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Sunday, March 17, 2024

RH2: "So much about the Missouri Synod": Hoffmann's report

      This continues from Part 1 (Table of Contents in Part 1) in a series presenting Pastor's Hochstetter's critique of a German pamphlet on the Old Missouri Synod. — In this post we present an English translation of the full 33-page pamphlet that acknowledged "so much about the Missouri Synod." 
Prof. Christoph Ernst Luthardt (Wikipedia)
    On the first page of Pastor Rudolf Hoffmann's narrative is a quote from Prof. C. E. Luthardt's German state church newspaper that provided his motivation. It spoke of some Missourian leaning pastors in Germany who were disturbing a conference. I located the source of the quote and found the following sentences to show how these "Missourians" were received at the conference:
The tone in which this happened is so well known that we need to qualify it in more detail. But because the closing prayer of Superintendent Fauck asked us to forget the discord in an extremely heartfelt and pleasant way, we should not take it upon ourselves to refresh our memory of the addresses in question by quoting the offensive statements here.
So these "Missourians" had ruffled the feathers of the state churchmen. Pastor Hoffmann thus poses the question: "Would we [in Germany] have to sit learning at the feet of Missouri?". He uses this question to launch his investigation. — The following is my English translation, using machine translators, from the original German. Because there are no chapters, only long narratives, I have added my own "Table of Contents" to allow the reader quick access to various sections:
A DOCX file of the above is available >>  here  <<. PDF of original here.

Because the writing above is focused on the old Missouri Synod (not the LC-MS) and its doctrinal differences with the German United, or Union, Church, I would encourage the reader to read Hoffmann's small 34-page pamphlet to get the full background of what was being said in Germany. — 
      A year after the above pamphlet appeared, in January and February of 1882, Pastor Christian Hochstetter would provide his critique in the pages of Lehre und Wehre.  In the following blog posts, I present an enhanced translation of Hochstetter's 16-page article. I will reserve my comments on Hoffmann's writing until then. The presentation starts with the next Part 3.

Thursday, March 14, 2024

RH1: German pastor: Yes & No on Missouri; Hochstetter's critique (Part 1 of 12)

