# Der Lutheraner_St. Louis Missouri_1848 05 30_S156
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

the semblance of learning, nowhere learning itself; public disputations, riddles, Latin verses, panegyrics — nothing but useless stuff. In addition, a philosophy in which it is forbidden to occupy oneself with God (questiones de Deo praetereantur)! — No one is ever to occupy himself with the First Cause, or with the freedom, or with the eternity, of God. — The pupils are to say nothing, do nothing, nihil agant, nihil dicant! — Yet this course of philosophy lasts three years! To what use, then, will they be put? Let them pass on without examination, transeant non examinando. And if someone has no aptitude for philosophy, if there are rather limited and dull ones among them, what will they be good for, to what use will they be put? To the study of difficult cases of conscience ("inepti ad casuum studia destinentur," Ratio stud., p. 172)!

Just as, in the field of learning, Jesuitism deliberately withholds from its charges what is deep, true, and whole, so too, in education itself and in the spreading of Christianity in general, it is not concerned with what is deeply inward, truly sanctifying, and regenerating. It does not confront the heart in its deep fall and its estrangement from God, sin as a settled condition (habitus), with the armor commanded in God's Word, Ephesians 6; rather, war is declared on individual sins, on vices, and rules of prudence, precepts of propriety, and calculations of profit and loss are supposed to check the deep-lying corruption. If it is characteristic of Catholicism in general not to support the Word of God, as the foremost means of awakening, enlightenment, and sanctification, in its free triumphant course, and not to open all the sluice-gates to its current, then Jesuitism in particular trusts sooner in a thousand means and ways of human cleverness than in the quiet and sure-working power of the simple word of the Bible. Where the evangelical educator knows that, by awakening in his pupils a love for God's Word, he has given them a protection sufficient for every case, a judgment that gives light for every case, there the Jesuit teacher piles up case of conscience upon case of conscience, and exhausts himself in the expenditure of wit and cunning, equipping his own with means and rules for individual cases. From a book by the Jesuit Father Humbert, which was approved a few years ago by the Bishop of Nancy and the Archbishops of Lyon, Besançon, and Bordeaux, one can see, in miniature and from one angle, the whole operation of the Fathers for the salvation of the world and the formation of mankind. A reporter says, among other things, the following about it:

"The work is divided into chapters, each of which contains stories serving as evidence for the preceding precepts. On every page the author preaches innocence, chastity, and abstinence to young people, but by the manner in which he treats this delicate subject, he very often achieves the opposite of what he intends. He takes it upon himself to explain to girls the difference between an ordinary kiss and a kiss on the mouth. Everywhere one finds descriptions and stories that are more likely to kindle the fire of the senses than to dampen it. There stands, for example, a novelistic story of an innkeeper's daughter who gave herself to a soldier and, having become pregnant, names a monk as the father. The monk submits to every punishment, raises the child, and dies; when the other monks then wash the corpse, they see that their brother was a woman: it was Saint Marina. St. Marina soon works wonders and first heals the innkeeper's daughter, who had been possessed by the devil from the time of her crime. To show the danger of bad company, young people are held up the story of Juliana, who, seduced by her companion Therese, fell ill and died. To make drunkenness repugnant to boys, they are shown the deed of Cyrillus, 'who, coming out of the tavern, wanted to violate his pregnant mother in the open street; the woman exerted herself so violently to defend herself that she gave birth prematurely. Moreover, the unfortunate drunkard made an assault upon the chastity of one of his sisters, who chose rather to be stabbed to death by her infamous brother than to consent to such a crime. And when the father came running at the noise, the raging son plunged his hands into the blood of the one who had given him life; indeed, he even stabbed to death another sister who wanted to defend her father. O heaven, what horrors and crimes!'" (p. 285.)

"To what end set such real or invented horrors before the eyes of the young, to what end excite their imagination, by everlastingly preaching to girls that they should not go about with bare necks and should not listen to boys; to boys, that they should not adorn themselves in order to please girls — by even giving instructions about bathing and dressing together?"

We could still cite a whole host of the most scandalous stories from this book, but we already feel obliged to ask the reader's pardon for having communicated the above; nevertheless, the more the reverend Jesuits' books try to hide themselves from the eyes of the public, the more they must be dragged into the light. We would ask, moreover, that it not be forgotten that the book from which the above extracts are taken is intended for pupils.

This straining out gnats and swallowing camels, this working for what has very aptly been called "conduct-morality" — that is, moral teaching for outward behavior — is precisely the element in which Jesuit education delights. — Throughout Jesuitism there prevails a secret rationalism, as even the famous Catholic theologian Möhler acknowledges; and this very rationalism cannot help but entrust everything in education to the wisdom that is from below.

What harm must arise from this for the souls of the children cannot be mistaken at all, and one may therefore rightly call out to parents who entrust their children to Jesuit schools: take good heed of what you are doing! God will one day require the souls of your children from your hand, if they are lost through your fault. Therefore do not let yourselves be blinded by outward appearance. It may be that your children, in the Jesuit schools, will in a short time acquire an outwardly smooth veneer and a kind of superficial education, but what is gained by that, if in the meantime their souls are poisoned? Here in America, where unfortunately one is only too easily satisfied with an external trimming and wants to have everything finished as quickly as possible, that warning is probably least out of place.
(Conclusion to follow.)

Why Are the Words of Institution, "This Is My Body; This Is My Blood," to Be Understood Literally?
(Conclusion.)

6. In the last issue we cited, as the fifth reason why the words of institution are to be understood literally, the Pauline passage: "He who eats and drinks unworthily eats and drinks judgment to himself, in that he does not discern the body of the Lord" (1 Cor. 11:29). We must return once more to this passage; for it furnishes us with a sixth reason in support of the "literal" understanding of the words in question. For, apart from the fact that these words of Paul already say expressly that those partake of the Holy Supper to their own judgment who do not believe that the body of the Lord is present, given, and received in the Holy Supper, these words also clearly contain the declaration that life and death, blessing and curse, salvation and damnation, grace and "judgment," depend on the correct conception one forms of the content of the holy Sacrament. Since, then, this is the case with the Holy Supper, it is beyond doubt that Christ must have spoken of the content of this Sacrament in such a way that even the simplest person, even a child, could understand it, and — provided he does not willfully depart from the words of institution — cannot go astray. This we must conclude from the fact that Christ is Love itself; for would it not be cruel if Christ had threatened judgment upon those who would not rightly distinguish his Supper from other meals, and yet had himself spoken of it only pictorially, figuratively, in a veiled manner, improperly — that is, let us simply say, obscurely and ambiguously for the simple-minded? Without doubt, it would be. Therefore, as surely as Christ is Love, so surely has he not laid a hidden hook in his Supper of reconciliation to catch simple souls and lead them into judgment; so surely, that is, has he spoken plainly — literally — in the words of institution.