# Der Lutheraner_St. Louis Missouri_1844 12 08_S32
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

and split it to its very foundation," in that a large party had formed here which retains the name "Lutheran," but behind this shield fights against Lutheran doctrine and introduces so-called "new measures," that is, a Methodist method of conversion; the nursery of this party is the seminary at Gettysburg. The author then turns to the attempts which the so-called "Evangelicals" are also making here to move the Lutherans to fall away from their Church, and thus to root them out, even in name, wherever they possibly can. He speaks, on page 26:

"But almost even more dangerous than this schism seem to me, for the survival of the Lutheran Church in America, the attempts at union between Lutherans and Reformed, which are also being made there of late. First — apart from a few earlier isolated cases — some years ago, new preachers who had come over from Germany began, in and around St. Louis and in a few other places, to form so-called 'Evangelical' congregations, that is, congregations mixed from adherents of both confessions. To all appearances this will, at least in the West, make rapid headway. Many forces are thereby withdrawn from the good cause, since naturally all who join these united congregations are neutral with respect to that struggle within the Lutheran Church. But what is especially dangerous about that union is that, because the confessions which one wishes to unite contradict each other, the firm ground of confession is entirely abandoned and exchanged for the slippery ground of subjectivity (one's own personal conviction at any given time), and love for the truth, together with holy earnestness for it, is weakened. Indifference and slackness in confession is the necessary consequence of this, if it is not already its origin. In this way one also becomes accustomed to regarding the bond of the Church and the sanctity of fellowship so lightly that in the end one changes fellowship as one changes a garment. Through these Evangelical congregations (in which everyone outwardly remains what he is) the members of the Lutheran Church are delivered, as through a passage-point, into the hands of every possible sect. Once they have, by entering such congregations, laid aside their reluctance to leave the mother church, they easily go over to sects as well. Thus the union, precisely because it seems to be something so harmless, threatens the Church most dangerously with gradual dissolution."

In inserting this passage, we are indeed afraid of being accused of doing so out of ill will toward the preachers of the surrounding area here who call themselves Evangelical. We are willing to bear this gladly as a reproach that always follows the open confession of the truth. We testify, however, before all the world, that we would then be wronged. A hostile disposition toward the united gentlemen preachers here is entirely foreign to us. We do not judge their hearts; God alone

32

is aware of what still holds them captive. But may we not publicly pour out our complaint that they, who ought to be fighting here alongside us for the Lutheran Church, are instead helping to work its destruction? May we not publicly ask them: What harm has the true Lutheran Church done you, that you too treat her as your enemy? If you simply wanted to have nothing to do with our fellowship, we would gladly excuse that ourselves; but why do you renounce the Church of our old, pious fathers, who were nevertheless recognized as faithful and honest witnesses of the truth? If you say: Yes, but the Lutheran Church is now too deeply corrupted! — then we ask you: If you recognize that along with us, should you not, precisely then, take the distress of the Church to heart, and be all the more faithful the more others now become unfaithful, and join in working to heal her wounds? Furthermore, what have our Lutheran brethren in the faith done to deserve this at your hands, that you make them unfaithful here in a foreign land to the Church that bore them, or at least seek to keep souls bound within a union into which they were brought — sometimes by cunning, without their knowing it, sometimes by force — by a tyrannical authority in the old fatherland? Why do you, who profess to want to establish peace, form a new party, out of which ever new sects are constantly born, and thus ever greater discord? If you are devoted in your hearts to Lutheran doctrine, why then do you not confess it in word and deed, and help build the Church that confesses this doctrine and seeks to preserve it? — Do not accuse us of quarrelsomeness, for oh, who desires more earnestly than we that there be peace between us! How deeply it grieves us that you have separated yourselves from us and that we cannot work together united! For we can never help destroy the Church that remains with such incorruptible faithfulness to the word of her Savior, and that so decisively casts out and rejects all error. Let us take our stand together upon this foundation! Oh, with what joy would we then be ready to extend to you the hands of brothers, to fight the common enemy together, and gladly to be the least among you!

Church News.

From the "Freimüthige" of Buffalo, N.Y.

On November 6, the local Lutheran church here, the so-called Prussian Church, at the corner of Michigan and Goodell Streets, was dedicated amid festivities held for the occasion, and given the name "Trinity Church."

From the "Christian Journal" of Chambersburg, Penn.

Opponents of Biblical Religion.

Philadelphia. — The building which was erected as a so-called church of rationalist belief for Ginal is now being used by the Methodists.

New York. — The Temple of Reason, in which Försch formerly fought against all Bible-Christianity, is now being used by the wretched Millerites.

Allentown, Penn. — The so-called Temple of Reason stands entirely empty.

These are, to our knowledge, the only temples specifically designated for that purpose — Temples of Reason — in America, and their fate is by no means an encouraging one for the adherents and advocates of a perverse religion of reason.

New German Lutheran School in
St. Louis.

Such a school has now also been established, by the Evangelical Lutheran congregation of the Unaltered Augsburg Confession here, in the northern part of the city, on Seventh Street between Carr and Wash Streets, next to the mill. Parents who wish to have their children admitted to it should apply to the present teacher, Mr. Th. Bünger, Jr.

"They come to an end amid terrors."
Ps. 73:19.

Elias Hasenmüller, who had himself first been a member of the Order of the Jesuits, but who, convinced of the truth of the evangelical doctrine, finally in the year 1587 went over to the Lutheran Church, and thereafter resided for a considerable time in Wittenberg, has preserved for us, in his "History of the Jesuit Order," which appeared in 1593, a remarkable example of what a pitiable end the apostate deniers of the truth often come to. Hasenmüller relates, namely, in the said work, that he himself had witnessed and heard the following:

A certain Jesuit, John by name, who had abandoned the truth he had recognized and had entered the Order of the Jesuits, came at last, in 1583, to his deathbed at Landsberg. In order to come to his aid in such distress, they brought him Agni Dei (images of the Lamb of God), rosaries, images of saints, wooden crosses, blessed medallions (small round pictures), the consecrated host, and other such things; they also promised to say prayers and read masses for him, and exhorted him to take comfort in the merits of the saints and of his brotherhood. All persuasion, however, was in vain, for he replied: "Away with all of this, for it is precisely because I believed in these things that I am now going to be damned." Thereupon I said to him: "Believe in Jesus Christ." The unfortunate man answered in horror: "There was a time when I believed in him, but I have shamefully denied him; to me Jesus has now become a condemning judge; my salvation is forfeited." To Petrus Hispanus, who was present, he said: "I beg you, kill me, or give me a knife, that I may pierce myself through, for I am already burning entirely in the flames of hell." Hearing this, the Jesuits held the sign of the cross before his eyes and laid consecrated herbs upon him. But the dying man cried out: "Away, away! With that you are only pouring oil on the fire; I see nothing but evil spirits waiting for my soul with open claws; I am already given over to them, for I have denied God and his holy Word." In such despair the wretched man passed away. B.

Printed by Weber and Olshausen.