In Pursuit of Religious Freedom: Bishop Martin Stephan's Journey

by Stephan, Philip

  On the other hand the daily demands of survival and their ongoing efforts toward their dreams kept the group from completely falling apart. They faced the question of whether they should return home or not. An unknown number did go back to Germany between June and December. Among them were some leaders of the Credit Fund and the planning group; attorney Eduard Vehse left in December. Adolf Marbach would join him back in Dresden two-and-a-half years later, after his defeat at the Altenburg debates.

  But before those leaders departed, the community would go through two more crises, issues of their personal and corporate identity. Who were they now that their bishop was gone? For many in this community the symbol of his office constituted the church. Another group including Vehse and Marbach wanted never again to be ruled by the clergy. The Saxon group was in shock, confused, and totally disorganized. While they continued to divide the land and build houses, that was just for survival. On an inner level they were infected with self-doubt.

  Many questions about their validity as a church were discussed in numerous formal and informal meetings. Were they wrong in leaving the church in Germany to come here to America? Did their leader have ulterior reasons for coming here, perhaps to get away from a bad marriage? Were their reasons for leaving Germany legitimate? Had they created a schism in the Germany Lutheran Church? How could they be a church without the pastoral guidance of their pastor and the bishop whom they had elected? These questions evoked emotions ranging from guilt at having splintered the German Church, fear their journey was useless, and blame and ill anger toward their once beloved leader.

  As the community wrestled with these questions, they wondered if the whole trip was worth the trouble and suffering. They believed their motives for emigrating to America were pure. They were told it would prevent the ecumenical merger the authoritarian state church was forcing on them. Was their leader then a false teacher? Some wondered now how they had been so duped. And so the questions kept coming through confusion and pain, in their difficult lives out in the rainy wilderness.

  Understanding how Martin Stephan was treated is critical to understanding the insecurity and aimlessness the community experienced. The failure of the Society to handle their own pastor’s problems and deal with them honestly, openly, painfully, and gracefully looms large. In this situation compassionate, caring, and just community did not come about. The way he was dealt with was an enormous failure for a Christian community: they expelled him without just process, under threat of violence, and on the basis of broken confidence within a sacramental confession. In many ways this failure is one where the church or churches fail to deal with issues of authority, identity, and ministry. The authority question asks who is in charge here. Who is the head of the church? The identity question asks who are we, disciples and servants? Or are we conquerors? The ministry question deals with how do we deal with and serve each other, by law or by grace? This failure at Perry County foreshadows the inability of Christianity today to accept the human condition as one that is never perfect and yet always becoming Christ-like. Human beings are not now nor will they ever be perfect. Perfection misses the whole point of one’s relationship to God. The Christian community fails when it is unable to deal with each other’s human condition in grace and with loving acceptance. Augustine said it well: “We were made in God’s own image and our hearts are restless until they find their rest in Him.”

  The St. Louis German newspaper heard about the entire story and printed a piece about Martin Stephan’s deposition and excommunication. When Society members read it, the news compounded their humiliation. The Anzeiger des Westens demanded that Bishop Stephan be delivered to the civil authorities. The paper demeaned him publishing various testimonies alleging his revolting excesses and unlawful abridgement of the common treasury. They insisted that he and all the other pastors should be punished according to American law and justice. The editors of the papers wanted a complete and accurate accounting of the congregation’s property. The editorial urged members to leave the group and asserted they needed to be properly reimbursed for their investments. The paper was relentless in its ridicule of the Saxon community for being foolhardy, following Stephan like blind sheep. The demands for an investigation were noticed but never acted on by civil authorities. The clergy replied once that they had erred in following Stephan so blindly; then they stopped responding to the newspaper’s continued editorial criticism.6

  When news of the whole debacle arrived in Dresden, it naturally brought horror and sorrow to many. Of course the Dresden press published the news. By July 26, 1839, all of Dresden knew of Stephan’s deposition and the turmoil within the colony. Some dubious critics responded with the characteristic “I told you so.” Julia Stephan was hurt and troubled, as one can imagine, but she was not too surprised by the news of Louise Guenther’s confession. Another person close to Pastor Stephan, Dr. Franz Delitzsch, was troubled by the news in letters coming from St. Louis and Perry County.

  Delitzsch, the highly regarded Old Testament scholar at Leipzig and later in Dresden, not only admired Pastor Stephan but was a close friend of the pastor and many of the Saxon emigrants. Most upset by the manner in which the Saxon community dealt with the expulsion of their leader, he wrote F. W. Barthel, the new treasurer of the Credit Fund, “with a bleeding heart I take up my pen to write to you.” He asked bluntly why all the letters coming from their new home contained such arrogant attitudes instead of humble confessions. Forster quoted from a Franz Delitzsch letter to Barthel: “The letter which I read from our people in America no longer breathes the former spiritual life, not to speak of a new one.” He was appalled by the uncharitable and even jesting attitude toward Bishop Stephan rather than serious personal confessions. Colonists’ confessions of their part in the strife would come, but years later.