Pr. Christian Hochstetter
      While reviewing the essays in the Old Missouri Synod journal Lehre und Wehre, a lively article from 1882 caught my eye, for it concerned how Germany's pastors and theologians viewed the Missouri Synod in Walther's day, in the 19th century. The essay was by Pastor Christian Hochstetter, the one who would 3 years later write the well-known book The History of the Missouri Synod, 1838-1884 in 1885. This 1882 essay was prompted by a pamphlet published in Germany in 1881 by a young pastor. Here is what Pastor Hochstetter stated about this pamphlet: 
To this day no report from German state-church circles has appeared in print which acknowledges so much about the Missouri Synod as this lecture by the late Pastor R. [Rudolf] Hoffmann [RH].
I suspect that Pastor Hochstetter became motivated to write his later great history in part because of the false judgments reported in this pamphlet. But the striking part about the pamphlet was just what Hochstetter alluded to, that Hoffmann did not ignore the incredible successes evident in the (Old) Missouri Synod. And so this pamphlet represents what I would call a "Yes and No" judgment on the Missouri Synod. Hochstetter uses this to reveal the remarkable ironies that Pastor Hoffmann presents.
Die Missouri-Synode in Nord-Amerika, historisch und kritisch beleuchtet : ein Vortrag (Title page)
    Hoffmann's 33-page pamphlet was entitled The Missouri Synod in North America, Historically and Critically Examined: A Lecture (Gütersloh, 1881) (WorldCat). Although there was no online availability of the original publication before, there is now: >> here <<. One discovers that Pastor Hoffmann was young when he wrote this pamphlet, about the age of 31. And he passed away at the end of 1880, just before his writing was published. His history is remarkable for his depth of reading in Old Missouri's early writings. Unfortunately I was unable to obtain a picture of him.
      Here are some examples of Hoffmann's "Yes and No" judgment of the Old Missouri Synod, most of which Hochstetter addresses in his critique:
"Yes":
  • "Walther's [Altenburg] theses were a resounding success" (p. 9)
  • "The greater right lay on the side of Missouri" vs. Pastor Grabau (p. 16)
  • "The doctrinal unity is built on the Lutheran Confession" (p. 20)
  • "the unshakeable consistency with which they rest on the symbolic books" (p. 23)
  • Walther's "astonishing wealth of thorough scholarship" (p. 24)
  • "highly commendable that they have uncovered the hidden treasures of doctrine" (p. 25)
"No":
  • "… difficult for anyone to agree with their democratic conception of Church and Ministry" (p. 16)
  • "excessive language" (p. 19)
  • Confessions are a "paper pope" (p. 28)
  • "exaggerated Lutheranism" (p. 28)
  • "arrogance of having pure doctrine" (p. 29)
  • "unbiblical and un-Lutheran radicalism" (p. 32)
We find judgmental "whiplash" throughout Hoffmann's writing that will be evident to the reader, German or American. — I first translated Hochstetter's critique, and learned much of what Pastor Hoffmann wrote about.  So I became motivated to locate and scan a copy of Hoffmann's pamphlet because I wanted to learn all of what was being said about Missouri in Germany, because so little was written in Germany about the Missouri Synod, other than by Friedrich Brunn's Free Church. In the next Part 2, we publish the translated text of Pastor Hoffmann, then in subsequent posts, we present Hochstetter's incisive critique of it translated into the English language. 
 - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -  Table of Contents  - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
RH1: Introduction; "Yes" and "No" judgments against the Missouri Synod
RH2: Hoffmann's pamphlet: The Missouri Synod in North America, historically and critically examined.
RH3: Missourians disturb United Church in Germany; "must we sit at their feet?" 
RH4: “historical description” sourced from Köstering's book; constitution and congregations
RH5: Missouri restricting church freedom?… compared to United (or Union) Church; Missouri grows
RH6: Missourians disagree with Pastor Grabau; Hoffmann against Stephan, but for Grabau
RH7: Hochstetter defends against Grabau (and Hoffmann); Grabau’s use of erring Lutheran teachers
RH8: Not constitutional question, but doctrinal; calling not by Church as a whole, but whole Church
RH9: Christocracy, not democracy; State churchmen = servants of state authority, "only a glittering misery"
RH10: Walther—Hoffmann criticizes, Hochstetter defends; “Thank God Missouri also errs”; Yes & No theology
RH11: Irony of Hoffmann and his United (State) Church; Repristination theology?; Chiliasm
RH12: Walther’s lament—don’t be another United Church; Iowa-Ohio shamed by German pastor
RH13: Appendix: Exegesis; Revelation; Confessionalism
RH14: Antichrist, Usury, Lutheran Orthodoxy, Predestination, Regeneration, Sunday/Sabbath

Saturday, March 9, 2024

"According to a pure understanding": true unity of the Church

      Ten years ago I did a blog post where I tried to expand upon the meaning of Article VII of the Augsburg Confession for the unity of the Church. Where Article VII spoke of agreement on "the doctrine of the Gospel", I asked the rhetorical question: "Could the Augsburg Confession be quite serious at this point in emphasizing the pure Gospel?" At that time I was not aware of what the original text said in the German version. Here are the relevant texts for comparison, as published in the venerable Triglotta:
(1) In the English it reads:
And to the true unity of the Church it is enough to agree concerning the doctrine of the Gospel and the administration of the Sacraments.
(2) In the original Latin, it reads as translated by Google Translate and Yandex Translate:
And for the true unity of the church, it is enough to agree on the doctrine of the Gospel and the administration of the sacraments.
(3) However the German language version is more explicit, for it does not want a misapplication of this article by opponents (DeepL/Google Translation):
For this is enough for the true unity of the Christian Church, that the Gospel is with one accord [einträchtiglich] preached according to a pure understanding, and the sacraments are administered according to the divine Word.
So the simple phrase "the doctrine of the Gospel" is clarified by the addition of "according to a pure understanding" of this Gospel. The Roman Catholic and Reformed errors on the Gospel take away this "pure understanding". Now I have, in the German original text, a confirmation of my point that all disunity in the Church is caused by an impure understanding of the Gospel. And a true unity was restored by C. F. W. Walther with his pure teaching of the pure Gospel, i.e. 

the Lutheran Doctrine of Justification.

