# LCMS Convention Proceedings_St. Louis Missouri_1851_S178
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

— 178 —

who have no interest at all in Christian truth are nonetheless weary of the filth and disgust-inducing blasphemies found in most of our German newspapers.

Pastor Hoffmann, who had to lay down his office because of physical suffering, was proposed as the suitable man to edit such a paper. A press owner in St. Louis offers to take over its publication, and asks for this only that the Synod provide support of about 400 subscribers. Since Pastor Hoffmann was not present himself, no definitive resolution could be reached; but there was confident hope that Pastor Hoffmann would not decline this proposal.

Correction to the article "Private Confession" in last year's
Synodal-Bericht, page 141.

Through a misunderstanding, the inquiry made by the delegate of the Frohna congregation, Mr. Weinhold, at last year's synodical assembly concerning the private confession practiced there had been recorded in the Synodal-Bericht in such a way as to suggest that the inquiry had come from the Frohna congregation itself. Mr. Weinhold now wishes to see this corrected in this year's Synodal-Bericht as follows: 1. That the inquiry was made in his own name. 2. That he does not recall having put the question this way: "whether private confession ought to be abolished for the sake of those who joined the congregation later" — because no such thing had ever occurred to the Frohna congregation; rather, the point at issue was only whether general confession, which was merely tolerated alongside private confession, should be regarded as standing on equal footing with it. The Synod resolved to grant Mr. Weinhold's request and to include this statement of his in this year's Synodal-Bericht.

Filling of various pastoral offices.

The Synod found itself this year in no small difficulty in trying to satisfy the requests that several congregations had addressed to it for the filling of their pastoral offices, because at present few candidates qualified for office were available. The congregations that had applied for preachers were as follows: Chicago,*) Lancaster, Cleveland, Washington City, Louisville, Hancock County, Ind., Grand Rapids, Mich., St. Joseph, Mo., Pekin, Ill., and a daughter congregation of Rev. Pastor Bürger near Buffalo.

For most of these congregations only men could be proposed who already held office elsewhere, but whose gifts qualified them for a wider sphere of work. Others had to be advised to make use of the services of neighboring Lutheran preachers, or in the meantime to make do with a reading service [*Lesegottesdienst*, a lay-led service built around a printed sermon] until the Synod should be in a position to provide them with a preacher of their own. It became clear in the process how greatly we need to ask God for faithful workers; how urgently it ought to be a concern of the heads of families to raise their sons for the

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*) Chicago, Cleveland, and Hancock County have since been supplied; Grand
Rapids has supplied itself.