  Franz Delitzsch also responded by mail to the invitation of Pastor Keyl to join them in Perry County after Stephan’s expulsion. He found the invitation strange and wrote Keyl that “We have abandoned the plan to emigrate since God has spoken so thunderously that the Old and the New World have heard.”7 However, he did not rule out coming later if the conditions in the church in Germany got worse.

  When the colony heard the negative reaction from the people back in Germany, even more dissension spread among them. They divided into groups based on what kind of church they believed they should become. Apparently, Ludwig Fischer—future author of The False Martyrdom or the Truth in the Things about the Stephanists and not to be confused with H. F. Fischer of the original emigration planning committee—had written about all the turmoil in removing Stephan and resulting doubts that arose within the community. Professor Delitzsch responded to Fischer, “You knew that I had a deep community of spirit with the departed friend and that I also had not resigned from this community despite the painful separation.”

  Much of the first two pages of Delitzsch’s letter are devoted to a defense of past charges and accusations against Pastor Stephan. He warned Fischer about listening to the gossip of those who “wantonly transgress against the eighth commandment while you accuse Pastor Stephan of committing public sins by breaking the sixth, even the fifth and seventh commandments.” He praised the pastoral effectiveness of Stephan and urged people to get to know Stephan’s private life, which he was sure they would find as uplifting as he did. He assessed Stephan’s pastoral ministry as one of gentle firmness, “combined with the most loving care of divinely distressed or troubled souls came the strictest reprimand, the relentless uncovering, the most thorough healing of spiritual damages.” Delitzsch mentioned some of the accusations specifically and stated that the rumor that Stephan stole from the alms cash box at St. John’s is untrue because there was no such box. He defended the nightly walks due to Stephan’s need for exercise. Delitzsch related that during these walks the topics of conversation ranged widely:

  Even if the subject was taken from the areas of science or art, the direction of the discourses never lacked for that higher and sanctifyi
ng connection. It was veritable spiritual pleasures to listen to Pastor Stephan speak about building, painting, compositions or style. Everyone was looking forward to hearing his discourse on historical subjects in the smallest details. His whole knowledge was about life in spite of the fact that it was lacking so called “useless” school learning as some people had charged. A special characteristic of his mental life was his sensitive and experienced observation of nature; his walks usually led him to areas which combined material for a more serious discussion with a healthy location.8

  Delitzsch also noted something that had been repeated often: Stephan did take long walks to the vineyard at Hofloesnitz and was accompanied by single women, but most of his friends never found this offensive. He closed the letter by addressing the current situation in Perry County: “Enough of this subject; it is discussed often and nauseatingly.”

  Delitzsch devoted the remainder of the letter to the burning question that troubled not only Fischer but the whole colony that had sailed to Missouri. The question had to do with whether the remnants of each of the German parishes that came to America were still the church, especially now that they had no leader and the clergy had no “divine calls” from the people since they had all resigned their calls back in Germany. Delitzsch addressed this question by quoting the Augsburg Confession’s articles on the church (de ecclesia) and on the pastoral ministry (de ministerio ecclesiastico). He emphasized the need for clarity on these two articles and practices because they had suffered so many offenses in many Lutheran parishes, especially “in Prussia and in almost all German states, due to the union.”

  The question troubled later theologians of the Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod, for example Ottomar Fuerbringer who was a theology student at the time of Martin’s deposition. Later he would attack Stephan’s teaching on church and ministry and label him a false teacher. Delitzsch and Pastor Stephan were in agreement about the church and ministry. Delitzsch addressed these reassuring words to the floundering community:

  Although, in the strictest sense, church designates the community of the chosen, in whose meaning she is called the body of Christ, the immaculate bride of Christ, etc., and as such, according to her individual members and size, is completely recognizable by and clear only to the all-seeing eye of God, but invisible to us, she is a healing institution in a wider meaning than the community of the called, visible through the means of mercy of the word of God and the holy sacrament entrusted to her. The invisible church is formed by those who have been reborn through the means of mercy put in order by God. There are two characteristics by which, in the majority of visible single churches, the true one can be recognized: pure preaching of the word of God and legitimate administration of the sacrament. Only the Lutheran church shows these characteristics; therefore, to everybody who tests honestly, she must appear as the Zion of the New Testament. Although consisting not only of reborn members, yet she is the kingdom of heaven, e.g. the institution leading to heaven, which the Lord Himself compares to a vineyard, a net, a sowed field in which good is mingled with bad.9

  Professor Delitzsch expounded to Fischer and to the community that each individual should seek the true visible church by being a bearer of the true word and the “housekeeper of the secrets of mercy (grace) of the sacraments” by public witness and by joining the visible church, even if it means moving to another house or county. He comforted their agonized souls, saying that they could find the church apart from the composition of her servants and confessors. Even if preachers do not always proclaim the truth, or if heresies are rampant, the church still exists and the sacraments administered by the church are valid. “The effectiveness of the church is not bound by the subjective beliefs of the church and her servants.” Delitzsch then quoted Stephan speaking to younger theologians at dinner: “My young friends, the magnificence of the church in full bloom cannot be described. You have not seen this magnificence. You were born when the church of the fatherland was already in trouble; however, I was so lucky to see her still in full regalia.”10

