RELIGION AS DOPE

Evening Star, Issue 21216, 24 September 1932, Page 2

RELIGION AS DOPE

Dope is a modern word. It lias hardly got beyond'the stage of slang. It does not appear in .Webster or' Skeat. The Oxford Dictionary derives the word from the Dutch. It means primarily apy fluid used as -an article of food or lubricant, then secondarily a natcotio drug for a racehorse to produce speed—a slang turf word.' But wd r know what it means. It is a popular, synonym for anaesthetic, easier spoken and spelled 1 . It is becoming a not uncommon thing in racing circles. Eyery now and, agaih we read of jockeys’ kdipiriistering;‘d6pes : to .horses. That is'"bad enough. But it is when it a case of giving dopes to men and women and children—that is different. There are, as we know, occasions when it is quite legitimate to do so,'; under proper conditions. Of that w«. shall treat later. Just now we want to'discuss religion as a dope.

That, as we know, is the attitude of the rulers of Russia towards it. On al| public and prominent places it is placarded: “Religion is Dope.” The riijers take their cue from Karl Marx —|h« text hook of Communism. “ Religion,” says Marx, “ is the opium of thfe people. It is the striving of the for an imaginary happiness. It springs from a state of society that requires illusion.” Another Communist authority writes.: “ The idea of God ira-r plies the abnegation of human reason add justice. It ends in the enslavement o|- mankind.” Christianity “ is the most audacious and monstrous of all religious absurdities.” Sentiments like these might be quoted ad lib. And it must be confessed that there were good grounds leading , to such a conclusion a'; generation ago in Russia, There was no distinction between politics and religion. ■ They were one and the same. Gjid, Tsar, and Fatherland were identical. In a state of things such as existed in Russia'fifty years ago and less, what was left for thinking and sympathetic people hut atheism and rebellion? Myriads of the Tsar’s subjects, writes Dr Dillon, were being systematically pinioned and cooped in ivays so hateful, that vast forces of revolt and destruction were generated ahd stored up against the day of reckoning. ■ And the day-of reckoning has cgmo with a vengeance, ji; 4 « • • , ,;It is, wise to watch that we do not qualify for the proverbial definition of »;• fool as one whose, eyes-are in the ends of the earth. So let us come nearer home. Is there any . danger of religion being used as a dope among ourselves? There is little doubt it has been so used in the past. Take, for example, the state of things that emerged when the great machine age was ushered, in. . Read'the history of factory reform in England—when complaint was made in Parliament about the shortage of workers. “ Take the children,” said Sir Robert Peel. And the employers took them. They worked them sixteen hours a day—by day and by night., Their beds never cooled. The day shift went into the beds the night shift had just vacated. A reputable historian of the factory movement writes: “ In stench, in.heated rooms, amid the constant, whirling of a thousand wheels, little fingers and little feet were kept in ceaseless action,’ forced into unnatural activity by blows from merciless overlpokers • and the infliction of pain, by ingenious instruments of punishment. - Irons were riveted on their ankles to keep them from running away. And they got ho wages. And While this was going on in Britain many of those who were reaping the lUopetafy’ Rewards were.'p6sing as • philanthropists, praying in churches on Sundays’, while'they preyed on the helpless masses all the rest of the week; subscribing moneyrto send, missionaries abroad to convert the heathen while the heathen in thousands about their doors were in, slavery worse even than negrogsj and.fesiering in moral corruption.” It sterns incredible to read that an otherwise so noble ,a man as John Bright should have; seconded the proposal to ? legalise these' horrible ‘ shifts and relays of children and to fix factory hours of work from 5.30 a.m. to 8.30' p.ih. Rfptests indeed were made, sudhr'as -Mrs" Browning’s sad, ringing •* Gry pf 'And-everyone krioWs thq fight’Lord Shaftesbury waged aghinSf these iniquities/ .But he tes- - scarcely any ministers of religion stood by him. The church wasr: . under' the thumb of the cotton:, lords, “ Bright-was my most maligndnt opponent. . Cobdgn was bitteflj? 'hostile. Gladstone was on the level the rest. He voted, with Sir Peel-to rescind- the Ten Hours Bill,; "He was the only member who endeavoured to delay the Bill which delivered women afid children from mines ahd/pits.” We are all ready to admit novf • the truth of the charge that re-

ligion, such as it was understood then by the rank and file of its professors, had acted as a dope upon them. We would applaud the sentiments of tho speaker at the political meeting pictured in ‘ Felix Holt,’ and for which at the time he ran tho risk of being gaoled. “ Speaking of the church and the aristocrats,” ho said, “ they’ll supply us with our religion like everything else, and get a profit on it. They’ll give us plenty of heaven. That’s the sort of religion they like—a religion that gives us working men heaven and nothing else. But we’ll offer to change with ’em. We’ll give them back some of their heaven, and take it out m something for us and our children in this world.”

