INDIFFERENTISM
146. Actual Conditions.—All sectarian churches formally acknowledge the Bible, yet they reject many of its doctrines. So a Lutheran synod may, in a formal and official way, accept the Lutheran symbols, and at the same time ignore or reject its material content. Witness the Lutheran state churches in Europe and the General Synod in America. In a measure, the actual conditions also within the congregations and district synods of the United Synod in the South have always been in conflict with their truly Lutheran basis. False doctrines, especially pertaining to the Puritanic observance of the Sabbath, were held and taught within the Synod. Without a word of criticism, for example, the Lutheran Church Visitor, July 13, 1911, published the following from the Sunday-school Times: "Don't use a public vehicle on Sunday unless you are prayerfully convinced that it would be sinning against God and man not to do so. Is not that a reasonable and safe principle? Is any other principle a safe one? A very limited amount of Sunday travel seems to be necessary. Probably more than ninety-nine one-hundredths of it is unnecessary and therefore wrong. To use a trolley car or train to go to church on Sunday may or may not be right; it is simply a question of God's expressed will for the individual at that particular time. To walk, or to attend another church would sometimes be the solution. To make a mere convenience of Sunday travel, under any circumstances, would seem to be a violation of the spirit of the day. But God will make each case clear to each surrendered seeker after the light of God's will, if the doing of God's will and the avoiding of sin by the widest possible margin are the only impelling motives."
147. Ignoring Intersynodical Differences.—With respect to the doctrines controverted within the Lutheran Church of America the United Synod has always maintained a neutral and indifferentistic attitude. Dr. Horn writes: "It can be said of the doctrinal basis of the Southern Synods that it is the sincere and intelligent confession of the churches. By this I do not mean that the Lutheran churches in the South have pondered all the controversies in which the symbols originated, and to which they gave the answer; nor that they have accepted all the inferences which sincere Lutherans now draw from the Confessions, and even may be justified in urging." (Dist. Doctr., 1893, 183.) Dr. Voigt: "The United Synod has no distinctive doctrines apart from the distinctive doctrines of common confessional Lutheranism." (Dist. Doctr., 1914, 179.) In other words, the United Synod accepts only those doctrines in which all agree who claim to be confessional Lutherans. The Lutheran Church Visitor, March 15, 1917, wrote: "The United Synod has the fundamental doctrines, rests on them, and is satisfied with them. Not, perhaps, the doctrines fundamental to Missouri, but fundamental to Christian faith and life." Ridiculing the doctrines of conversion and election as taught by the Missouri Synod, the Visitor continues: "These doctrines are the simon-pure, unadulterated, unalloyed Lutheran doctrines! Missourianism and Lutheranism are convertible terms!"— Regarding the fact that the United Synod has refused to take a definite stand with respect to the doctrinal differences within the Lutheran Church, the Visitor, March 15, 1917, remarked: "Still, husband and wife may live together in peace and happiness although they do not agree on every point. It may even be understood that some subjects are altogether taboo." This, evidently, is the spirit of indifferentism, inherited from the General Synod, with whom, in accordance with the law of spiritual affinity, the United Synod exchanged fraternal delegates, and is now organically united in the United Lutheran Church in America.
148. Old Spirit of Indifferentism.—To what extent the leaven of indifferentism was active also within the United Synod in the South appears from the following utterances of a layman in the Lutheran Church Visitor: "The spirit that developed this country, and that which has animated the clergy of the Lutheran Church, are antipodal. This unprogressive spirit, together with their aversion to innovations of all kinds, their refusal to deal with present-day problems, their mania for ramming doctrine wholesale down the throats of their communicants, their spirit of aloofness from ministers of other denominations, and their refusal to cooperate with them, has been the chief cause of this lack of progress in our Church. They have, in their strict and even painful adherence to dogma and form, taken the spirit and life out of the Church and its worship. The enthusiasm and warmth of natural religion have given way to a religion of form and ceremony. They have taken the life and beauty out of the Bible, and made it a code of dry and inspired theology. Instead of preaching, they have almost invariably talked theology, and theology alone. Our Church has never been in need of would-be theologians, but we have been and are now sorely in need of pastors and preachers. They have discouraged honest investigation, if that investigation has the least taint of rationalism. In their supreme disgust for innovations they have made our Church as inflexible and unfit for the various conditions of modern life as the customs and practises of the Middle Ages would be out of place now. They have been completely oblivious of the fact that there are necessarily change and progress in theology and religion as well as in everything else. True, there are certain fundamentals that never grow old; equally true is it that there are some non-essentials that change with the varying hours. The non-essential has been made essential, and so strongly insisted upon that it is almost a sacrilege even to insinuate against its authority." The Visitor, March 15, 1917, referring to this publication, remarks: "Well, we admit the excerpt from the article is pretty raw. But the Visitor believes in allowing some freedom even to the religious press…. Unanimity ere long becomes monotony. Varietas sine unitate diversitas. Unitas sine varietate mors."
