# LCMS Convention Proceedings_St. Louis Missouri_1857_S321
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

— 321 —

catechism instruction, always precious, will come more and more, the
longer the more, into blessed currency. Individual congregations, however,
even now already distinguish themselves most advantageously above others
in this respect.

That our school system is capable of improvement, and greatly in need
of it, I need not first assure anyone. Where there are dedicated
schoolteachers, the schools improve from year to year, and it becomes
clear that there too the sense for schools inherent in the German people
can easily be reawakened, in that such schools come to be attended by
children of parents who do not even belong to the congregation, to such a
degree that the number of outside children mostly exceeds that of the
congregation's own children — for which the larger cities in particular
supply the proof, where, thank God, the congregations are, year by year,
almost driven, precisely through the school attendance of outside
children, to found new schools, and are also found increasingly willing to
raise the not inconsiderable costs. May the congregations consider ever
more what an important work of mission is being carried out through
schools among that part of our German countrymen who have become prey to
unbelief, and how the Lord has laid the dear little children upon our
hearts in particular. May he help the Reverend Synod very soon to a
proper teachers' seminary, and bring us people who take up this holy
calling and its heavy duties with desire, love, and faithfulness. It is to
be hoped, through his grace, that as the parents themselves grow in faith,
he will take from them, more and more, the common earthly-mindedness that
unfortunately shows itself often in this respect too, and that keeps them,
for the sake of gain alone, from sending their children to school more
regularly and for longer. The Lord has certainly destined our children
here in this country for something other than to serve as mere haulers of
wood and water for the spirit of speculation. When we consider how badly
the civic order here lies in disarray, seeing that God has ordained and
governs his worldly kingdom in good order too, and will punish the
contrary with heavy judgments, and seeing that it is to be assumed that
such people as have been instructed from youth in God's Word and brought
up in the fear of God will also serve more conscientiously in whatever
post they may hold in worldly government — then we ought, for this reason
too, already to strive to shape our children for God in such a way that he
may also make use of them for that purpose. A gratifying sign, in my eyes,
of the dawning of a better time is the teachers' conference held in
Milwaukee, as well as the prospect that the academy in Fort Wayne will
finally be put into operation. Unfortunately, God knows, in most
congregations the schools are still held by the preachers, and until the
Reverend Synod brings it about that not every congregation, even the
smallest, has its own pastor, but that larger dioceses are instead
established, perhaps with several schools, it will always remain a
half-measure, both in the carrying out of the preaching office and of the
teaching office. The matter is too plain for me to think it necessary to
detain the Reverend Synod with more on it.

Very deficient still is the order of worship. Naturally only
orthodox agendas [liturgical orders] are in use. Yet, where the Old Saxon
one or Löhe's is not used in full, the combination of the individual
pieces is often carried out, to put it most mildly, without proper
coherence and tact. Much, in my opinion, could be done by the preachers,
at least on taking up new congregations, if they proceeded not
arbitrarily, but after the pattern of the church from

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