# Der Lutheraner_St. Louis Missouri_1848 07 19_S204
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

Confession of a United Evangelical.

Thus writes, according to the "Deutscher Kirchenfreund" (of July), a United preacher of this country to the editor of that paper:

"[It] is that all faithful and honest labor in an evangelical congregation is only half-work. A two-year experience has considerably changed my Union sentiments. Things must still be prepared quite differently than has been done up to now, before a true Union*) can come about. Regarding all the United congregations that I know, it is a misery; they are rationalistic, preachers included. 'We all believe in one God' — that is their fine principle, which is also written in large letters above my pulpit. That is why, when I came here, I found Jews, Catholics, etc., in the congregation."

How well-founded these complaints are is shown by every new far-reaching attempt to transplant onto American soil the United Evangelical Church built up in Germany especially by princes. A so-called "German United Evangelical Synod in North America" has arisen which, consisting of thirteen preachers, held its third meeting on September ..., 1847, at Cleveland, Ohio. Since June ... of this year, this synod has had a German religious newspaper published in Cincinnati, under the editorship of pastors Dethlefs (Allegheny, Pa.), Dr. Fischer (Hamilton, O.), and Schaad (formerly editor of the "Theophilus," now in Cincinnati), appearing as their organ under the name "Christlicher Hausfreund." The editorship of this United Evangelical paper is, as we read in the "Freien Deutschen Katholiken,"α) so divided among themselves in their views on how to conduct it that already in No. 3 one contributor lodges open protest against two articles by his co-editor and declares outright that he "only reluctantly permitted these articles to be admitted."

Might these men, through such experiences, have their eyes opened to see that it is wholly wasted labor when they wish to build here in America a church founded on the confessions of either the Lutheran or the Reformed Church, or even merely on the confession of a few so-called principal truths of the Gospel selected by men. Such building on uncertain ground has not been able to hold up in Germany despite all royal decrees, and in America still much less, and instead of promoting unity, it will only be a true hotbed for ever new sects, which arise like insects overnight in whole swarms.

*) What true union consists of, the holy apostle Paul tells us when he writes: "Now I beseech you, brethren, by the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that ye all speak the same thing, and that there be no divisions among you; but that ye be perfectly joined together in the same mind and in the same judgment." (1 Cor. 1:10.) Further: "Endeavouring to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace. There is one body and one Spirit, even as ye are called in one hope of your calling; one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all." (Eph. 4:3–6.) Thank God, we Lutherans do not first have to seek this true union — we have already found it — in our church. On the other hand, all those who demand unity of faith not in everything, but only, as they say, in the essential doctrines of the Word, will always seek that true union and never find it. — D. R.

α) We have received the "Christlicher Hausfreund" only from the fourth number on.

Jesuit Doctrines.

I.
"If you unshakably believe that you are commanded to lie, — then lie."
(Casnedi, Jud. theol., p. 278.)

II.
"If you are asked about a theft you have committed in order to offset a debt, or about a loan which you do not actually owe because you have already paid it, or are not currently obligated to pay because the term has expired, or because your poverty probably excuses you from paying, you may swear that you have received no loan — with the secret thought that you are nevertheless bound to pay it at once, because the judge demands the oath for his own purpose."

(Castro Palao, Jesuit, De virtutibus et vitiis, 1631, p. 18.)

III.
"A man who finds himself entangled in a bad affair, and whom one has made swear that he will marry the girl with whom he has been caught, can swear that he will take her, with the secret reservation: if I am compelled to it, or: if she pleases me afterward."

"If someone wishes to swear without obligating himself to keep his oath, let him mutilate the words. For example, let him say uro and leave out the j, so that it reads: I burn, instead of juro, I swear; then it is nothing but a small venial sin, which is easily forgiven." (Sanchez.)

IV.
"If a wife has concealed the amount of her dowry after her husband's goods have been confiscated, and she is asked whether she has kept anything back, she can answer that she has kept nothing back — meaning, of course, nothing that belonged to someone else."

