Chapter 6

He was born in Wilhelmshoehe, January 28th, 1860, where his father commanded a company of soldiers in the royal castle. In his early youth he was sent to New York to meet a relative whom he never found. One Sunday morning, homeless and friendless, he accosted me after service at the door of the church. I offered him employment in my office and for several years he was an efficient helper in the educational and mission work of my parish. Although he was already suffering from defective eyesight, which not long afterward resulted in total blindness, he expressed an ardent desire to enter the ministry. Under the circumstances this seemed to be impossible, but his earnest pleas overcame every objection. In 1884 he entered Hartwick Seminary where he was graduated with honor in 1888. Unable himself to read the text books, his friends read them for him. Especially helpful to him in his studies were Professor Hiller and his wife, the daughter of the sainted Dr. George B. Miller.

Upon the completion of his course in 1888 he was ordained to the Gospel ministry and for the next four years rendered faithful service as the assistant of his pastor in Christ Church. Few that heard him would have suspected his blindness. His remarkable memory enabled him in conducting the Service to use the Bible and the Liturgy as though he could see. In the library he could go to the shelves and place his hands upon the books that he needed. His reader then supplied him with the material needed for study.

In 1893 he took temporary charge of St. John's Church in Christopher Street.

In the Fall of 1893 he accepted a call to St. Matthew's Church in Augusta, Georgia. His retirement in 1896 to take charge of a mission among the cotton mill operatives of Columbia, S. C., was deeply regretted not only by his congregation but by the entire city.

Thus far his ministry, however useful it had been, was only a preparation for the remarkable work he was called upon to do in South Carolina and adjoining states. The mountain whites who had been drawn into the cotton mill work of the South were illiterate and but ill prepared for their new conditions.

With the help of his devoted wife, a night school was established. Additional schools became necessary. The Columbia Board of Education became interested and supplied the teachers while the mill company provided for the equipment. Mrs. Weltner helped the girls by creating an interest in good housekeeping and in beautifying the homes and their surroundings.

The movement extended to other parts of the state and into adjoining states, and Dr. Weltner was called upon to explain and direct it. The blind man had seen a vision. The homeless youth of New York's East Side became the prophet of a new era who turned many to righteousness. His eyes now see the King in His beauty.

THEIR PROBLEMS

The Problem of Synods

A synod is an assembly of delegates organized for the purpose of administering the affairs of the churches they represent.

Fourteen synods are represented in Greater New York. Some are based on differences of doctrine. A volume published in 1893, entitled "Distinctive Doctrines and Usages" (See Bibliography), treats of these differences. Others are due to differences of language and race.

In some countries a hyperchurchly trend of the national or state church is responsible for dissenting movements which, left to themselves, finally take the form of separatistic churches. Although these movements temporarily persist in America there is no permanent need for them in our atmosphere of freedom. Our church has room for many men of many minds so long as the essentials of belief are held and respected.

Finns are represented in three synods, Scandinavians in four. These nations therefore account for one-half of our fourteen synods. The history of the Missouri Synod is one of struggle, sacrifice and remarkable growth. For seventy-five years other Lutherans have sought fellowship with them, but they decline to hold fellowship with churches that are not in full accord with their doctrinal position.

Each of these divisions has some historical reason for its existence which cannot be ignored or lightly pushed aside. For various reasons each synod emphasizes some phase of church life which in its opinion warrants a separate organization. Perhaps some of the progress of the last half century may be credited to a wholesome rivalry between these various schools of Lutheranism.

On the other hand these synodical divisions among churches holding the same substance of doctrine, even when they do not provoke downright hostility, are an effective bar to the fraternal alliance so greatly needed in our polyglot communion. Our neighbors, too, of other Denominations, when they try to understand our meticulous divisions, are not unnaturally disposed to look upon us as a conglomerate of sectarian religionists rather than as a Church or even as a distinct Denomination. In lists of denominational activities our churches figure as G. C. Lutherans, G. S. Lutherans, Missouri Lutherans, etc., while all of us are frequently called upon to explain whether we belong to the Evangelical branch of the Lutherans or not.

Absorbed as we are in the local interests of our individual congregations and in the questions that divide us among ourselves, we seldom have an opportunity to give expression to outstanding principles of our church in such a way as to impress the public mind with a sense of their importance.