And yet are we so sure that we are not permitting the religion of our day to act as a dope on our political and social activities? AVhat does it mean that the great bulk of the labouring classes—the classes to which Christ Himself belonged and from whom He chose His apostles—are not to be found in the churches to-day ? They say they have no time for organised religion as they understand it. It is of no use to them; it has been no help to them in their efforts to bettor their social conditions. It has indeed often been not only indifferent, but in the camp of the capitalists. AVhat is the inner meaning of Socialism from this point of view but just the assertion of that? To multitudes of working men in Christian countries Socialism has taken the place of religion. It is to them practically an equivalent for it. And the Socialism which commands the reason and stirs the emotions of the vanguard of its adherents is that which repudiates what to most adherents of religion is its distinctive dogmas. “ AVheu will people seriously wake up,” says a writer in an Australian Socialist paper, “ to the fact that these priesthoods—and in particular the Christian variety—are enemies of all forms of liberty and general social well-being?” That sort of sentiment carries the stamp of Russia upon its face. But it is useless to disguise from ourselves that it is spreading its net among tho working classes, and getting at their springs of action without repassing through their minds. And the reason is that religious people seem to have allowed it to act as a dope upon their intelligence and their will. “The Socialist programme,’’ writes Professor Peabody, “ represents the penalty which the modern world is paying for its insufficient obedience to the social teaching of Jesus.” « • * It is not difficult to understand how this state of things has come about. There are those who maintain that religion has nothing to do with politics. In an English cemetery you may read this inscription upon a tombstone: “ Here lies the dust of So-and-So, who never voted. Of such is the kingdom of heaven.” There are two diverse classes of people who yet unite in warning off religion from interfering in social and political questions. There is the pietistio class represented in the inscription just quoted. At the opposite extreme from these is another class interested in continuing tho status quo. It tells religion to mind Rs own business, to preach the Gospel and not meddle with politics. Both these conceptions of the sphere and function of religion have no sanction from the handbook of religion in Christendom—the Bible. “ That religion has nothing to do with politics,” says a recent writer, “ is a proposition which is contradicted on every page of Holy Scripture.” And Jesus came declaring that His purpose in coming was not primarily to teach men how to get to heaven, but how to establish heaven on earth. To divide man up into separate compartments, one called religious and one called secular, with no communication between, is a caricature of Christianity. And it is this caricature of it that has led to the popular notion that it is dope. There can be no doubt that the church, as the organised custodian and interpreter of the Christian dogmas, has given too much ground for this popular belief. It would bo easy to show how that has come. For ono thing, Christianity insists on the passive virtues—patience, endurance, etc. But that does not mean acquiescence in things as they are, but only the spirit in which we are to meet defeats in the struggle to secure things as they ought to be both within and without ourselves. A writer pointed out some time ago another.reason why religion seems to he identified witli the status quo. Some three generations ago science and philosophy seemed to have reached the conclusion that denied freedom to man and his Maker. He was merely a machine with no power to he other than his circumstances dictated. Against this ,philosophers like AVard and James and Martineau and others rose up in protest. They at last won the day. They cleared a space, leaving man the captain of his soul and God, not bound in a straitjacket by His

laws. From tin's it was only a short step to think and feel that life as it is is justified; that “God’s in His heaven, all’s right with the world.” So religion appeared to accept the status quo, and in the view of the masses to bo doped—and damned. • ♦ « * Hitherto we have written of religion only as a dope. But there is another side to the question. The present writer was recently visiting a friend under sentence of death. He was suffering frightful agony. He said existence was tolerable only while he was under the influence of a dope. And there are millions in like case. There are maladies of spirit and body that would ho unendurable were it not for some sort of'an amesthetic. And everybody agrees that when required it should be administered to master pain in the interests of life and health. A veterinary surgeons says: “What makes doping popular in the racing world is that a stimulant will give a rogue the Dutch courage to do his best. It will also put courage into nervous, frightened animals and help them to fight out a finish with greater dash.” And that is true of the dope of religion. George Eliot, writing a letter of comfort to a friend in deep sorrow, said we must try “to do without opium ” and face our trials clear-eyed and stout-hearted. The opium she is thinking of is that which religion offers. Yet when her own sorrows came she found she could not stand alone. She had to find substitutes for religious opium in some other direction. It is only a question where the best is to bo found that will enable us to cope with stark tribulations and terrors. A virile thinker very truly says: “It is nothing against Christianity that it has a sort of pharmacopoeia to help us through dark hours. If anyone . . . tells me he never needs such help, that he can dispense . . . with all alleviations and recreations and illusions, ho is a liar!” No, it is nothing against Christianity that it can come between us and sonic conditions which, wore there no temporary escape, would overwhelm us. What are the nature and efficacy of the dope which it provides for such contingencies must be loft to those specially ordained to explain and administer it.