In August 1934, addressing Ourselves to a delegation of the
International Federation of the Motion Picture Press, We pointed out the very
great importance which the motion picture has acquired in our days and its vast
influence alike in the promotion of good and in the insinuation of evil, and We
called to mind that it is necessary to apply to the cinema the supreme rule
which must direct and regulate the great gift of art in order that it may not
find itself in continual conflict with Christian morality or even with simple
human morality based upon the natural law. The essential purpose of art, its
raison d'être, is to assist in the perfection of the moral personality, which
is man, and for this reason it must itself be moral. And We concluded amidst
the manifest approval of that elect body - the memory is still dear to Us - by
recommending to them the necessity of making the motion picture "moral,
an influence for good morals, an educator".
And even recently, in April of this year, when We had the happiness of
receiving in audience a group of delegates to the International Congress of the
Motion Picture Press, held at Rome, We again drew attention to the gravity of
the problem and We warmly exhorted all men of goodwill, in the name not only of
religion but also of the true moral and civil welfare of the people, to use
every means in their power, such as the Press, to make of the cinema a valuable
auxiliary of instruction and education rather than of destruction and ruin of
souls.