# Lehre und Wehre_St. Louis Missouri_August 1862_S227
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

Report on the True Mean of the Lutheran Liturgy. 227

only in the Mass, spoken by the priest. Has not the devil here cunningly stolen from us the chief part of the Mass and brought it into silence? For who has ever heard it preached, that in the Mass one should attend to these words*), and defy the world upon them with a firm faith, when that ought to have been the foremost thing? Thus they have made themselves afraid, and taught us to fear, where there is no fear at all, but rather where all our comfort and security lie. What miserable consciences might have been comforted and rescued by this, which are ruined by fear and distress! What devil, indeed, told them that the words which ought to be the most common, the most public of all among all Christians — priest and laity, man and woman, young and old — should be kept most secretly hidden? How should it be possible for us to know what the Mass is, how it is to be practiced and observed, if we were not to know the words in which the Mass consists and proceeds? — But would to God that we Germans read Mass in German, and sang the most secret words at the very top of our voices! Why should not we Germans read Mass in our own tongue, just as the Latins, the Greeks, and many others hold Mass in their own tongue? Why does one not also keep the words of baptism secret: I baptize you in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, Amen (Matt. 28:19)? May everyone here speak German and aloud, though these words are no less holy words and promises of God; why should one not likewise speak and let everyone hear, aloud and in German, these words of the Mass? (Ibid., 27, 152-153.)

2. On the Whole Form of the Chief Divine Service.

a) How beautiful, glorious, and evangelical it is: "God be praised, in our churches we can show a Christian a truly Christian Mass, according to the order and institution of Christ, and also according to the true meaning of Christ and the church. There before the altar stands our parish pastor, bishop, or servant in the pastoral office, rightly and honestly and publicly called, but beforehand consecrated in baptism, anointed, and born a priest of Christ, regardless of the corner-chrism; he sings publicly and clearly the order of Christ, instituted in the Supper, takes the bread and wine, gives thanks, distributes it, and gives it by the power of Christ's words: This is my body, this is my blood, do this, etc., to the rest of us who are present and wish to receive it; and we, especially those of us who wish to take the sacrament, kneel beside, behind, and around him — man, woman, young, old, master, servant, wife, maid, parents, children — as God there brings us together, all of us true, holy fellow-priests, sanctified through Christ's blood and anointed and consecrated in baptism through the Holy Spirit."

*) How fitting, then, is the passage in Luther's aforementioned paraphrase: "In the second place I exhort you in Christ, that with right faith you attend to Christ's testament, and above all firmly grasp in your heart the words in which Christ grants us his body and blood for forgiveness."