I had great religious fervour which persisted until shortly after my confirmation at the age of sixteen. I remember the incredulity with which I first heard that there actually were people, people baptized like myself into the Church of England, who did not believe in Jesus. I never met an unbeliever in all these years. As soon as I did, it was all over with my simple, faith in the literal fundamentalist interpretation of the Bible. This was bad luck on my parents, but they were doomed to it. One married couple that I know, belonging to the same generation, decided that the best way in the end to ensure a proper religious attitude in their children, was not to teach them any religion at all until they were able to understand it in some degree of fulness. The children were sent to schools where no religious training was given. At the age of thirteen the eldest boy came indignantly to his father and said: ‘Look here, father, I think you’ve treated me very badly. The other chaps laugh at me because I don’t know anything about God. And who’s this chap Jesus? When I ask them they won’t tell me, they think I am joking.’ So the long-hoped-for moment had arrived. The father told the boy to call his sister, who was a year younger than him, because he had something very important to tell them both. Then very reverently and carefully he told them the Gospel story. He had always planned to tell it to them in this way. The children did not interrupt him. When finally he had finished there was a silence. Then the girl said, rather embarrassed: ‘Really, father, I think that is the silliest story I’ve heard since I was a kid.’ The boy said: ‘Poor chap. But what about it, anyhow?’