Thursday, March 7, 2024

Luther on the Church in the End Times (Dan. 12:11-12), not in American Edition (yet)

      Over 11 years ago I posted a blog where Pieper quoted Luther to emphasize the necessity that the pure Gospel be preached in the public ministry, and the dire effects when it is lacking.  Although the quote was powerful, yet I find that I had only translated the first of five paragraphs that were missing from the American Edition of Luther's Works. In the following, that will be rectified.
      As one reads the news today of what is going on in the world, a Christian will surely notice signs of the End Times. The marginalization of Christianity in the land of "religious freedom" is certainly evident. And, as Friedrich Lochner pointed out even in his day, few people believe the Pope (now Pope Francis) the Antichrist, yet there he is, sitting in the Church, exalting "himself above all that is called God". (2 Thess. 2:4)
      In the concluding paragraphs of Luther's Daniel commentary, he gives more details of the End Times, and thereby warns Christians of the dangers ahead. But the following is missing in the American Edition (volume 35, p. 313), even though it is in the Weimar Ausgabe (here and here). According to the current CPH Prospectus ("included are the portions of his influential preface to Daniel"), it is promised to appear in the future, presumably volume 63. But readers of this blog do not have to wait. — From St. Louis Edition, vol. 6, pp. 938-940, §§ 14-18 [EN]: 
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Daniel 12:11-12
   And from the time that the daily sacrifice shall be taken away, and the abomination that maketh desolate set up, there shall be a thousand two hundred and ninety (1290) days. Blessed is he that waiteth, and cometh to the thousand three hundred and five and thirty (1335) days.

14 But I would like to interpret the daily sacrifice [Dan. 12:11] in a spiritual way, that it is the Holy Gospel, which must remain until the end of the world, together with the faith and the Church. But nevertheless it may happen that the world will become so epicurean that there will be no public preaching  [or pulpit] in the whole world, and public speaking will be a vain epicurean outrage, and the Gospel will be heard only in houses by the fathers of the house; and this will be the time between the words of Christ on the cross: Consummatum est [“It is finished”], and: Pater, in manus tuas commendo spiritum meum [“Father, into thy hands I commend my spirit”, Luke 23:46]. For just as Christ lived a little after such Consummatum, [consummation], so also the Church can remain a little after the public silence of the Gospel. And just as the daily sacrifice of the Jews was indeed done away with in the seventh week by the Apostles' council [Acts 15:6], and yet remained afterward until the destruction of Jerusalem, and was also kept by the Apostles themselves where they wished (but without necessity), so also the Gospel can publicly become dormant [liegen] and remain silent in the pulpit, and yet be preserved by pious Christians in homes.

there will continue to be little faith even in homes

15 But such misery should not last longer than 1290 days, that is, four and a half years; for without public preaching the faith cannot stand for long, because at this time the world also becomes more evil in one year. The last 1335 days will finally be evil, so that there will continue to be little faith even in homes. Therefore He says: Blessed is he who endures until that Day. As if to say, as Christ said [Luke 18:8]: “When the Son of Man comes, do you think he will find faith on earth?”

16 Almost all teachers have spoken of such four and a half years, and all the books are full of them, without pointing to the reign of the Antichrist [Endechrist], which, according to the order of the text, Daniel does not suffer, who goes on to prophesy what is to happen after the fall of the Antichrist, and places these four and a half years after Michael, and after the oath of the angel on the water.

17 And although this interpretation seems as if one should be certain of the Last Day, which day or year it should come, that yet Christ denies knowing, Acts 1:7 and in the Gospel [Mark 13:32], yet it falls far short. First of all, if the sacrifice of the Gospel is made in public, no one will be able to recognize the year or the day when it begins, since it cannot cease on one day in all sacrifices. On the other hand, even if it were already known when it should begin, the 1335 days are set above the 1290, which no one in the whole world would recognize. And in summary, I think that these 1335 days will not be publicly understood as being fulfilled on the Last Day. Unless God were to raise up a Noah, for example, who could count these same days and certainly fulfill them.

