Soviet’s War on Religion

Waikato Times, Volume 107, Issue 18004, 26 April 1930, Page 14 (Supplement)

Soviet’s War on Religion

Addressing a non-party gathering Jn the Darwen Division of Lancashire Sir Herbert Samuel referred to the reports of religious persecutions in Russia.

' There had been some exaggeration, no doubt, he said, in the accounts of actual atrocities, at ail events during recent months or years, but the events that were now taking place undoubtedly merited the name of religious persecution. ; “There is a spiritual oppression which outrages the feelings of reverence and flouts the love of toleration, which arc among the best features of modern civilisation. Russian Bolshevism thinks it is in the forefront of the intellectual advance of mankind —that it is the pioneer of humanity. Materialist Philosophy. “As a matter of fact, it is strangely old-fashioned in its ideas. It embraces a materialist philosophy. It is founded on a principle of State -Socialism, which attracted many of the best minds in Western Europe fifty or .sixty years ago. The doctrine with regard to nature and the universe

which is associated with the name of Haeckel, the theory ol economics which was promulgated by Karl Marx, gained the support of many progressive thinkers of that time, and seemed destined to dominate the future. Trend of Philosophy To-day. ‘A generation and more has gone by since then. The whole trend of philosophy to-day is in a different, direction. Hardly any philosopher in Western Europe now would take the materialist view, and hardly any economist adheres to Ibc principles of Karl Marx. When Tsardom was overthrown and Russia emerged from the Middle Ages, she came out intellectually, not into the twentieth century, but into the middle of the nineteenth. That is why 1 describe the predominant ideas of Bolshevism as old-frshioned.

THE BRITISH ATTITUDE DISCUSSED BY SIR HERBERT SAMUEL.

"For my own part,” Sir Herbert continued, "I do not consider the present events in Russia arc a reason for breaking off diplomatic relations. For us to have an Ambassador in Moscow ami lo receive an Ambassador here does i d in the smallest degree imply i;pp : i of any internal events in Russia! .. did not imply approval of the oppression of the Tsars (hat we should have maintained diplomatic relations with that country. To maintain such relations all over the world is indispensable in order to handle trade affairs and other affairs of mutual concern. "But it is right that the Russian leaders rhoud know that the moral sense of mankind in all countries among all classes and creeds, profoundly disapproves the attack upon the primary human rights of liberty of thought and action in which they are now engaged”