RELIGION IN RUSSIA

Sun (Auckland), Volume III, Issue 900, 18 February 1930, Page 8

RELIGION IN RUSSIA

NEW FIVE-DAY WEEK

CAUSES AN UPHEAVAE The following interesting letter 0 the subject of religious persecution! in Russia has been sent to The by Mr. W. R. Kingston, of Manure*. Road, Remuera: Sir,— The present raucous controversy England about religious Persecution I! Russia must be somewhat unintelu gible. to those who do not know th basic cause—or at least the more re~J cause. Practically it comes to this- Tv Soviet Government has abolished Sunday or seventh day of rest . every day is now a work day ’ n< By implication, therefore, 'churches ing becomes a direct challenge to authority of the State, and. accofa*' 1 to the Scanty information we cables, is being ruthlessly nut 1*2,” iis a kind of mutiny. Dess than six months ago, the Se.a.. inaugurated an entirely new reSS* with three main objectives the i?■ day week, the socialisation of the and the five-year plan of isation (of factories, railways on). The first is the most serious the social viewpoint, as it upsets .S previous ways of living, to say tioUd!. of dividing all the people in to *rr.m —quite arbitrarily, so tel- as onf f. 1 ! judge. The year of 365 days has, been divid.a into 12 months of 30 days each, ate five revolutionary feast days iC* 1 ? month is further subdivided into .2 weeks of five days each. All the p are divided lnlo five classes ,25,7 known for convenience by a colom? and each class in turn works four the days and has one day off That means that work goes on <Lv without ceasing:, and everybody in t«£ has one full day free in the five. ButtS universal day of rest, when chur? services are usually held, has bem tirely obliterated. * n ’ This idea is not necessarily unnonu lar with the common people, becat SP Mr. Ivy Lee, the well-known writer of New York, writing recently from cow specially Cor the London tator,” tells how “the plan has met with the greatest enthusiasm throughimr the country.” But apparently the r<li gious fervour of some Russians is too deep-seated to be casually uprooted bv a mere civil ordinance. Hence the pre*ent persecution which, for efficiency ~i* shrewdly accompanied by official poganda of a distinctly negative » “Anti-God?” kind. That is the most recent and most obvious source of the anti-religious campaign, but the crusade has been carried on by the Soviet, with poster school instruction and public address for years past. In part it is based on the opposw tion of religion to science (for the Soviet places strict emphasis on evolution and the Darwinian teaching*) in large part it is political and based'on the close connection between the old church and the priesthood of the old political regime; in part it it based on the old efforts of the priests to keep the people in ignorance; and in part it is based on the teaching of Marx and Lenin. ;hat “religion is the opiate of the people* From our point of view there are two quite different aspects of this business. Essentially the matter s * civil one. concerning Russia s intern*! organisation. Considering that Great Britain and Russia have a special clause in the recently-signed agreement, to “scrupulously respect the undoubted right of a State to order its own life in its own way,” the Government of Great Britain has not “a leg to stand on” in any suggestion of official intervention. Lord Par-moor 1 * statement that other countries should be allowed the same liberty in domestic policy that Britain claims for h-*rself is so obviously right that one should pause and give seriously to think before scoffing at it. Quite apart from the official view, however, is the natural horror of all warm-hearted people at deliberate religious persecution in this age of the world. Insofar as the Soviet's attitude is really religious persecution, it should be denounced in no uncertain terms by religious bodies and all Christian people. One of the really splendid hings about the Anglo-Saxon peoples i* the spirit of high and noble endeavour that has seized them at different times and sent them out to battle right gallantly against wrong. Public indignation at the Armenian tortures and the outrages on the Belgian Congo, for example, came to fever heat, and t* know that this same splendid spirit works in the blood even today i* a* augury that the world has not entirely gone to the devil. But to mix political motives with religious indignation is fatal. There is a wealth of wisdom in the reply of Dr. Rushbrooke, a great Protestant leader in England, wh*m h« was asked recently by the* “Morning Post” to speak in the Albert Hall at the huge meeting of Christian protest against Russian persecution: “1 shart to the full the sorrow and indignation which not only every Christian, but every civilised man and woman, must feel. But religious persecution is not a new fact in Russia. Tsamt Russia, despite its cruelty to BapP*t% and other Evangelicals, was recognise* by Britain. If we maintain recognltion and diplomatic intercourse, while at the same time expressing unqualified condemnation of the anti -religion* action of the Soviet State, we man clear to Russia and to all the won» that the interests with which we ar* concerned are not political, but purew religious.”