18 But I for myself am content with this, that the Last Day must be at the door, for the signs which Christ preached and the Apostles Peter and Paul have now almost all come to pass, and the trees are budding, the Scriptures are greening and blossoming. Whether we can't just know the day is not the point; another make it better; it is certainly all at the end.

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      Luther's powerful words are all the commentary I need on the Biblical teaching of the End Times, and the Antichrist, the Pope. May readers, and I, "endure until that day".

Tuesday, March 5, 2024

H6b: Pasche’s history, part 2: Germany–>America; to "the world-famous, truly Lutheran, Missouri Synod"

      This concludes from Part 6a (Table of Contents in Part 1) in a series that began with Walther's 1871 announcement of the republished "little book" by Matthias Hoe von Hoenegg, a book that gave instruction to south German Lutherans oppressed by Roman Catholics. — This concluding segment finishes my selection of snippets from Pastor F. E. Pasche's account of his Salzburger ancestry, and of himself.
Pasche and wife
c. 1940?
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CHAPTER 4: Our new home where I was born.

I, Frederick Emil Pasche, was born in the village of Baiersberg, Germany, April 8, 1872. Our village is forty-five miles from Berlin and five miles from Kustrin on the Oder River which flows northward into the Baltic Sea. …

Our house was built with wood and clay, the roof being tiled. The trellis work, covered with grapevine …

We loved our home. My forefathers were lucky to be among those who were permitted to settle down here in the Oder Valley where the soil was exceptionally rich. …

CHAPTER 5: Our Church

… Our church was yet called a Lutheran church. But many things have happened in Germany which deeply affected the Lutheran church. Rationalism arose. … the attempt of the State to combine the Protestant denominations, chiefly the Lutheran and Reformed into one church. This movement, called "The Union", began in Prussia and then spread to other parts of Germany. …

What was to be done so that a truly Lutheran Church, unhindered by State control and freed from rationalistic unbelief, could flourish? … A call for the organization of emigrants was issued, which met with a very hearty response. More than six hundred people signified their willingness to leave home and friends and try to build up their lives, and above all, their church, on the American frontier. … these people found themselves in a new country, ready to build their homes and…their church. And what a great and wonderful church they were privileged to build; the world-famous, truly Lutheran, Missouri Synod. … This is our church, a church of which we are proud. It teaches the Word of God …

CHAPTER 6: We go to America

… Mother…remained unshaken in her faith and taught us children to pray, and she read with us from Spangenberg's Postil, a good old Lutheran sermon book with Bible pictures in it.

…Our good luck was that Mother's father had been good enough to deposit safely $400 for Mother before her marriage. And this sum was just enough to bring us to America, the land of great plenty. It was the end of November 1881, and the voyage over the Atlantic was extremely stormy.

CHAPTER 7: The land where milk and honey flows.

We came to America. It is good to be here. In the Old World many dangers threatened us. … America is the land of liberty. We feel really at home here. We are happy. We sing "America".

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    While Pastor Pasche does not mention the names of Hoe von Hoenegg or Jacob Reihing, those names were likely known to him and his early ancestors, the Salzburger Emigrants. He mentions his mother's use of "Spangenberg's Postil", a popular devotional book for the people. A recent historian relates (p. 26) that this book "stresses in particular how to … avoid the delusions of the Papacy". As this was the same function as Hoe von Hoenegg's "little book", we have come full circle to Walther's comment, from America, on Hoe's book, that it was "a favorite book of the people in Germany for two hundred years" and so this would also apply to the people of South Germany, now to America.
     The above record is a most interesting read, of an individual, German born, Missouri Synod pastor.  His account is much more edifying than that of Berthold von Schenk. If any descendants of Pastor Pasche would like a copy of his 70-page "Family Record", with illustrations, send me an email. And if permission could be granted, I would publish whatever portion they would agree to be made public.
      I have learned much from this series, much of it related to the Reformation and its after-effects in South Germany.  Having travelled in Austria in my younger years, I knew that it remains largely a Catholic country. Walther's enthusiastic endorsement of Hoe and his Evangelical Handbook gave me the motivation to learn much more. Now I am not so ignorant of German history, of Lutheran history in Germany.