The question therefore continually recurs, why should these divisions be perpetuated among brethren who are agreed on the essentials of Lutheran teaching even though they may not have completely assimilated each other's minute definitions of theological dogmas. Laymen, more interested in practical results, find it hard to understand why there should be so many different kinds of Lutherans. Even ministers, accustomed as they are to sharp distinctions, sometimes deplore these divisions and wonder when they can be healed. They long for the time when the adherents of the Augsburg Confession may unite in one great body, "beautiful as Tirzah, comely as Jerusalem, terrible as an army with banners."

Alluring as such a prospect may seem, it is not of highest importance in a communion which from the beginning emphasized the right of private judgment and acquired for the world the right to think for itself in matters of conscience and religion. The Church of the Reformation derives its strength from unity rather than from union. Theoretically at least, it is a communion, a fellowship of believers. Its earliest designation was not "The Lutheran Church," but "Churches of the Augsburg Confession."

It is consonant therefore with our historic principles to respect the gifts and calling of the existing divisions in our churches without insisting upon an artificial union which could contribute little to the true unity of the church. There are "many members, yet but one body.... There are differences of administrations, but the same Lord." In our mutual relations therefore it behooves us to recognize the rights of the individual.

This, however, need not prevent our working and praying for union. If it be possible, as much as lieth in us (unless this involves synergistic heresy), let us cultivate tolerance and live peaceably with all men, especially with all Lutherans.

We have in this city a great field in which there is work for us all. In friendly co-operation, rather than in hostile competition, we may escape some of the perils of our past history and perform with credit the tasks with which at present we seem to be struggling in vain.

The Metropolitan District includes the urban communities within ten miles of the boundary line of Greater New York. This territory of a hundred and fifty square miles now holds a population of over seven millions of people. Our churches in Greater New York minister to a baptized membership of 141,642 souls. If we include in our estimates of parochial responsibility, not merely enrolled members, but the entire Lutheran population of the District, Russians, Poles, Slovaks, Bohemians, Hungarians, Letts, Esthonians, Lithuanians, Dutch, Germans, Swedes, Norwegians, Finns and Danes, to say nothing of the multitudes of American birth from the Hudson and Mohawk valleys, from Pennsylvania, Virginia, Ohio and the West, the number of people claiming to be Lutherans amounts to more than five hundred thousand souls.

To minister as we should to such a constituency, we need co-operation in place of competition. The work of cultivating effectively such a field can never be done by churches so hopelessly divided as ours.

Other churches, Protestant and Catholic, with a centralized ecclesiastical organization, are able to work together as one body and make plans for their work covering the entire Metropolitan District. We, with our strong individualism, cannot vie with them. In our polity we are extreme congregationalists and must pay for our freedom.

But there is much that our churches have in common. Our flocks are not alienated from each other as much as are the shepherds. The formation of local groups throughout the greater city, co-operating in common causes, or at least refraining from a polemical policy, would pave the way for a better understanding of our mutual needs and opportunities for service.

Three things, at least, might be done without compromising the faith or violating the spirit of our church life:

1. We might meet for the purpose of forming each other's acquaintance and for the discussion of practical questions. Perhaps none of us is quite so heretical as the synodical divergence would lead a layman to suppose.

2. We might meet for the discussion of vital questions of religion and morals. It is one thing to read about these things in books. It is quite another thing to listen to a spoken presentation warm with the sympathy of a living experience.

3. We might recognize each other's spheres of influence and federate our forces in meeting the needs of our vast community.

In the meantime we are slowly learning that the aspirations and convictions that unite us are greater than the things that separate us. The clearer comprehension of the principles we hold and of the work we have to do, and the sense of our responsibility as one of the larger communions of the metropolis, compel us more and more to emphasize not the unessential details of our theological system but rather the larger truths and principles for which we stand and which we hold in common.

A hundred years ago, on the tercentenary of the Reformation, after a period of political humiliation and economic distress in the Fatherland, the Ninety-five Theses of Claus Harms sounded a call for a Lutheran awakening throughout the world. The result of that revival is felt in the churches to this day.

The quadricentenary of the Reformation was celebrated amid the convulsions of a World War. Is it too much to hope that after this war also the ground may be prepared for a spiritual sowing and reaping when the unnecessary dissensions of sectarian controversy will give place to fraternal co-operation in the service of a common Lord and in the promotion of a common faith?* *Since the foregoing paragraphs were written an unexpected change in the outlook has taken place. Steps were taken a year ago toward bringing together three of the general bodies of the Church in America. Should this hope be realized, it will bring into closer union a majority of the churches of Greater New York. On May 7th, 1918, at a meeting of nearly one hundred Lutheran pastors, members of nearly all of the synods represented on this territory, there was organized a "Conference of the Lutheran pastors of the Metropolitan District for the discussion of all questions of doctrine and practice to the end of effecting unity." This, too, is a harbinger of an approaching era of reconstruction and peace.

