ADDRESS OF PAUL VI
TO THE PERSONNEL OF AIR-INDIA

Tuesday, 16 March 1965

Dear Friends of Air India,

We call you friends because We feel that the recent trip to India has given us a special relationship of friendship.

This audience provides Us with the precious opportunity of thanking Air India through the management and personnel in Rome for the magnificent work of preparation and for the thoroughly comfortable flight to India. We are well aware that all of you laboured arduously to insure that Our flight would be most enjoyable and effective. We congratulate you and We thank you, each one of you because in your own way all of you contributed your share in this successful flight. You prepared Us very well for the warm reception which We received on arrival in Bombay.

This visit with you recalls to mind the very pleasant days spent in India, a land which We came to know first-hand, and Our most satisfactory encounter with a marvellous people who did not stint in extending to Us their exquisite hospitality with affection and admiration. It is for Us an unforgettable experience, a most precious memory, an episode in Our life which We treasure highly.

In your work, you come in constant contact with peoples of different nations, races and creeds. Let them taste also the graciousness and kindness which We witnessed in that grand land of India. Remember too that we are all members of one family, the family of God. We encourage you to treat all with that love and respect that is worthy of a child of God. By so doing, you will be creating good will among peoples which will make it possible for all to work in mutual harmony for peace, which will permit everyone to enjoy the creation of Our Father Who is in heaven. In your own small way, you will be making a precious contribution to understanding between peoples.

Once again, We thank Air India, its directors and its personnel, for the pleasant efficient service rendered to Us, and in so doing We lovingly invoke upon all of you and your loved ones an abundance of heavenly blessings.