# Lehre und Wehre_St. Louis Missouri_September 1856_S280
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

280 On the Rhenish Palatinate Church Struggle.

...of the soul into heaven is not permitted; for these distinguishing doctrines are set aside." — Thereupon it was declared in a general decree of the consistory at Speyer, in blunt terms: "Whoever is not content with this may — indeed must — for honor's sake withdraw from the united Church of the Bavarian Rhenish Palatinate."

Against this a number of united clergy of the Bavarian Rhenish Palatinate, who are devoted from the heart to the Lutheran confession, turned in a petition to the highest offices in Munich, and asked for the withdrawal of Ebrard's measures. The answer was long in coming. At last a reply came in the form of a new instruction for pastoral office, drawn up by the consistory at Speyer and confirmed by the Ministry of the Interior, in which the proceedings of the consistory were on the whole approved, while the mixed doctrine of the Supper set forth above was expressly sanctioned.

And now came the provisional end and the close of the struggle — a troubling end. Some Lutheran-minded clergy of the Rhenish Palatinate resolved to lay down their pastorates entirely, to emigrate to Bavaria proper on the far side, to seek positions there in Lutheran parishes, and in this way to come into the Lutheran Church. One of them expresses himself thus in Dr. Kliefoth's Lutheran journal, 1856, issue 1: "The writer of this, and a number of other friends, find themselves compelled to leave the service of this Church and to seek another position in Bavaria proper. To wish to bring about a separation would, at least under our circumstances, be a thoroughly contrived and therefore untrue thing, and therefore a thing not pleasing to the Lord nor blessed by Him. In every such separation there are countless temptations, both for the leaders and for the members of such a separation. Happy are those who escape them! The writer of this parts with a heart deeply grieved."

It is these words, now, concerning which we cannot in the end suppress our misgivings. A separation from the united Church of the Rhenish Palatinate was and is, under all circumstances, obligatory for Lutheran clergy, for the united Church in general, and the Rhenish Palatinate one in particular, has clearly and definitely declared itself against the Lutheran confession and has closed itself off from it entirely. — But not only the Lutheran pastors, but also the Lutheran members of the congregations are morally obligated to such a separation from the union that is hostile to the confession; that there are, however, not a few Lutheran-minded members of congregations in the Bavarian Rhenish Palatinate still today has been most definitely assured to us, and may also very well be supposed, since once, and not so very long ago, the Lutheran doctrine and Church rightfully existed in that little territory, and since Lutheran-minded clergy have labored there in preaching and instruction down to this very hour. The Lutheran Church itself, however, has a right to exist everywhere in German lands; her right is God's Word, which she teaches faithfully and purely, and her human