Saturday, March 2, 2024

H6a: Missouri pastor, a "Salzburger": F. E. Pasche's personal account

Pastor F. E. Pasche
Pastor F. E. Pasche
      This continues from Part 5 (Table of Contents in Part 1) in a series that began with Walther's 1871 announcement of the republished "little book" by Matthias Hoe von Hoenegg, a book that gave instruction to south German Lutherans oppressed by Roman Catholics. — For this concluding segment, we come to the 20th century, to a pastor of the Old Missouri Synod, Pastor Frederick Emil Pasche (1872-1954). Regular readers may remember his name from my Copernicanism series as he was the most prominent pastor of the 20th century defending against Copernicanism. I learned from a library holding that Pastor Pasche had written a "Pasche Family Record" (WorldCat), and so obtained it.  It was initially written in 1947. In the first section, he goes over the history of his ancestors, an ancestry going back to the Salzburgers in East Prussia.
      There are a number of helpful histories available on the South German Lutherans and the Salzbergers. But the following is one Missouri Synod pastor’s history which was written for his own descendants, not for the benefit of a wider audience. It was written 7 years before his passing, in 1947. I am certain that he draws on other histories, but he gives them a personal touch. And it is “biased”, as the “objectivists” would call it, biased as a true Lutheran would be. — The following brief excerpts from the "Pasche Family Record" have left out much of the “Family Record”, but have retained the material of interest to, and comfort for, all true Lutherans. Excerpts from He Leadeth Me, or, The Wonderful Ways of God: the Life Story of a Lutheran Pastor:
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CHAPTER 1: My forefathers' first country.

At the time of the Lutheran Church Reformation my forefathers lived in the Austrian crownland of Salzburg, on the Eastern slopes of the Alps …

God also had blessed them quite abundantly in spiritual and heavenly things. Here the doctrines of Luther were introduced at an early period. Here Staupitz, the friend of Luther, spent the last years of his life; here Paul Speratus, Urban Rhegius, and others, spread the Gospel during the Reformation; here George Sharer [Georg Scherer, no English Wikipedia] was beheaded in 1528 for his Lutheran witness. Here Luther's Bible translation and Catechism and the Augsburg Confession were cherished and, despite all attempts of the Salzburg archbishops to extirpate Lutheranism, remained in the mountains and valleys and mines of the Alpine country.

Lutheranism… remained in the mountains… through the Bible

It remained in the mountains long after the pastors were banished, through the Bible and the Lutheran writings. The miners sang the hymns of Luther and Speratus. The Lutheran books, for which the archbishops hunted, were hid in cellars and secret places in walls. …

The last edict of yet more cruel banishment was issued in 1731. Frederick William I of Prussia received twenty thousand fugitives in his kingdom, while a small number found refuge in the state of Georgia in America.

CHAPTER 2: How they were ousted from their country.

Firmian, the archbishop of Salzburg, had the most splendid palaces and gardens. He loved riches, was stingy, but given to drunkenness and wild life. When in the heat of much drink he was told that there were yet many secret heretics in his beautiful land he swore to exterminate all heretics from his land … He launched a harder persecution than ever before.

Then the Lutherans united in a firm covenant. August 5, 1731, more than a hundred of their representatives descended from the surrounding mountains to an inn at Schwarzach, were seated around a table, took salt, and made an oath never to deny the true evangelical faith, but rather be steadfast in it in life and death. …

Firmian… treated them as rebels

But then and there these Lutherans also resolved to send spokesmen to all the Protestant rulers in Germany with the request to do something for them. This was emphatically done by the Prussian king who spoke for them before the Emperor and realm. The infamous archbishop Firmian … treated them as rebels who stirred up sedition and disorder, and he asked the papistic Emperor to help him subdue them. The Emperor acted as if he believed the rebellion fiction and sent six thousand soldiers "to quench the rebellion". … now they could not get away as all passes were guarded and emigration was stamped a crime which sharpened the punishment. But two men managed to slip by the guards that watched the border and got through to Berlin. Here Frederick William I received them friendly and promised them to do all he could for them on the day when they would be driven from their native country.

