# Der Lutheraner_St. Louis Missouri_1911 06 27_S208
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

208

institution director M. Lücke. Fifty years ago the institution numbered 3 professors and 78 students; today, 8 professors and 234 students.
L. F.

From our correspondence. A few weeks ago a widow from North Dakota wrote: "I, the undersigned, have with great joy read the daily reports on the delegate synod and the reports on the wonderful Walther celebration, and would like also to contribute a small gift to the collection for the Walther Fund, for which the enclosed dollar is intended. Kindly asking you to see that this small gift reaches the treasurer, I thank you sincerely in advance for your kindness, and ask that my name not be mentioned." A few days ago a letter signed only "N. N." came from Illinois: "I see from the last 'Lutheraner' that the heathen mission is in need. Enclosed you will find a dollar for this mission." And some time ago a servant girl from New York likewise sent us a dollar with these words: "I have read in the 'Lutheraner' that the student fund is in need. I have also seen how great the need is for preachers and teachers. Love for my Lord Jesus has compelled me to take up the pen at just this evening hour and send this small gift for the poor students. I will also include the educational institutions in my prayer. I am only a servant girl, so please do not take it amiss that the gift is so small. May the Lord bless even this small gift! It is given from the heart. Your fellow Christian, N. N., from the congregation of the Reverend Pastor X, greets you." May such examples stir other widows and servant girls according to the word of St. Paul: "Your zeal hath provoked very many," 2 Cor. 9:2. May especially those be stirred by it who can give much more easily and much more abundantly than widows and servant girls as a rule can. And yet another good example is given in this letter. Many good works are left undone, many gifts are withheld from the church and its educational institutions and missions, because the matter is put off and then forgotten, or one never gets around to it later. Here is the best advice: do at once what one is moved to do out of love and gratitude upon reading a report; put the gift in an envelope at once and bring it to one's pastor or send it to the treasurer.
L. F.

Cardinal Gibbons of Baltimore celebrated on June 6 his 50th anniversary as a priest and his 25th anniversary as a cardinal and highest dignitary of the Roman church in our country. This was again an occasion for the Roman church to shine, and for the politicians in our country to burn their incense to it. The hall in which the celebration was held seated 15,000 people, and on the platform, around the cardinal, sat 600 invited guests, among them President Taft, Vice President Sherman, former President Roosevelt, Chief Justice White, the Speaker of the House of Representatives Clark, his predecessor Cannon, Governor Crothers of Maryland, Senator Root of New York, and other notables. All those named spoke except Chief Justice White, who as is known himself belongs to the Roman church, and again mingled, more or less crudely, state and church. President Taft did say expressly: "We are not here as members of any religious body. We are not here in any official capacity." But what right did Vice President Sherman then have to say to Gibbons: "I am here to speak for the greatest legislative body in the world" (he meant the Senate by this) "and in its name to congratulate you on this day and on this occasion and to express to you our loyal esteem and cordial good will"? The senators also represent many Protestant citizens who want nothing to do with such an homage paid to one of the highest servants of the great Antichrist. President Taft showed himself a poor student of world history when he said of Gibbons: "One of the principles of his church is respect for lawful authority." For no body has ever disregarded divine and human authority as shamefully as the papal church. And former President Roosevelt took little to heart the instruction given him in his time from the Lutheran side, for he returned again to his old theme and said: "We shall have presidents who are Catholics just as well as presidents who are Protestants" - an expectation in which he will no doubt be thoroughly disappointed. Naturally Cardinal Gibbons himself also made himself heard, speaking of the "sacred and God-given rights of conscience," although his church has time and again most shamefully curtailed and robbed these rights; he also called the president a "credentialed servant and plenipotentiary of God," although by his oath of office he must regard as ungodly any government that does not acknowledge the pope. But Rome and its dignitaries are ever also deceitful, hypocritical, and cunning.
L. F.

Over 5000 people once entrusted their money to the false prophet John Alexander Dowie, to found the city of Zion near Chicago. For a time everything outwardly went well, and Dowie's misled followers swam in prosperity. But even before the death of the lying apostle, signs increased that the end was no longer far off, and since then it has gone rapidly downhill. Recently the shareholders were paid off. They received only 12 cents on the dollar. That is the end of the great fraud, but not its worst consequence. Far greater than the loss of earthly goods is the harm to souls that Dowie brought upon his followers, among whom there were also Lutherans, through his false, soul-destroying doctrine. "For what is a man profited, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul? Or what shall a man give in exchange for his soul?" Matt. 16:26. Soul lost, all lost!
L. F.

What has just been said may serve as a warning to the followers of Christian Science. The popess of this sect, as unchristian as it is unscientific, Mrs. Mary Baker G. Eddy, did not, it is true, take money from her deceived followers in Dowie's manner, through reckless ventures and speculations. But that she enriched herself at their expense in another way is generally known; she did so in particular through her book "Science and Health," which she placed on a level with the Bible, which appeared in ever new, revised editions, and which had to be bought by her followers at a high price. Even before Mrs. Eddy's death there were individual persons and congregations who rebelled against her tyranny. After her death a public dispute broke out, when a follower claimed to be the rightful representative of Christian Science. And since then unrest has stirred now here, now there, and the signs increase that people no longer wish to tolerate the compulsion exercised by the mother church in Boston. Recently two congregations again, one in Minneapolis and the other in Duluth, Minn., have declared their independence from the mother church in Boston and now call themselves "Christian Science Reformed." Mrs. A. E. Smith, who heads the congregation in Minneapolis, had been accused of heresy by the board in Boston that keeps watch over the "doctrine," and the declaration of independence was the result. Here too it holds true that the harm to souls which this unchristian sect works among its fanatical followers is far greater than the fraud and the tyranny that it practices.
L. F.