# Lehre und Wehre_St. Louis Missouri_Juli 1855_S222
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

222 Obituaries.

b. When an evil rumor is circulating about someone.

J. Ludw. Hartmann writes:

“We say that no suspicion is sufficient to exclude a person entirely from Holy Communion; but we are speaking of a suspected person who has also been diligently examined, yet persistently denies the deed. For a person is not always guilty of the crime of which rumor accuses him. Furthermore, it is an erroneous assumption that a clear and explicit confession of every individual sin is necessary, especially of the sin of which someone is accused by rumor or strong suspicion; no command to this effect is found in Holy Scripture. No less false is the assumption that a person does not truly repent of the sins he has committed unless he explicitly confesses them before his confessor. Moreover, other means are available for bringing a person suspected of a crime to acknowledge it. An inquiry must be made as to whether, for example, he recognizes himself as guilty of adultery, etc., and he must be admonished to take great care not to heap sin upon sin. Thus the late Dr. Höpfner writes in his Isag. coen. part 1, p. 358: ‘Where there are only grounds for suspicion, and those suspected of a fundamental error or an evil deed are unwilling to confess it specifically, but acknowledge in general that they are wretched sinners, they are not to be suspended from participation in Communion. For if they are unwilling to confess such a sin specifically, either voluntarily or after prior admonition by the confessor, and yet persist in requesting absolution, they are to be judged according to their words and left to their conscience.’ Thus Luther’s judgment applies here: If someone comes to confess and is suspected of a crime, then I must, when acting as confessor, inquire into it as circumstances require. But if he denies it, I must esteem his ‘No’ more highly than my suspicion; and if he insists on being admitted to Communion, I am obligated to give it to him.”

(Pastorale evangelicum, p. 791.)

Obituaries.

On February 1 of this year, Claus Harms entered into his rest. “On the evening of the last day of January he was in perfect health and cheerful; he conversed as usual and joked, as was his custom. When he was about to retire, he had Gellert’s hymn of faith read aloud to him:

Thus, then, with steadfast courage I hope
In God’s grace and Christ’s blood;
I hope for eternal life.

and remarked that this would be the last hymn that the pastor’s wife