# Der Lutheraner_St. Louis Missouri_1852 11 23_S55
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

55

Pastor Grabau a eulogy. Since the latter has already shown this love to the former in the "Informatorium" as well, the writer may well have thought: "One love is worth another." Moreover, we heartily grant Mr. Pastor Grabau praise where it is due him. We have to do not so much with his person (although he himself, together with his associates, makes himself so much business with our person) as rather with his doctrine. We are also quite willing to concede to Pastor Winkler that it may have gone with him regarding Pastor Grabau much as it once went with us regarding Pastor Stephan, whom we likewise found quite different from what rumor depicted him, and who also in his time, as a true servant of God, labored with admirable fidelity for the rescue of many hundreds, perhaps many thousands of souls, but who nevertheless fell into false doctrine!*)

*) It goes without saying that we by no means wish to compare Pastor Grabau with Pastor Stephan in respect of the latter's immoral life, which later became manifest, although the fanatical Grabau in his unchristian zeal has set Stephan at our side without such limitation.

4. The fourth article is by Mr. von Rohr, whose acquaintance our readers have already made in the affair of the unjust ban. The article is headed: "Warning against Jesuits." Of course the dear gentleman means by the Jesuits our humble selves. Because, namely, some years ago we ourselves published in the "Lutheraner" the passages from Luther's earlier writings on the unjust ban upon which the Buffalo people lean, at that time indeed without the necessary distinction, but now no longer wish to let them stand as Luther's always retained doctrine, we are therefore to be and must be a Jesuit. Mr. von Rohr has not considered that one may and ought to learn also from one's enemies. Luther, as is well known, calls the enemies of Christians the grindstones of Christians, and Arnd is said, in his sacristy, every time that in the church hymns a passage occurred in which enemies were mentioned, to have taken off his little cap and to have thanked the dear God for the much good which the enemies had unwillingly done him through God's providence. We confess that we too, when we think of the Buffalo people, find cause enough to doff our little cap. By this, for example, how the Buffalo people have exploited Luther's earlier doctrine of the unjust ban, we have been wholesomely roused to distinguish better in Luther's doctrine on this point between the earlier and the later time than we did some years ago. Moreover, it does astonish us how Mr. von Rohr, as an old military man, can treat the matter so naively. We have shown him so clearly his error and his wantonness precisely with regard to the doctrine of Luther and of the Lutheran Church concerning the unjust ban that no doubt about it has any room left, and he poses as though he had just fallen again from heaven and therefore knew nothing at all that during his absence something had been written against him precisely concerning this point! True, he has put the date "16 September 1852" under his last article; yet we do not wish to hope that this is again to be a back door!

5. The fifth article is a communication from the church council of the congregation at Martinsville, in which the same, as the Buffalo gentlemen are wont to do, declares everything that Mr. Pastor Krause had replied to the Martinsville congregation in the "Lutheraner" to be sheer lies, without proofs. The writers complain at the same time that they sent this would-be refutation of Krause's article also to the editorial office of the "Lutheraner" for inclusion in this paper, but did not receive so much as an answer to it. The matter does indeed stand thus. But we ask everyone who can judge even by the rules of reason and common justice: Is it not downright senseless to demand of an editor that he accept a rejoinder which contains nothing but abusive language and unproved bare denial of the facts of the case on the part of the attacked party? Could we regard the request of the senders, to accept such a rejoinder, as anything other than mockery and scorn, to which we could oppose nothing better than silence? The writers, to be sure, exclaim: "There one sees how the congregation's right is conceded to it" — but who the acting "congregation" is among the Buffalo gentlemen we know, alas! only too well, for us to feel ourselves hit by such side-blows and to be convicted of having violated a holy congregational right. So it goes: first one tramples the congregational rights underfoot, but when the misled congregation is to cover the shame of its false shepherds and to shoot off the bolts they have turned, then suddenly there is talk of congregational rights.

6. Lastly the "Informatorium" gives something more for the amusement of its readers, which we wish to communicate in full. It says, namely, in the last article: "America is a land of the strangest occurrences. A Stephanist pastor ceases, allegedly, to be one; becomes then professor at Concordia College in St. Louis in Missouri, and now he is minded to become the driver of a sidecar which runs alongside the ""Lutheraner."" Sic transit gloria mundi (so passes the glory of the world!). The Synod of Missouri, etc., seems accordingly to wish to transform itself into an association of carters,, a transformation which would yield little to the Ovidian ones and would best show how it esteems the divine office of preaching. Cor. 1, 15." — Concerning this article not many words are needed. It shows anew that the Buffalo gentlemen would like by all means to move us somehow to stay at home with the promised histories of their doings and ways, but that they go about it rather clumsily to attain their end. With such silly childish antics they only betray what weapons they must use in order to meet in advance the impression which they fear from the revelation of the truth. We remind you, moreover, once more that the Buffalo gentlemen did not rest until they had pressed from us, with ever new, ever more vehement challenges, the promise to disclose their unjust bans and hierarchical practices, and that they now, when we, with reluctance, compelled by them, are about to do it, call us incessantly, even prenumerando, before the presentation has appeared, liars, slanderers, and the like. God look upon it! —

Now since the last number of the "Informatorium" has, as reported, occupied itself almost solely with us, it gives at the very last the following notice: "We have begun to let the Informatorium appear twice a month, in the hope that the number of subscribers would increase considerably and that all would diligently pay in advance; but this has not happened to the extent that was to be wished for the carrying out of the matter. We are therefore, though quite unwillingly, compelled to publish it again once a month," etc. We communicate this only, without making use of this fact against our gentleman opponent, but we cannot refrain from putting to their conscience here at least the question: What would they do if it went with the "Lutheraner" as it now goes with the "Informatorium?" Would they not, judging from existing analogies, exclaim: "Do ye not see here how God's judgment has already overtaken the "Lutheraner?""

Ecclesiastical Notice.

On the 24th of October my dear brother, Wilhelm August Fick, was solemnly ordained in the Immanuel Church at St. Louis before the assembled congregation by the president of our Synod, Pastor Wyneken, with the assistance of Professor P. Walther and of myself, after he had passed a colloquium on the Wednesday before. My brother attended the gymnasiums at Verden and Hildesheim in Germany and then studied theology at Göttingen.

Constrained by love for our forsaken Lutheran co-believers in this part of the world, he left the fatherland this spring, under the blessings of our dear parents, in order to serve the Church of the Lord here. And the Lord soon called him also into His vineyard. After he had visited the brethren here, in Perry County and in some other places, he received a call from afar. For in the farthest West, in Holt County, 65 miles west of St. Joseph in Missouri, a small Lutheran congregation had formed, which still this