# Lehre und Wehre_St. Louis Missouri_September 1864_S283
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

283

Church and Contemporary History.

I. America.

The Franckean Synod. Once more the "Lutheran and Missionary" comes to speak, under the above heading, of this noble body, and in particular of its own and the General Synod's playing games with the Lutheran confession and name, and to punish the latter as it deserves. It expresses itself on the matter as follows: "We think the church has to regard the question of the Franckean Synod as closed by its own most recent action. They 'declare their formal adherence to the Confession (the Augsburg), as proposed by the said Synod (the General Synod).' That is the last act of the drama which this changeable body has played. When we first heard them in their defense before the General Synod, they took the position that the articles of faith printed in their constitution were their faith, on which ground their petition was unanimously pushed back. The following day it seemed as though they took the position that the Augsburg Confession, in the manner of subscription recommended in the General Synod's formula, was their faith, and on this ground the question was brought onto the table again. Toward the end of the discussion, Mr. Van Alstine, who was so awkwardly frank that the friends of the Franckean Synod had to silence him, seemed to take the position that they had no confession of faith at all, and the General Synod, after having spent several days largely in rhetorical attempts to obscure a very clear matter, resolved: to admit the Franckean Synod on the condition that they 'formally accept the doctrinal basis of the Lutheran Church, namely the Augsburg Confession, as containing the fundamental doctrines of the Word of God, or forfeit their membership in this body.' Thereupon the Franckean Synod did as noted above. Meanwhile their constitution, with its articles of faith, stands untouched in full force; the Augsburg Confession as a rule of doctrine is a dead letter; from their own document it is perfectly evident that they do not regard as fundamental many things which the church and the confession hold to be fundamental. There is not a Methodist, Presbyterian, or Episcopal fellowship in the whole country that could not accept the Augsburg Confession just as truly and unreservedly as the Franckean Synod does. The only difference is that they call themselves Lutherans. Is the name 'Lutheran,' then, so much, and the thing actually signified by it so little? To say to the Franckean Synod, 'Come in!'—and yet to turn away a body of another denomination that holds the general foundations of Protestantism more firmly than they do—amounts to saying to those turned away: 'Stay outside; we cannot tolerate Christians honest enough to call themselves what they are. It is not your principles we reject; you simply lack the right name. Remain what you are, only call yourselves Lutherans, and we will receive you.' Some consider that liberality; we call it bigotry and sectarianism of the lowest kind. A genuine Lutheran does not let himself be bound in this way. Where he finds unity of faith, there he recognizes the unity of the church, whatever the name may be; and where this unity is lacking, the name has no value, be it the name 'Lutheran' or any other. He will grant to a Methodist fellowship that calls itself Methodist the very same regard, both personal and ecclesiastical, that he grants to a Methodist body that chooses to call itself Lutheran—with only this difference, that he will feel a respect for the honesty and constancy of the former which he cannot feel for the latter." C.

Universalism in America. The "Evangelist" writes: "The 'Ambassador,' the organ of the Universalists, who believe in no hell, says that by now almost all Unitarians—that is, those who reject the doctrine of the Trinity and do not hold Christ to be true God—have adopted the universalist principles of a general salvation."