The Problem of Language

It was a Lutheran demand in the sixteenth century to preach the Gospel in the vernacular. It would be un-Lutheran in the twentieth century to conduct public worship in a language which the people do not understand.

This lesson is written so plainly in the history of our churches in America that "he may run that readeth." The Swedish churches on the Delaware, planted by Gustavus Adolphus for the very purpose of propagating the faith in America, were all of them lost to the Lutheran church because the persistent use of the Swedish language, and the inability of the pastors to preach in English, proved an insuperable obstacle to the bringing up of the children in the Lutheran communion. When the New York Ministerium at its meeting in Rhinebeck, September 1st, 1797, resolved that it would "never acknowledge a newly-erected Lutheran Church merely English in places where the members may partake of the services of the Episcopal Church, it halted for a century the growth of the Lutheran Church in New York. [Tr. note: no close quotation marks in original.]

The same experience greets us in London. There the Lutheran Church was established in 1669, only five years later than in New York. For more than two centuries it had the recognition of royalty. As late as the Victorian era Prince Albert, the Queen and the royal family, in their personal relations, were connected with the Lutheran Church. To this day Queen Alexandra is a communicant in the Lutheran church. There exist therefore no social barriers to its growth. Yet not a single English Lutheran church is to be found in London.

With one exception the dozen Lutheran churches of other tongues recognize no responsibility to propagate the faith of the Augsburg Confession in the language of the city in which they live. The exception is that of the German "Missouri" congregation. Here English as well as German is used in the services. Here alone it would seem that "religion is the chief concern."

The language problem confronted us early in our local history. In the first hundred years three languages, Dutch, German and English, contended for the mastery. In their pastoral work some ministers used all three.

Dutch was the first to surrender. The children of Dutch families adopted the language of their English conquerors, and when immigration from Holland ceased, the use of Dutch in worship became obsolete. The last use of Dutch at a Lutheran service was at the communion on the First Sunday in Advent in 1771. It had maintained itself for 114 years.

After the use of Dutch in worship had ceased, German and English came into collision. It was a fight to a finish. When it was over there was little left for which to contend. When Pastor Kunze died, in 1807, the congregation had declined almost to the point of extinction. Many of the English-speaking families had left us and we thus lost some of our leading members, people whose ancestors had for five generations belonged to our communion. The Germans remained, but during the lull in the tide of immigration the use of German declined to such an extent as to imperil the existence even of the German congregation. When Kunze's successor arrived he had difficulty in finding members of the church who could speak German. Even in the German congregation English had become the language of every-day life.

German thrives in German soil. Elsewhere it is an exotic not easily cultivated. From their earliest history Germans have had the _Wanderlust_ and have sought for new homes as it pleased them. But wherever they go they amalgamate with their surroundings.

The Franks settled in Gaul, but, excepting its German name, the language retains but few indications of the German ancestry of a large part of the French people.

The Goths settled in Spain. Physical traits, blue eyes and blonde complexion, persist in some districts, but their descendants speak Spanish.

The Longobards crossed the Alps and settled in Italy where their children speak Italian, although Lombardy is just across the mountains, not far from the early home of their immigrant ancestors.

A notable exception to this tendency of the Germans to amalgamate with other nations was when the Anglo-Saxons invaded Britain. The island had been deserted by the Romans, and the Germans refused for centuries to ally themselves with the British inhabitants. They retained their own language and customs with but a slight admixture of alien elements.* To this day after twelve centuries they prefer to call themselves Anglo-Saxons rather than British. (_Nomen a potiori fit._) *"Philologically, English, considered with reference to its original form, Anglo-Saxon, and to the grammatical features which it retains of Anglo-Saxon origin, is the most conspicuous member of the Low German group of the Teutonic family, the other Low German languages being Old Saxon, Old Friesic, Old Low German, and other extinct forms, and the modern Dutch, Flemish, Friesic, and Low German (Platt Deutsch). These, with High German, constitute the 'West Germanic' branch, as Gothic and the Scandinavian tongues constitute the 'East Germanic' branch, of the Teutonic family. (Century Dictionary under the word 'English.')"

