# Lehre und Wehre_St. Louis Missouri_November 1856_S347
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

On Church Life in the Kingdom of Hanover. 347

completely. Both factions still exist even today. The larger, less strict one
also has its own preacher, namely Diepenbrock, who had been sent out from
Berlin as a missionary and was detained by the Coccians in Emden while on
his journey to Rotterdam; he holds services for them every Wednesday and
Sunday evening in a large hall specially fitted out for the purpose. Yet the
separation is said to have already reached its high point; the Reformed
pastors have already applied for the closing of the assembly, but of course
without success, owing to the right of association still in force.

In no other part of the Kingdom of Hanover is the confessional disorder so
great, nor does it stand in such urgent need of a swift and thoroughgoing
remedy, as in East Frisia. Yet plenty is to be found in other parts of the
country in this respect too that is not to be approved. Thus even under the
purely Lutheran consistories at Hanover, Stade, and Osnabrück there are
nevertheless Reformed congregations as well. Subordinate to the consistory
at Hanover are the four Reformed congregations in the formerly Hessian
territory of Plesse, which also have their own Reformed superintendent, to
whose inspection a Lutheran congregation likewise belongs. — The consistorial
district of Stade has five Reformed congregations incorporated into it,
comprising 6,500 souls, whose preachers stand under Lutheran superintendents
and, like their schoolteachers, are examined and confirmed by the Lutheran
consistory, and in part even appointed by it. We are told that in Lehe and
Ringstedt, in the Stade district, Lutheran and Reformed congregations are so
united that each has its own particular preacher but together they share the
same church and the same church and school board. Thus it is said to happen
that in Lehe the Reformed pastor, as the elder, presides over all church and
school affairs, even those of the Lutheran congregation. At communions the
Reformed preacher assists the Lutheran one and hands the cup to the
Lutheran communicants, even at the confirmation of Lutheran children. In
mixed marriages, which are frequently found, the Lutheran wives usually go
to the Reformed for the Holy Supper, without the Reformed wives of
Lutheran husbands for their part communicating at Lutheran preachers' hands
— thus in the Stade district exactly the reverse of what obtains in East
Frisia. The Reformed, whose pastors are given the testimony of being
believing and strictly Reformed, by no means wishing to be "Melanchthonian,"
have carried it through that in the mixed congregations the prescribed
Lutheran mission collection is not held at all, so as to give them no offense;
they insist firmly on holding fast to the Heidelberg Catechism and have
offered determined resistance wherever the Lutheran element has stirred and
sought the introduction of Luther's Small Catechism. It should be noted,
however, that among not a few Lutheran pastors in the consistorial district
of Stade a very sharp opposition to all mixing of confessions has shown itself
and has already carried through a good deal. It is well known that the
reaction of Lutheran