Paul to the U.N.

A discreet endorsement of the United Nations tucked into Pope John XXIII's 1963 encyclical Pacem in Terris was a tip-off that Rome foresaw fruitful cooperation with the U.N. in a common goal: peace. Last year Pope Paul VI tightened the link by sending a tactful monsignor to the U.N. as the Vatican's official observer. Last week, just as the serious turn of war between India and Pakistan heightened Paul's worries over man killing man, the Vatican announced that Paul will go to New York on Oct. 4 and make a plea for peace before the U.N. General Assembly. Sometime that day he will celebrate Mass in either Yankee or Shea Stadium and will probably find time to confer with President Johnson.

Shortest in Time. As is their custom, Vatican aides managed to find an appropriate symbolism in the date chosen for Paul's trip: it is the feast day of Francis of Assisi, patron saint of San Francisco where the U.N. was born. Although it will be the longest of Paul's flights in miles--4,273 each way, compared with 3,843 for his pilgrimage to India--the New York trip will be the shortest in time, largely because the Vatican Council will be in the midst of its fourth session. The Pope will arrive at Kennedy Airport at 10 a.m., may well fly home that evening.

The chance of a meeting with Johnson was cleverly made to seem a coincidence of timing, since protocol forbids that the President should drop everything to meet the head of a state that the U.S. does not recognize diplomatically. After the announcement of the Pope's trip, the White House revealed that L.B.J. had a "previously scheduled" engagement to dine with U.N. Ambassador Arthur Goldberg on Oct. 3. Presumably, Johnson will stay overnight, meet the Pope either at Goldberg's suite in the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel or at the residence of Francis Cardinal Spellman. Among their possible topics of conversation: establishing diplomatic relations.

Singular Opinions. Despite his efforts to keep world peace, Paul's principal duty is still to keep the faith. Recently a group of Catholic theologians, mostly Netherlander, have been pondering whether bread and wine actually become the body and blood of Christ when they are consecrated (transubstantiation), or whether the change is simply a matter of their significance ("transignification").

Last week Paul issued an encyclical firmly in favor of transubstantiation. He did not deny the right of the holders of "singular opinions" to investigate, but it was his duty to warn against "the grave danger that these opinions involve for correct faith."

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