That day was soon to come. In November 1731, the decree of emigration was issued: All those that owned no immovable property were to leave within eight days and all owners of such property must leave within three months. This decree, too, was a shameless breach of the Westphalian Treaty of Peace according to which all were guaranteed a full three years of time before their free and unmolested departure. But this intolerant archbishop claimed that the Westphalian Treaty of 1648 was not binding in this case because, he said, these people were not mere religious renegades but rebels. How hard the lot of these poor people now became. Winter set in, but leave they must. … They were promised to be set free if they would swear off the Lutheran faith within fifteen days and again become Roman Catholic which, however, very few did.

Thus these suffering persecuted fugitives left their beloved Southern homes and wandered through foreign lands in a cold world. In several troops and at different times, from November 1731 until November 1732, thirty thousand of these people thus emigrated.

… [God] directed all these things for their best. He already had prepared a new and good place for them afar North. … Then their mouth was filled with laughter and their tongue with singing. 

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      It was good for Pasche to scoff at the false charges by Catholic leaders that the Lutherans were "rebels", calling this a "rebellion fiction". Even today's modern Salzburgers in East Prussia may be falling for this fiction. While Salzburg, Austria, may claim that it is tolerant towards Evangelicals, yet its website visit-Salzburg.net, although hosted by local people and not the government, states the following:
“Before we sound all too critical about the expulsion of Protestants: Lutheran theology was only one side of the medal; for centuries, religious conflicts were only one aspect of social and political warfare. In a Catholic state with a Bishop as the landlord, a Protestant denomination was automatically a subversive if not hostile political statement.”
Without clarification, this leaves the impression of placating its Catholic citizenry, and allowing that the Evangelicals, as Christians, were "subversive" under Catholic rule. The editors of this website may want to learn more about the "Peace of Westphalia, 1648" and why Firmian's ruling was illegal in that it did not allow the proper period of time for the emigrants to prepare. (This reasoning will likely be the reasoning used by the opponents of Christianity here in America in the future.) — In the next Part 6b, we conclude these excerpts, and this series, on South German Lutherans.

Tuesday, February 27, 2024

H5: Salzburgers' emigration: "they went…singing hymns"; now in Georgia, a "reconciliation"?

Train of Salzburg emigrants in 1732

     This continues from Part 4 (Table of Contents in Part 1) in a series that began with Walther's 1871 announcement of the republished "little book" by Matthias Hoe von Hoenegg, a book that gave instruction to south German Lutherans oppressed by Roman Catholics. — We now go deeper into the history of the Salzburger Emigration and follow them to two of their destinations: (1) East Prussia and (2) America: 
Salzburger emigration (from Salzburg to Nuremberg, to Berlin, to East Prussia)
1) East Prussia
      My familiarity with this area has been minimal, but that increased as I learned of some events surrounding the story of the 20,000 re-settled Salzburg emigrant Lutherans who were given some available lands in north Germany by King Frederick William of Prussia. More details of their travels are available at this Wikipedia article, and at "The Red Brick Parsonage" here. (See the map at left for a general idea of their route.)
      The following is a translation from a 1965 East Prussian book (pp. 21-22) about the emigration which included "a rather vivid report on the arrival of a train of emigrants in the … Imperial City of Memmingen":
"... it seemed to me at the time as if I saw before me with the greatest emotion a vivid picture of the exodus of the Israelites from Egypt. There was a mixture of stooping, trembling old men with white hair, strong men and young men in their prime: exhausted and weary old women with powerful women and beautiful young girls. …But anyone who thought that these homeless people, as they approached us, would have filled everything with lamentation and wailing and mourned their pitiful fate with cries that pierced the clouds and streams of tears, would be very much mistaken. It is true that the bystanders were moved by the sight, that tears rolled down their cheeks and their compassion was expressed in sighs. But they [the Emigrants] themselves resembled triumphants and were similar to the old Christian martyrs, of whom it is said that they went to their fate singing hymns. So these confessors of ours approached us singing, and singing they left the city again, driven out of their homeland, wandering through many dangers on rough paths in lands unknown to them, without knowing where they would one day find a home and a permanent abode."

