The “English Churchman” quotes the following remarks by Mr Norman St John Stevas, Conservative MP for Chelmsford and an ardent Romanist, which appeared in the Roman Catholic newspaper “The Tablet”:
“The Protestant underworld has attempted to exploit anti-papal emotions in Britain by pointing to the sinister overtones of the very nomenclature of the European Charter—The Treaty of Rome—and they have a point, although not quite the one they are seeking to make. As the European countries grow together and build up joint social, economic and political interests, they are bound to draw closer together religiously as well. The unhappy rift which was opened at the Reformation with the rise of nationalism is likely to grow narrower as nationalism recedes into a wider European setting. It would be strange indeed if religion was the one matter to be left out of European Union.”
The Roman Catholic Church, as can be seen from these remarks, is not blind to the advantages she can expect from Western European Union.