# Lehre und Wehre_St. Louis Missouri_Juli 1859_S218
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

218 The Agenda Controversy in Baden.

self-conceit, but in loving consultation with brethren in the faith. Only
necessity excuses an exception to this.

Note. In this there also lies an obligation for Christians to see to it
that young people are instructed in the competence required for this.

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The Agenda Controversy in Baden.
———

With the close of the past year Baden has furnished yet another
epilogue to the well-known Bavarian struggles of sorrowful memory. The
Baden General Synod of 1855 had resolved, by a large majority of votes
against 4 to 6 dissenting votes, upon a new order of divine service. After
the Grand Duke's approval had been obtained, the Supreme Consistory
worked out a service-book [Kirchenbuch] on the basis of the synodical
resolutions, which last year, on March 18th, left the press and was sent
out to all parish offices for introduction. This service-book is the object
of the dispute. It contains a simple and an expanded order of service.
Both are borrowed, in the main, from the Saxon Lutheran orders, and
seek to give the service more of a distinctly Lutheran character. Kyrie,
Gloria, confession, general assurance of grace, the creed, kneeling at
confession and at the reception of the Lord's Supper, and the like, betray
an origin other than the South German one. For in the Baden territories
there had prevailed, since the Reformation, an order which conformed to
the simple Reformed service; and it was precisely this that people wanted
to do away with, partly because it was said to be too sober and lacking in
feeling, partly because it left too much room for arbitrariness and stood
in the way of a full service. The most influential representative of the
new order, Prelate Ullmann, was concerned to work the Baden Union
somewhat out of its disorganized state by this means; and just as he had
already, though in vain, endeavored elsewhere to give the state church a
firm confessional foundation, so he now wanted at least to fit a few
churchly building-blocks into the service. The measure of what he
demanded was fairly modest. Distinctively Lutheran doctrine had come
to expression nowhere, unless one wishes to count the baptismal formula,
which unambiguously states the regeneration of little children. The
formula of distribution at the Holy Supper reads: "Christ says: Take,
eat, etc.;" and when Professor Schöberlein, who represented the
Lutheran views most strongly, moved to remove this ambiguous formula,
he remained in the minority with four votes. In any case, the shorter,
simple order of service, with its tightly cut altar liturgy, was now
prescribed for all congregations, while kneeling and some other matters
were left optional. The detailed order was left to the discretion of the
congregations. One would have