Modern scholars tend to call reports such as the above "legend". A full English machine translation of this 51-page booklet is available here, German text here. (Or view immediately below) See pages 17-18 for a closer account of the Catholic actions leading up to the expulsion. This book was produced by Salzburger descendants, not by objectivist unbelieving scholars. I have added highlighting to certain portions of interest, for example page 47, of an association to preserve "the heritage of ancestors expelled from the Salzburg region because of their Lutheran faith". I have also highlighted some problematic points. [See the next blog post Part 6a about this.]

ostpreussen.de map, Salzburgers' route to America
2) America (Georgia)
      At right is the same map as above, but showing where the Salzburg Emigrants split up at Nuremberg, a small portion going to America. The story of those who settled in Georgia is well reported by the Georgia Salzburger Society. — One then naturally wonders how the descendants are maintaining the steadfastness of their ancestors — the ones who loved the doctrines of Scripture? … the doctrines that Hoe von Hoenegg defended? One finds that there remains a Lutheran church in their settlement to this day, the Jerusalem Lutheran Church, "the oldest continuous worshiping Lutheran Church in America", established in 1733. But the congregation is associated with the ELCA, a synod which is Lutheran in name only. Surely the congregation was embarrassed when the ELCA came to an agreement with the Roman Catholic Church in 1999, with the so-called "Joint Declaration on the Doctrine of Justification".  Then one learns of a "Reconciliation" initiated by a government, not a Catholic Church, official of Austria who commissioned a stone monument.  The monument was first displayed at the famous Christ Church (Lutheran) in Salzburg in May 1994 before it was shipped to Georgia. At that unveiling, it was stated that the "speakers celebrated the new gesture of reconciliation between Catholics and Protestants." The monument was placed in Salzburger Park in Savannah, Georgia.
Salzburger Monument of Reconciliation (Savannah, Georgia)

Then in 1996, the State of Georgia placed an Historical Marker near the monument which states that the monument was "in memory of the Lutheran Protestants of Salzburg who were denied religious freedom and expelled from their homeland." — One wonders that the Governor of the State of Austria had to apply some pressure on the Catholic officials to participate… or did they participate? Did those at the commemoration sing Luther's hymn "A Mighty Fortress Is Our God" (TLH 262) or "Lord, Keep Us Steadfast in Thy Word" (TLH 261) at this ceremony? (I have my doubts.) Or did they sing the Catholic "Salve Regina"? — 
Jerusalem Lutheran Church, "the oldest continuous worshiping Lutheran Church in America"
     Do the Lutherans of the Jerusalem Lutheran Church not realize that the separation of Church and State in Austria only came about by the influence of America's "First Amendment", and that the Catholic Church did not initiate this so-called "reconciliation"? — Prof. Dr. Korey Maas stated in an essay in CTQ 2019, pp. 230-231 (emphasis mine):
If one of the central principles of liberalism, for example, is a religious liberty such as that codified in a separation of church and state, it must be admitted that this is not, contrary to [George] Weigel, a long-held or “basic” Catholic belief. It was a principle explicitly rejected as “absolutely false” and “a most pernicious error” by popes as recently as the twentieth century.
Dr. Maas exposes a statement made by a current prominent American Catholic spokesman (George Weigel), for what it is, a brazen falsehood.
===>>> Can the congregation in Georgia, "the oldest continuous worshiping Lutheran Church in America", in good conscience, sing the truly Lutheran hymns now as their ancestors sang them during their forced emigration?
       In the next Part 6awe come back to the Salzburgers who settled in East Prussia, and find a connection with the Old Missouri Synod.
[The East Prussian book quoted above, in English, may be viewed directly in the window below:]