surviving Samaritans, Amran Ben Isaac. He also visited Jacob's Well, near Nablus, where Jesus asked for a drink of water from the Samaritan woman who had come to draw water.
Pope Pius defended
A Canadian born Israeli author, Pinhas Lapide, is publishing a book in Holland this year, The Last Three Popes and the Jews, in which he credits Pope Pius XII with having saved at least 700.000 Jews from the Nazi gas chambers.
Pope Pius spoke out in defence of the Jews in encyclicals, pastoral messages and radio appeals, says Mr. Lapide, and did all he could to initiate rescue work secretly. Last week the author said he had waited for the Vatican to refute charges such as those in Rolf Huchhuth's play The Deputy. but
"apparently it does not know the results of the Pope's repeated interventions".
Eastern review
A semi-annual review dealing with news of the Eastern Churches—Catholic and Anglican—is to be published in London from the end of this month by the Eastern Churches Study Group of London, under the patronage of the Melkite-rite Patriarch Maxims IV Saigh. of Antioch.
Eastern Churches Review will be edited by Mrs. Barbara Fry and Donald Attwater, both authorities on the Eastern Church. The board of advisers includes, Catholic. Orthodox and Anglican clergy. The overall object is to promote OrthodoxCatholic dialogue.
Delay foreseen
Pope Paul's Commission on Birth Control announced last week that it \Sas impossible to set a date lor the issue of a
definitive report on which the Pope could act, although he is reported to have asked for firm recommendations by mid-June.
Fr. Henri de Riedmatten, the Swiss Dominican serving as Commission secretary, said it was not possible to fix a date "for whatever pronouncement the supreme authority may decide to make". According to some Vatican sources the final report may not be available until the end of the year.
`Lion of Munster
The late Cardinal von Galen, Archbishop of Munster. was described as "Hitler's greatest opponent in Germany" at a meeting last week in Munster to mark the 20th anniversary of his death.
Dr. Rudolf Morsey, a Bonn historian, said the "Lion of Munster". as he was called. bitterly opposed the concentration camp slaughter, and predicted at the invasion of Poland that Germany would lose the %var.