In the ninth and eleventh centuries the island was invaded by other Germanic tribes, directly by way of the North Sea or indirectly by the Channel from Normandy, and so the language was developed still further along English, that is Germanic lines. (According to the Century Dictionary the historical pronunciation of the word is eng'-glish and not ing'glish).

Low Germans, (Nether Saxons or Platt Deutsch) who have settled in New York in such large numbers, enjoy a distinct advantage over other nationalities. In the vernacular of America they discover simply another dialect of their native tongue. Hence they acquire the new dialect with little difficulty. The simpler words and expressions of the common people are almost the same as those which they used on the shores of the North Sea and the Baltic. For example: _Wo is min Vader?_ Where is my father? _He is in the Hus._ He is in the house. English and German sailors from opposite shores of the North Sea, using the simpler words of their respective languages, have no trouble in making themselves understood when they meet.

The High Germans learn English more slowly, but they, too, find many points of contact, not only in the words but also in the grammatical construction of the language.

In the United States the descendants of Germans number seventeen millions. They have made no inconsiderable contributions to the sum total of American civilization. For philological reasons, as we have seen, no people are more ready than the Germans to adopt English for every-day use. None amalgamate more easily with the political and social life of the country of their choice. In normal times we do not think of them as foreigners.

English has the right of way. Its composite character makes it the language for every-day use. Thirty-five languages are spoken in this city, but the assimilative power of English absorbs them all. The Public School is the effective agent in the process. This is the melting pot for all diversities of speech. Children dislike to be looked upon as different from their companions, and so it rarely happens that the language of the parents is spoken by the second generation of immigrant families. Their elders, even when their "speech bewrayeth" them, make strenuous efforts to use the language of their neighbors.

Seeing, then, that Anglicization is inevitable, why should we not cut the Gordian knot, and conduct our ministry wholly in the English language? This would greatly simplify our tasks, besides removing from us the stigma of foreignism.

We are often advised to do so, especially by our monoglot brethren. There are those who go so far as to say that the use of any language other than the English impairs the Americanism of the user.

Some of the languages at present used in our church services may be of negligible importance. The Slovak, Magyar and Finnish for example, as well as the Lettish, Esthonian and Lithuanian of the Baltic Provinces, will never have more than a restricted use in this city. The Scandinavians and those whose vernacular is the Low German easily substitute English for their mother tongue. Scandinavian is kindred to English, while Low German is the very group of which, philologically speaking, English is the most conspicuous member. Upon these tongues it will not be necessary to do summary execution.

It is a different matter, however, when we come to High German, or, properly speaking, New High German, the language of German literature since the sixteenth century, of which Luther, through his version of the Bible, may be called the creator. He at least gave it universal currency. This is a language which we could not lose if we would, and would not if we could.

Scholars are compelled to learn it because it is the indispensable medium for scientific and philosophical study. Formerly Latin was this medium, today it is German.

Lovers of literature learn it because it is the language of Goethe and Schiller, the particular stars of a galaxy that for the modern world at least outshines the productions of the ancient classics. Lutherans enshrine it in their inmost souls because it is the receptacle of treasures of meditation and devotion with which their forms of worship have been enriched for four hundred years. To ignore Angelus Silesius, Paul Gerhardt, Albert Knapp, Philip Spitta and their glorious compeers, would be to silence a choir that sang the praises of the Lord "in notes almost divine."

We need the literature in which the ideas of our church have for centuries been expressed. Language is the medium of ideas. The thirty denominations that constitute the bulk of Protestantism in this country derive the spirit of their church life for the most part from non-Lutheran sources through the medium of English literature. This is as it should be. But when Lutherans no longer understand the language of their fathers or the literature in which the ideas of their confession have found their fullest expression, they lose an indispensable condition of intellectual and spiritual growth. They can never understand as they should the spirit of the church to which they belong. They are doomed sooner or later to share the fate of the Lutherans of New York of the eighteenth century.

When we have forgotten our German we shall be out of touch with the Lutherans who come to us from the Fatherland. For the time being the World War has put an end to German immigration, but this will not last forever. Some time certainly immigration will be resumed, and as in former periods will be an unfailing source of supply for the Lutheran churches of New York.

In the nineteenth century the "Americanized" Lutherans did not understand the Germans who came over in such overwhelming numbers, and were unprepared to shepherd them in Lutheran folds. The work had to be done by immigrant pastors who, on their part, did not understand the American life well enough to accomplish the best results. For the sake of the Lutherans who come to us from foreign lands we cannot afford to lose touch with the historical languages of their churches.