A NICE COUNTRY TO LIVE IN.

Daily Telegraph (Napier), Issue 3806, 26 September 1883, Page 4

A NICE COUNTRY TO LIVE IN.

Blasphemy, according to tho laws of Russia* is a" "crime against faith." _ Tho punishment is deprivation of all civil rights and banishment to the mines of Siberia for ten or fifteen years. Speaking against the Scriptures of tho Christian religion is punished by similar deprivation of rights and by imprisonment for six or eight years. Persons who go to chmvh, and there, during divine service, speak disrespectfully of religion, or of tho services yvhich arc going on,"aro put in tho penitentiary for two or three years. The law does a kind deed to drunkards by providing that if anybodyconvicted of these offences shall be proved to have been drunk at the time they were committed his punishment is considerably reduced. Tlie State religion of Russia is "that of tho "Christian Orthodox Catholic of the Eastern Confession," yvhich is commonly known as the Greek Church. There are heavy penalties for trying to proselyte to other faiths. For a clergyman teaching the child of Greek Church parents the catechism of any other religious faith, the penalty is for the first offence suspension from his office for from one to three years. For the second offence it is suspension for ever and imprisonment for two years. Ministers of other denominations arc thus tied up to labour in very narrow bounds. They must be content with such followers as they have, and must not try to bring iv any outsiders who may hereditarily or otherwise belong to the Greek Church. Converting an adult member of the Greek Church to another faith is punished by transportation to Siberia for life, and no question asked. Tho life of a minister in Russia, if belonging to any other than the regular Church,' must be beset by difficulties and dangers.