THE CHURCH IN FRANCE
Sut,—Canon Roger Lloyd contributed an understanding article to The Spectator of May 30th, dealing with the Catholic Church in France and her relations with the industrial workers. He entitled it Pays de Mission? The very inclusion of the question mark shows Canon Lloyd's care for accuracy. As for the latter part of the article, where the findings of the French priests' book, France, Pays de Mission? are related to the Church of England and her problems, it would be out of place—here—to offer any observations. But, had space allowed, perhaps Canon Lloyd might have referred to two other books which put that of the abbes Godin and Daniel in a somewhat different perspective. He does remark that there is " the other France of the countryside where conditions are totally different," but he might have mentioned thereupon the recent book by the abbe Boulard, Problemes missionnaires de la France rurale. And he would have redressed the balance still further, and in relation to specifically industrial areas, had he mentioned the work of the Mission de France launched by the French hierarchy in 1941 ; this is one of the several practical and constructive facts to be set alongside M. l'abbe Godin's more analytical treatment. Perhaps Canon Lloyd will forgive one slip in his article being pointed out. The French Christian Workers' Unions or more accurately the Confederation Francaise de Travailleurs Chretiens (C.F.T.C.), did not stem from the J.O.C., but antedated it by a decade ; and it is unusual to refer, as he does, to the Jeunesse Ouvriere Chretienne in the plural.—Yours faithfully,
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