'Birreligion'

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XXXV, Issue 1, 3 January 1907, Page 9

' Birreligion'

The hew ' unsectarian ' school religion 'manufactured by Mr. Birrell has been squeezed to death by the House of Lords. When it was first broached, it was greeted with the following skit in an English contemporary :— ' Let Irreligion 'hide its head And Birreligion reign instead/! 'Twas thus the Commons raised the cry ; Religion heard, and heaved a sigh.'

The strong opposition aroused^ in England by Mrr Birrell's Education Bill was a protest against the principle "of forcing upon people a manufactured creed which was not acceptable to their religious convections. It seems strange" that the Imperial Parliament should try , to deprive.'Christians in England of the denominational rights in education which it confers as a matter of course upon" Hindus-in India and upon Mahomedans in the Soudan. It looks as if the American ' pious editor ' is not the only one who believes in freedom's caufce—provided it be ' ez far away ez Payris is '.