"If a crime is secret, one may deny being guilty of the crime — meaning, of course, publicly."

(Father Stoz, Jesuit, Tribunal poenitentiae.)

V.
"The rebellion of a clergyman against the king is not a crime of lese-majesty, because a clergyman is not a subject of the king." (Emanuel Sa, Aphorisms, under the word Clericus.)

VI.
"When one gives a sacrament or a holy thing for an unchaste pleasure — indeed as a reward, and not merely under the title of a free gift — this will be simony and sacrilege. This is the case of a man who would give the brother a benefice as the reward of the unchastity he committed with the brother's sister; but if, after having slept with the sister, one gives the benefice to the brother under the title of gratitude, there lies in it at most a kind of irreverence."

(Vincent Filliucci, Quaestiones morales, tom. II, cap. VIII, p. 616.)

VII.
Of Father Arsdekin, a Swedish Jesuit, it is said: "Simony and astrology are permissible things."

(Theologia tripartita, 1744, tom. II, tract. V, cap. XII.)
(The Free German Catholic.)

Union Churches.

The Lutheran Pittsburgh Synod has, as we see from the "Christlicher Hausfreund," among other things, passed the following resolution: "Resolved, that this synod regards the building of union churches as a source of continual harm, and especially of discord — which is precisely the opposite of what one commonly promises oneself in the erecting of such houses." Might the congregations take warning from this testimony, which an entire synod bears after many years of sad experience!

All those who have subscribed and prepaid for the Book of Concord, both with Mr. P. Walther and with the undersigned, may obtain their copies from the latter. In addition, copies are still available at $1.30 (including the contribution toward transport costs) from F. W. Barthel.

The German Evangelical Lutheran Synod of Indianapolis will hold its next session on the first Thursday in September of this year in St. John's Church, Caesar Creek Township, Dearborn Co., Ind. Punctual attendance is expected.

The brethren arriving on the Ohio should inquire in Aurora for innkeeper Rothert, where on the appointed day, as well as the day before, a wagon will be ready for their further conveyance. J. G. Kunz, Sec.

A Lutheran Preacher Wanted.

The undersigned congregation, which up to now has been served with the Gospel every third Sunday by Pastor J. G. Kunz of Indianapolis, wishes, in agreement with him, to call its own preacher, who can not only hold services every Sunday and festival day, but also take over the school instruction of our youth.

The pastor's salary is $200.00 annually, not counting school fees.

Lutheran pastors who are, in doctrine and life, what the name signifies, are most cordially invited to preach a trial sermon in the German Evangelical Lutheran Zion Church on Dock Creek, Brookville Road, Hancock Co., 12 miles east of Indianapolis, Indiana.

C. Wilhelm Rösener,
Carl Bruner,
Anton Kerkhoff,
Church Council.

Received for the Preachers' Seminary at Fort Wayne from the congregation at Frankenmuth, Michigan: in May 1847, $11.07, and in June 1848, $13.21.

Received —
a) for the heathen mission on the Cass River in Michigan:

50 cts. and $2.00 from two unnamed [donors]. $55.00 from Mr. Peter Schmelz, Seneca Co., O. $2.00 from Mr. Sigm. Koch.

b) for the synodical mission fund:

$2.00 from the congregations of Mr. P. Kraus in Bucyrus, Crawford Co., O. $2.00 from the congregation at Pomeroy, Meigs Co., O. $1.00 from Mr. Gottfr. Rausch.

Paid.

Vol. 4. Messrs. P. Krauss, P. Löber (2 copies), Jakob Göglein (from No. 24 on), Jakob Steinle.

Vol. 5. Messrs. Joh. Fr. Gerding, Geo. Kauss, Wendel Kautz.

For 200 copies of No. 6, through Mr. P. Wier, $5.00, on February 21, 1848.

Printed by Arthur Olshausen, publisher of the Anzeiger des Westens.