  Delitzsch addressed his friends regarding the office of the ministry in great detail. He advised them that the evidence that a minister preaches the “pure” Word of God and administers the sacraments is found by continual testing whether what he preaches as the Word of God is consistent with that Word. Ministers are called by churches and by the Holy Spirit. Their ranks in the church are not arbitrary nor were they in the early New Testament church. If there are any higher ranks among ministers it is because of the gift given to them. Delitzsch said,

  No office is by divine right and all ministers are equal in rank and different in gifts. However, their spiritual paternity in Christ, their rich experience, the spirit of Christ, which they carried, and the many seals of their offices which they could present—these and more earned them the respect not because of their arrogance but the blessing of their God. Only in this way Pastor Stephan is being highly regarded by us, indeed, as a Noah who escaped the general flood, as a pillar of the church which has adorned her for more than twenty-five years, as a faithful shepherd who bears the characteristics of such for the sheep of Christ.11

  The office of the ministry was indeed a great point of contention among members of the Society. In a very knowing way Delitzsch managed to address this issue, but it would take some time to comprehend it. Eduard Vehse, one of the leaders of the anticlerical group, wanted the role of the clergy diminished. Vehse had always opposed Stephan’s authority and bristled at the thought of the episcopacy. When he penned his experience and thoughts during the voyage back to Germany in December of 1839, he filled fifty pages impugning Stephan’s character, his ministry, and his theology. Then, in the same angry style, he attacked the other clergy for letting the catastrophe happen. He tried to rally the laity with the call to take over the church, which he thought belonged to the laity anyway. He believed that too much authority was in the hands of the clergy. He called for a church that was totally run and administered by the laity. The role of the clergy was to be limited to preaching and administration of the sacraments, visiting the sick, and teaching the children. When he left in 1839, his position was championed by Candidate Brohm. For some time his position was also ridiculed by Keyl and Buerger, which they later retracted.12

  This dissension and churchly self-doubt continued among the colonists for two years. There were three distinct groups, and they circulated their ideas among the community through various discussions and meetings. They disagreed about their own validity as a church and about the authority of the clergy. There was much dissension among the clergy about their right to pastor without a direct call from a congregation, and so Keyl, Buerger, and even C. F. W. Walther resigned their pastoral status for a time

  Those who supported Vehse’s position led the first group and advocated a laity controlled church body. In his book Vehse mobilized Luther’s writings on church and ministry in the Lutheran Confessions to support his position. His supporters maintained this stand after he returned to Germany. Vehse said that congregations make up the church, and the pastors are there to serve the people, not the other way around. The other prominent attorney, Adolf Marbach, led the second group. Marbach was the most negative of the three, saying that the colonists were not the church and they all needed to disperse, close the community, and return to Germany. The third group followed Pastor C. F. W. Walther, joined by pastors Keyl, Buerger, O. H. Walther, and their newest pastor, Gruber. They adopted a more passive strategy. They admitted their own faults in following Bishop Stephan, but only as they needed to and without taking the blame for losing total control of the community or for all the turmoil.

  Generally the colonists were weary of fighting; they were depressed and lacked confidence to move on in their spiritual lives. Even after self-examination and penitential prayer, they were unable to see their roles in the emigration and in the expulsion of Bishop Stephan. However, Vehse, angry and feeling betrayed, wrote on his voyage home that Stephan was treated wrongly by the co
ngregation:

  I shall not try to justify the manner and form of the deposition with respect to its appropriateness for a Christian congregation. It can be excused only because of Stephan’s low conduct at the time, the extraordinary furor roused by the revelations about him, and the confusion of mind which these occasioned. That it was basically wrong is shown in the Appendix.13

  The appendix to Vehse’s book contains the document declaring the deposition, which is most unkind, accusatory, and unloving. He is the only one of Stephan’s opponents to admit the treatment of Bishop Stephan was cruel. In spite of this comment, he was unable to help the colony heal and move on. He left the community long before they resolved their inner anxiety, but his ideas were carried on by others.

  While it may appear that this group of colonists struggled to provide a structure to solve their identity crisis, they did manage their everyday living needs in an organized way. However, when it came to exploring whether they were a church, they were quite divided. They had believed that the church was connected to the pastors and to Bishop Stephan who had been called as their chief shepherd. They firmly believed that Stephan was to blame for their dilemma. In truth, they had exhibited a classic need to follow the leader’s authority. In order to understand the irony of this authority issue, it is important to realize that when a group is unable to organize its own effective leadership, a strong leader emerges in the vacuum. The Society had never been without a leader before. Now that he was expelled they were unsure what authority their current leaders had, and they were divided among themselves, not certain where to turn for direction.