# Lehre und Wehre_St. Louis Missouri_Januar 1861_S18
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

On the Union. 18

is too sacred for one to be permitted to quarrel over it. Whoever is
unreasonable and unloving enough to desire or to disdain the Lord's
Supper with a narrow heart is altogether unfit for the kingdom of God —
for him the body of the Lord must, in whatever form, become poison!" —
thus I would have served him who, out of malice, wished to attack me on
account of this breaking of bread. I hold that the preacher himself must
not doubt in the least his authority from on high, etc., to make such
changes in his church, provided he is himself conscious that he is
fulfilling the will of his Lord and Master; — and I am finally of the
opinion that every congregation will silently and willingly accept the
new rite if its pastor himself has gone before it with his own example
in the enjoyment of the Lord's Supper after this manner, without having
to justify himself to his congregation on that account. — The less fuss
we make about it, the more easily it goes."

These my experiences and views on the matter please receive, my dear
brother, as kindly as I have here imparted them; and do not regard as a
hodgepodge what usually comes to light when one writes hastily and
without a plan. Grant me your brotherly love, and share with me
sometime also something of your experiences from your own field of
labor. With the highest respect I remain, to my honor,

Your most devoted brother in office and servant

Stephani.

2. From the pamphlet "Toward an Understanding on the Union," Wangemann
(vol. II, p. 364) communicates the following:

How such "truly united" congregations came into being is instructively
illustrated by a small town of our province, of which we have closer
(indeed documentary) knowledge. In this town, B., there was on the one
hand a Lutheran congregation of about 4,000 souls with three pastors
and richly endowed church and parsonage property. On the other hand
there were in the town seven — I say seven — "Reformed," namely (it is
meant as no disparagement of the Reformed confession when we take a
closer look at these its most scattered and outlying members): 1. an
old surgeon, who lived in concubinage and was withal the church elder
of this "Reformed" congregation; 2. and 3. two determined adherents of
Uhlich, whose wife had several times supplied the best hymns to the
"Papers for Protestant Friends"; 4. a hospital inmate paralyzed by a
stroke, who had, incidentally, been instructed according to the
Lutheran catechism and confirmed as a Lutheran; 5. a poor tailor, who
could not support himself by his trade; and finally 6. and 7. two poor
old women. These seven Reformed naturally had no clergyman of their
own; it had long since been arranged that the second Lutheran pastor
should preach a sermon to them quarterly and administer to them alone
the Holy Supper six times a year, for which they paid him a fee.