ADDRESS OF THE HOLY FATHER PAUL VI
TO THE BOARD MEMBERS AND EXECUTIVES
OF «REUTERS NEWS AGENCY»

Monday, 10 September 1973

It is with the greatest pleasure that we welcome you, the Board Members and Executives of "Reuters News Agency", and we are indeed honoured to receive you on the occasion of your meeting here in Rome.

We are well aware how great is the influence and renown of the News Agency which you represent. We know that it not only provides the press of Great Britain, Australia, and New Zealand with an objective and accurate service of world wide news but also makes this service available to the press, radio and television of almost every country in the world.

Such an important function arouses our greatest interest, for we are convinced that the integral development and above all the spiritual development of man requires information that is full, consistent, accurate and true. Your function then, distinguished gentlemen, carries with it a great responsibility because it is destined to render man more capable of acting in conformity with his own dignity and of assuming an active role in the economic, political, cultural and religious life of his community. By the speedy and accurate dissemination of news you not only assist men in exercising their right to information about affairs which affect them (Cfr. Inter Mirifica, 5) but you are also active in aiding men to help one another.

Since your are fully aware of the special nature of our religious mission, permit us to invite you to study, with your well known competency, the particular problem, complex as we know, of the diffusion of information regarding the religious life of man and of the Church. At the same time, we wish to express our gratitude for all that your agency and the individual publishing companies and newspapers which you direct, have already done to this end.

We cordially extend to each of you our best wishes for the success of your meeting in the Eternal City and we assure you of our prayers while we invoke upon yourselves, your work, and your families an abundance of divine graces and blessings.