In his new book, Dawkins relates for the first time the full story of his schoolboy break-out as an atheist. In the chapel at Oundle, he helped lead a small insurgency of boys who refused to kneel. The school\u2019s headmaster was in Oxford on the day that the young Dawkins took his university entrance exam and drove him back. During this lift, Dawkins writes, the headmaster \u201d\u02dcdiscreetly raised the subject of my rebellion against Christianity. It was a revelation,\u2019 he says, \u201d\u02dcto talk to a decent, humane, intelligent Christian, embodying Anglicanism at its tolerant best.\u2019<\/p>\n
I ask him about this. \u201d\u02dcI\u2019m kind of grateful to the Anglican tradition,\u2019 he admits, \u201d\u02dcfor its benign tolerance. I sort of suspect that many who profess Anglicanism probably don\u2019t believe any of it at all in any case but vaguely enjoy, as I do\u201d\u00a6 I suppose I\u2019m a cultural Anglican and I see evensong in a country church through much the same eyes as I see a village cricket match on the village green. I have a certain love for it.\u2019 Would he ever go into a church? \u201d\u02dcWell yes, maybe I would.\u2019<\/p>\n
But at this point he turns it back around again. I try to clarify my own views to him. \u201d\u02dcYou would feel deprived if there weren\u2019t any churches?\u2019 he asks. \u201d\u02dcYes,\u2019 I respond. He mulls this before replying. \u201d\u02dcI would feel deprived in the same spirit of the English cricket match that I mentioned, that is close to my heart. Yes, I would feel a loss there. I would feel an aesthetic loss. I would miss church bells, that kind of thing.\u2019<\/p>\n