UNLUTHERAN PRACTISE.
149. Lodge-, Pulpit-, and Altar-Fellowship.—Forbearance with all manner of weakness in doctrine and practise does not per se conflict with confessional Lutheranism. But a refusal on principle to take the correct position, also as to Lutheran practise, is indeed incompatible with true Lutheranism. The attitude of the United Synod, however, toward lodge-, pulpit-, altar-, and church-fellowship has always been of a kind which practically amounted to a denial of its confessional basis. Dr. Voigt confesses: "As a matter of fact and actual practise, Lutheran ministers in the United Synod do not invite others to occupy their pulpits indiscriminately; and although in some churches the custom of extending a general invitation at Communion still continues from earlier times, the practise is diminishing, and in most churches has passed away with the introduction of the Common Service. As to secret societies, there is not much agitation against them except in the Tennessee Synod, and a number of United Synod ministers are known to be members of such orders; but the sentiment of most ministers is unfavorable to them." (Dist. Doctr., 1914, 188.) "Discussions in regard to stricter or more lax practises have never led to divisions nor issued in official pronouncements of distinctive developments of confessional position." "Firm as they are in their convictions, Southern Lutherans are generally adverse to controversy. This is probably the true explanation of the conservative attitude of the United Synod towards the questions connected with pulpit- and altar-fellowship and secret societies. There are differences of view on these questions existing in the United Synod. But the disposition has always been not to fight the differences out, but to wait for time to bring about unanimity in regard to them. In the formation of the United Synod peculiar circumstances thrust these questions upon the notice of the body; but it declined to legislate in regard to them because it was unwilling to go through the throes of controversy which a decision upon them involved. Combined with this aversion to controversy, there exists an evangelical [?] impatience of legal constraint, which impels men to act upon principle rather than by rule." "It has already been stated that the Tennessee Synod is unique among the synods constituting the United Synod in having rules against pulpit- and altar-fellowship and secret societies; and the United Synod has pledged itself not to employ in its general work, in its theological seminary, in its mission operations, in the editing of its official organ, any person who would foster secretism or unionistic fellowship." (Dist. Doctr., 1914, 147 f.; 1893, 182.)
150. Attitude toward Non-Lutheran Denominations.—The United Synod as such did not establish an exchange of delegates with any of the non-Lutheran churches. However, invitations to preach in their pulpits on the occasion of synodical conventions were not refused. The Lutheran Church Visitor, March 15, 1917: "Our United Synod ministers are not ashamed to speak of our Evangelical Lutheran testimony before Methodists, Baptists, Presbyterians, et al., et id genus omne." But the fact is that at such occasions the distinctive features of Lutheranism are, as a rule, passed over in silence; that full fellowship of prayer and service is indulged in; and that the spirit of indifferentism as well as the desire, on the part of the Lutheran synods and congregations, for returning the comity and kindness received at the hands of Methodists, etc., is encouraged and strengthened. As such, furthermore, the United Synod did not take an active part in interdenominational organizations, but, on the other hand, did not consider it a denial of the truth when its pastors openly and heartily participated in local ministerial unions, or when its congregations occasionally joined in union religious meetings. Thus Drs. Horn and Drach took part in the Interdenominational Conference at Edinburgh in 1910. The Lutheran Church Visitor encouraged participation in interdenominational meetings; e.g., in its issue of April 6, 1916, the Men's National Missionary Congress in Washington, D.C. "So it has done, does, and shall continue to do, and not be ashamed," declared the Visitor, March 15, 1917, and explained in defense of this attitude toward non-Lutheran bodies: "The United Synod believes that the lump [non-Lutheran churches] cannot receive 'absent treatment,' and that the Lutheran leaven cannot be placed in the lump from a prohibitive distance." However, according to the history of the Lutheran Church in America, in practically all of the interdenominational movements and meetings participated in by Lutherans, the rule has been not to confess, but, directly or indirectly, to deny the distinctive truths of Lutheranism. Speaking of the United Synod, Dr. Voigt remarked: "Rigid exclusiveness is quite foreign to its spirit."
TENNESSEE AND HOLSTON SYNODS.
