MR G. B. SHAW AND RELIGION

Otago Daily Times, Issue 22356, 1 September 1934, Page 27

MR G. B. SHAW AND RELIGION

HIS AIM

(From Our Own Correspondent.) LONDON, July 20,

Speaking on religious teaching in secondary schools, at Durham, the Bishop (Dr Hensley Henson) quoted from a book in which members of Bede College, Durham, described the religious education they received in secondary schools. One said: “We had one hour per week, supposedly for religious knowledge, in which wc had read to us the plays of Bernard Shaw.” “ That, commented the bishop, “ may have been very interesting, but it could not have been spiritually hopeful.”

Mr Shaw said to a representative of the Daily Telegraph: “I wish the bishop would read my books. So far as I. know, I am the only writer wiio has made it part of his business to provide people with a credible modern religion. 1 said a long time ago that there was not in the whole world a single credible religion. “Take the Apostles’ Creed. How many intelligent, educated people can believe every statement in that creed? I believe in two —the Communion of the saints and the life to come. But most people would understand my belief in the Communion of saints to mean St. Paul, St. Peter, St. Andrew, and others, sitting round a. table so that I might chide them. When I say I believe in the life to come, as a good revolutionary should, I shall lie understood as having a belief in personal immortality, which is an appalling belief.”