# Der Lutheraner_St. Louis Missouri_1852 01 20_S85
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

85

„...gratitude which I owe you for much kindness shown me in former days, to venture yet another attempt, with the help of God and the gracious assistance of His Holy Spirit, to help you by hearty admonition out of God's Word, so far as in me lies, that you may again become sober out of the snare of Satan, in which you now lie captive. I therefore entreat you earnestly to permit me to come to you in the course of this day with Mr. Sommer, in order to make you a brotherly and loving representation, for which, alas, there was so little opportunity yesterday, since I was constrained to confine myself to a brief and decided testimony. Let me therefore kindly know, through Mr. Sommer, who brings you these lines, whether and at what time of this day I may come to you for the aforesaid holy purpose.

„May the gracious God incline your heart, that you may gladly and with joy agree to this proposal of a faithful though lowly servant of Christ, animated by the spirit of love and peace. This is the prayer and entreaty, from the bottom of his heart, of
August Crämer.“

This letter, to be sure, Winkler would not accept at all, not even when the bearer had briefly indicated its contents to him. But from this it is as clear as the sun how greatly Winkler has distorted the truth, in that he interpreted this letter-story to the advantage of his evil cause, while it, faithfully set forth, only reveals his great hardness of heart. Yet no liar is so clever but that he will be found out, and must needs be caught in his own words. So it goes also with Pastor Winkler. For when he now goes on to report that from that time on Crämer carried on his factious doings quite boldly and without shame, and held meetings upon meetings with the faction, from which on the 19th of June, under Crämer's eyes and leadership, a letter of renunciation to Pastor Winkler proceeded, he has certainly acted very unwisely in stating the date so exactly. For between the emphatic "from that time on" and the fateful 19th of June there is, as the date of the above letter, likewise cited by Winkler, shows, only a single night. Since it can now be shown statistically that most of the people belong to the trading class, who must attend to their occupation the whole day long, and that they live scattered far and wide in the city, any simple person can readily see what is to be thought of it when Winkler says that the undersigned held meetings upon meetings with the faction, namely, that this is a brazen lie. Easily, too, will every simple person be able to judge what is to be made of it when Winkler further reports that he and his board twice refused to accept the renunciation which was handed in, but burned it, as a confession that they wished to have no fellowship with the ringleader Crämer; for it is ridiculous to hear that they believed they were entering into fellowship with Crämer by accepting that paper, he who was in no way further concerned in it than that, over the treatment given them by Winkler and, respectively, his contemptuous rejection, the people came fully to the certainty that Winkler would not come to the light, that he would never suffer their just cause to be examined by an impartial court, whereupon, of course, nothing else remained to them but to renounce such an open wolf. — When Winkler further goes on in his report thus: that Crämer, in his eagerness to secure the Detroit spoil, had lost all sense of discipline and shame, and seeks to prove this by asserting that he went about the city day after day, either running with the factionists to lawyers, to try whether they could rob the congregation of its church property, or in hearty fellowship with the worst enemies of the church, pasquil-writers by profession and heavy beer-drinkers, or walking alone upon the street, the biretta on his head and the cigar in his mouth: in the first place, it is impossible that Crämer should have gone about day after day, since he remained in Detroit only one day more, and going about is not at all his way; further, there can be no question of a robbing of the congregation, since in fact those cannot lay claim to the name of congregation who remain with a wolf who has been exposed, and as for the church property, it falls, according to Winkler's own constitution, to those who remain with the pure Lutheran doctrine, but by no means to such as, contrary to Matt. 18, wrongly exercise the ban and by joining the Buffalo Synod make themselves partakers of the Grabauian errors; finally, the undersigned is not at all aware of having had any fellowship, let alone a hearty one, with known enemies of the church, pasquil-writers and beer-swillers, and he must in general declare Pastor Winkler a base slanderer until he proves to him that during his stay at that time in Detroit he really did something that was contrary to discipline and shame.

Winkler continues in his report by saying: if Crämer makes the people believe that the lawyers advised him against going to law, on the ground that Pastor Winkler is a lawyer and they could win nothing against him, this is a palpable untruth. To this we must reply that it is, alas, an undeniable fact that not only the lawyer whom the congregation, concerned for its church property, asked for counsel, but also a respected judge, did really make that remark before several witnesses. Moreover, this story, woven in without occasion, reminds one of the tale of the man with the hole in his coat, who, though no one would have noticed it, by excessive care to conceal it first really drew the eyes of the people to it. Let Pastor Winkler take good care that he does not, by the sophistries and artifices of lying in this his report, himself reveal to all the world that he has more talent for a lawyer than for a pastor. Or is it anything else than a lawyer's trick, when Winkler knows very well that we, who were attending to our calling 90 miles from Detroit, could know nothing at all of filthy, maliciously slanderous articles which the faction, as he says, had for a considerable time caused to be printed against him in a Socialist newspaper, even if such things, certainly to our own great displeasure, had happened, and yet falsely promises that in its time it will become manifest what share the faction-priesthood had in those articles. We can calmly await that time, and look on while Winkler goes on blaspheming and slandering until he has revealed himself to all the world as a lawyerly fabricator of lies. In the further course of his report Winkler now says: the Synod of Buffalo thereupon, in accordance with its calling, had the Detroit matter investigated by an ecclesiastical court. In truth, Pastor Winkler must count upon very forgetful readers, that he may offer them such a thing. Has he not himself related at length in the introduction that their constitution, for the case that the congregation belongs to no synod, prescribes as the way of deciding any disputes that may arise, that members of a committee to be formed shall be called from both contending parties, and does not his whole report rest upon the undeniable fact that he himself in the present case took that way, indeed stubbornly insisted that the matter must be decided so and not otherwise? How can he then say that the Synod of Buffalo had been called to investigate the matter in accordance with its calling? We would ask, whence is this calling to come? Rather it is, after all, clear as the sun that it presumed to undertake something which did not belong to it. When now Winkler further reports: that when the faction saw that it would not prevail with its hatred, but that in a thorough investigation its abominable deeds must come to light, it said it did not recognize the court: it is in truth outrageous to see how the matter is here all at once turned right about and represented as though the complainants had wished to evade a strict investigation; whereas from Winkler's report itself, and still more from our truthful account of the matter, it is clear as the sun that the people were always most willing and ready to have their affair investigated in the constitutional way by an impartial court, while Winkler, on the contrary, when it was to be made earnest, interposed disturbance, and indeed by the contemptuous rejection of the committee member of his opponents, formerly acknowledged by himself, made the investigation impossible, which fact in itself really suffices to convince every one that the people are no faction