HORTLY after World War Two, a French professor and I - convinced of our Christian vocation - started the International Catholic Correspondence Organisation. Our aims during this time are to promote understanding, reconciliation and friendship by letter-writing. Our organisation keeps to traditional values and endeavours to be ecumenically open and tolerant.

From a modest beginning in 1950, the organisation expanded to include today countries on all continents. So we can look back now on more than 800,000 successfully arranged pen-friendships. Our organisation is a member of FIOCES, the International Federation of Organisations for School-Correspondence and is subject to its code of honour.

At the beginning of the new school term in Germany we actually receive large numbers of requests from German students 10 to 18 and young adults, asking for penfriends in Great Britain. Your British way of life; your culture; the principles of your citizens have generated a tremendous feeling for your country, its people and its history.

That explains why every second letter we receive from our co-citizens ask for a penfriend in Great Britain. Hence this letter to you as Editor of a newspaper in the UK.

I would be very much obliged, if you could help me to increase, with your kind assistance, the number of personal friendships between British people and those in Germany. May I ask you please to acquaint your readers with the situation I have described, and invite them to participate.

To simplify matters, everyone writing to me should give such personal details as age, hobbies, languages known (if so), and her/his full postal address legibly written. No problem for those being unable to communicate in a foreign language as all our students write in English.

I remain at your disposal for any additional information you may wish to have, and I thank you very much for your co-operation.

Adolf Lang

Founder and Director of International Catholic Correspondence Dept.

Veilchenweg 2

D-66798 Wallerfangen

Germany

E-mail: CCIPX@t-online.de

Converted for the new archive on 14 July 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.