151. Tennessee Lowering Her Standard.—The Tennessee Synod, whose early history is dealt with extensively in American Lutheranism, Part I, was the main factor in bringing about the change in the confessional attitude of the Southern synods. The Lutheran Church Visitor, March 8, 1917: "The Tennessee Synod helped the other synods to rise and regain their Lutheran feet. Since then she has helped them to keep their feet and to win stronger foothold." "The ministers of the Tennessee Synod," says Dr. Horn, "trained as they have been for the most part in the homes and companionship of older ministers, have not a wide and varied culture, but possess a profound acquaintance with the writings of Luther and a ready and genial knowledge of the Holy Scriptures." (Dist. Doctr., 1893, 178.) In the revised constitution of 1866 the original confessional statement of the Tennessee Synod, adopting the Augsburg Confession without limitation or qualification, was enlarged to include also the Apology, the Smalcald Articles, the Smaller and Larger Catechisms of Luther, and the Formula of Concord "as true Scriptural developments of the doctrines taught in the Augsburg Confession." In the same year the Tennessee Synod, following the example of her daughter, the Holston Synod, eliminated from her constitution the objectionable features respecting incorporation, theological seminaries, synodical treasuries, etc. Among the Southern synods the Tennessee Synod alone adopted rules against pulpit- and altar-fellowship and against holding membership in secret societies. Her endeavors to induce the United Synod to take a similar position failed. Indeed, the original constitution, submitted in 1884 at Salisbury, contained a paragraph against pulpit- and altar-fellowship, membership in lodges, and chiliasm. And when this paragraph was rejected, Polycarp Henkel, representing the Tennessee Synod, refused to vote for the constitution. In 1886 the Tennessee Synod adopted the Salisbury basis, but added a declaration which condemned chiliasm, lodge-services, pulpit- and altar-fellowship, and all church union and cooperation conflicting with pure Lutheran doctrine, and recommended that the United Synod embody in its by-laws a paragraph pledging theological professors to teach nothing contrary to these principles or the doctrines of the Lutheran Church. At the meeting of the United Synod in Savannah, 1887, Socrates Henkel proposed a corresponding by-law, which, however, was tabled till the next meeting. The Tennessee Synod reaffirmed its resolution with the threat that they would not cooperate with the United Synod until a by-law embodying the four points had been adopted. However, when the North Carolina Synod, with equal determination, took the opposite stand, Tennessee yielded, compromising on, and contending herself with, the resolution adopted in 1900 in which the United Synod assured the Tennessee Synod that, in their common work, they would earnestly endeavor to avoid everything that might tend to burden the consciences of brethren in any synod, and that all synods were equally bound to direct their practise and fulfil their duties according to their honest and conscientious conviction of the true and real sense of God's Word and the Confessions. Thus the Tennessee Synod, untrue to her noble traditions, finally did waive her demand for a correct Lutheran position on the part of the United Synod with reference to the four points. Tennessee closed her eyes to the fact that she remained responsible not only for what was done conjointly with the other synods in the United Synod, but also for the practise of these synods as such. Unionism, once again, had gained the victory. And now, after decades of fraternal intercourse with the General Synod, the Tennessee Synod is organically united with the synods in opposition to which she organized in 1820.
152. Holston Synod.—The Ev. Luth. Holston Synod was organized January 2, 1861, by 11 ministers and 16 congregations (with a communicant membership of 1,000) residing in East Tennessee and neighboring counties of Virginia, after having received their honorable dismission for this purpose from the Tennessee Synod, which by this action was left without a single congregation or minister in the State whose name she bears. The step was taken not because of any dissatisfaction with the doctrinal position of the Tennessee Synod, but on account of the inconvenience and expensiveness of attending her conventions. However, the peculiar attitude of the Tennessee Synod toward theological seminaries, incorporation, synodical treasuries, etc., contributed to the separation. (Holston Minutes, 1861 ff.) In his Quartocentennial Address, 1886, Dr. A.J. Brown, for more than twenty-five years president of the Holston Synod, stated: "There was at the time of her formation, and had been for some time prior to this, considerable dissatisfaction with the constitution of the Tennessee Synod, and strong efforts were being made to have it amended. It was contended by the advocates of reform that that instrument contained features and prohibitions which cramped and crippled the energies of the Church in the prosecution of her sublime mission, and that it no longer reflected the views of the whole Synod." The Holston Synod, then, did not model her polity after that of the mother synod. (Minutes, 1886.) But, while this was undoubtedly a progress in the right direction, the strict Lutheranism of the Holston Synod did not prove to be as pronounced and consistent as that of the Tennessee Synod had been. In 1886 the Holston Synod numbered 15 pastors and 27 congregations, with a communicant membership of 2,000, compared with 1,800 communicant members at present. The minutes of the Holston Synod record numerous reports and resolutions with respect to Mosheim Institute, which, however, proved to be a failure.