COMMUNIST SUNDAY SCHOOLS.

Otago Daily Times, Issue 19261, 27 August 1924, Page 5

COMMUNIST SUNDAY SCHOOLS.

BLASPHEMOUS TEACHINGS. BILL TO PROTECT CHILDREN. (From Oor Own Correspondent.) LONDON, July It. Moving the second reading of his Bill to prevent seditious and blasphemous teaching to children under 10, Lord Danesfort gave some selections from the text hooks of the Communist Sunday schools. He explained that the Bill did not interfere with the teaching of Socialism or any other political propaganda which the Constitution allowed. It aimed only at the stopping of teachings of a kind forbidden by the common law. and proposed to enable the teachers liable to be dealt with summarily instead of by the present method of indictment.

The Communist movement, said Lord Danesfort, was not indigenous to this country. It was part of an active propaganda against British influence and the British Empire' which had been going on unremittingly for years. Some selections of the maxims of the

“To teach the children the ideal of tho revolution should be the primary object of a .Socialist Sunday school. All other touching is of no avail.”

“A boy and girl should be learned a veal, lire, red-hot revolutionary speech to take about 10 minutes."

“Our work is to train the children and tho working class to accomplish the revolution.”

From tho “Ten Proletarian Maxims,” published in Glasgow in 1921, were:— “Thou shalt not he a patriot for a patriot is an international blackleg.” “Thou shalt teach revolution, for revolution means the abolition of the present political state ami the end of capitalism, and raising in their place an Industrial Republic.” “Thou shalt wage the Class AVar.” Then in what was called an oral explanation was:--“What is a patriot?—A soldier, sailor, a policeman, u Boy Scout, a Girl Guide. Never you become one of them. They dress you in tine uniforms and stuff you with tales of patriotism and of soldiers — soldiers arc trained to murder men of their own class. AVe were made to murder poor peaceful Germans we had no grudge against. Comrades, prepare for the day of revolution, when the working classes will rise up and take by force what is theirs by right." ATROCIOUS BLASPHEMIES. Then there were the atrocious blasphemies of which he would recite a few samples. “Christ on the Cross dying for sinners is so ridiculous that one despairs at the hold this superstition has on the minds of the working class ” From the Prolctcult, October, 1923: "Did Jesus Christ come from Heaven?—jN». AVas His mother a virgin?—No. Is - 'the story about Him true?—No. Who was His father?—Joseph, just in tho ordinary way. Thus the story is a legend? Of that there is no doubt.” Further, from the A'onng Worker: “A little child shall lead them—Lead whom? AVhy load the capitalists to slaughter. What child?—Why, the chfld of the workers, who belongs to the Children's Section of the Young Communist League.” Lord Danesfort said there were 13 Communist Sunday schools in London, and each was attended by from .30 to 100 children. There were 25 such schools in Glasgow and in other parts of the country. • SLAUGHTERING THE POLICE. The Duke of Atholl quoted from various booklets issued in the schools, and added that he was no prude, and he had knocked about the world a good deal, but for pure downright filth he had never read anything to equal the publications put before youths and girls in the Proletarian schools. A Communist book which he held in his hand encouraged rebellion and immorality. It encouraged the playing of a game, which was to capture officials and police and slaughter them—a very pretty game. On the division for the second reading of the Bill 102 votes iu its favour and 20 against.