#augsburg confession

[droegeboycreations]

League of Confessors - Video 10

League of Confessors – Video 10

[prolifeproliberty]

Find the Book of Concord, which includes the Augsburg Confession, here:

Falsely are our churches accused of abolishing the Mass; for the Mass is retained among us, and celebrated with the highest reverence. Nearly all the usual ceremonies are also preserved, save that the parts sung in Latin are interspersed here and there with German hymns, which have been added to teach the people. For ceremonies are needed to this end alone that the unlearned be taught [what they need to know of Christ]. And not only has Paul commanded to use in the church a language understood by the people (1 Cor. 14:2-9), but it has also been so ordained by man’s law. The people are accustomed to partake of the Sacrament together, if any be fit for it, and this also increases the reverence and devotion of public worship. For none are admitted except they be first examined. The people are also advised concerning the dignity and use of the Sacrament, how great consolation it brings anxious consciences, that they may learn to believe God, and to expect and ask of Him all that is good. [In this connection they are also instructed regarding other and false teachings on the Sacrament.] This worship pleases God; such use of the Sacrament nourishes true devotion toward God. It does not, therefore, appear that the Mass is more devoutly celebrated among our adversaries than among us.

- Augsburg Confession XXIV: 1-9

[postcard-from-the-past]

1930 Procession on the day of the Augustan Confession in Augsburg, Bavaria, Germany

German vintage postcard

[stpauls-milaca]

A Discussion About Good Works

For as long as there has been a Christian church, the matter concerning Good Works has been at the forefront of theological discourse. After the Reformation some 500 years ago, the theologians of Augsburg disagreed concerning Good Works and how to rightly emphasize them. On the one hand, some said that “Good Works are necessary for salvation,” and “It is impossible to be saved without Good…

[aurinavenir]

📷 Doors of the Evangelical Cemetery of the Augsburg Confession in Warsaw, Poland.

[mioritic]

A view over the Council Square (Piața Sfatului) from the Black Church (DE: Schwarze Kirche / RO: Biserica Neagră), Brașov, Transylvania, Romania. Photograph not dated (probably early 20th century).

The Black Church began construction in 1383 and was completed in 1476. It is home to a Lutheran (Augsburg Confession) parish of the Transylvanian Saxon community. The twelve statues which decorate its façade, as seen on the left of the above photograph, are currently being restored (with other sections of the church having previously been restored in 1937 and 2000).

Honterusgemeinde / Evangelische Kirche A. B. Kronstadt

[danjaley]

Adventures in Reading

The Hobbit - An Unexpected Journey

My first encounter with the Hobbit was when I was about ten years old and on a train-journey. My mother handed that pink edged book to me and said this was a good one, I'd enjoy it. So I looked at the cover and wondered which of these unpleasant-looking creatures was supposed to be the "Hobbit". To make things worse, the name Bilbo reminded me of a puppet-play by the Augsburger Puppenkiste "Bill-Bo und seine Kumpane" (about a gang of robbers), which I didn't enjoy. Although I usually think the world of the Augsburger Puppenkiste, and if they'd adapted the Hobbit, it would have been perfection.

Then I read the first few pages. A dwarf rang at the door of the "Hobbit". Then another dwarf. And another. And another. I did not notice anything humorous about it. I handed the book back and said it was a stupid book.

I don't have that copy any more - these are covers reprinted in the German Annotated Hobbit. It was only there that I found out, the cover art was originally supposed to look like the one on the left. Which at least has a unifying concept. But I have to confess I never liked anything by Klaus Ensikat.

The first thing by Tolkien I thoroughly enjoyed were the Father Christmas Letters, as an adorable tiny boxed set.

In my early teens, the Lord of the Rings movies came out, so it became common knowledge that this work existed, and The Hobbit was a prequel to it. My mother loves boxed sets, so of course we also have one of the Lord of the Rings+Hobbit. When I was small I always wondered why they put a small figure there instead of 0. Because I had seen those spines all my life, declared "a book for grown-ups" I never thought of them as something I might actually open and read. Since my best friend at the time "read Tolkien", I wanted to give him another chance, so I read Tuor's Arrival in Gondolin. Which is not exactly the best thing to start with.

There came the day my mother played a CD in the living-room, which I wanted to hear, but without anyone noticing I was listening. My relationship with music was even more complicated then, than it is now. So I picked up the first volume of The Lord of the Rings, which was lying about, and that was when I finally got it.

After this revelation I did read The Hobbit, but again I had tackled it wrong. Directly after The Lord of the Rings, I found it rather disappointing. It had one thing in common with Wuthering Heights: At 50% I thought, okay, all the famous quotes have been delivered, what on earth are they going to do with the rest of the book?

As an aside, my mother also owns this extraordinary English copy, which came out with the old animation-movie. That was my first read-through in English, but nowadays I have a reading-copy with all the appendices.

Then came the year 2012, in which the world did not end, but it was one of the worst years I ever lived through. It was also the year the first Hobbit movie was released. I remember thinking at the time, if I have nothing else to look forward to in this life, at least I can look forward to another two films like this. Gawd, I'm glad I was wrong! I hated part 2 and 3!

But that was when I finally got into reading The Hobbit and enjoying it. I remember how amazed I was how much the dwarf-scene made me laugh (with a clear memory of that train-experience). I had discovered that the university-library owned an old edition of the Annotated Hobbit, and I could read this in my breaks. Thanks to the movie, there was also an affordable, and much updated edition of that work in German (on the right).

But actually I also own it in English now, because the German can be all over the place, trying to squeeze poems and their translations into the margins. But then the German edition has an extra focus on the Hobbit's printing history in Germany. And that's how I discovered the beauty of annotated editions. It's a story-book, but with lots of stories about the story. I particularly love when stories in books develop after they have been published, like the famous riddle-scene between Bilbo and Gollum.

And so I wrote my own annotated edition of a book (currently secret, hopefully to be published over the next years).

[culvers-unofficial]

It seems everyone decided to have strong opinions while I was at work sweating my ass off.

Winter is the best, no competition. Snow and ice are great, and idc about the cold. One of the most ethereal moments I've ever had was during winter. I was walking home from watching my dad curl at night through the snow, trudging through the stuff that was on the ground. It was a still night, with barely any wind. Big snowflakes were falling lightly, and I was listening to Green by Cavetown. I have no other words for it but ethereal.

Also, you can put as many layers on as you want in the winter, but you can only take so many off in the summer

When can this summer shit be over. I know the heat is good for the frozen custard business, but it's absolutely killing me. Can winter just get here already?

[mybeautifulchristianjourney]

It Happened Today in Christian History

June 25, 1530: The leaders of the Reformation present the Augsburg Confession to Emperor Charles V—an explanation of the position and beliefs of Lutherans.

June 25, 1580: Fifty years after the presentation of the Augsburg Confession, the Book of Concord is made available to the public.

[thebeautifulbook]

BIBLIA, DAS IST: DIE GANTZE HEILIGE SCHRIFT, ALTES UND NEUES TESTAMENTS, VERTEUTSCHET DURCH D. MARTIN LUTHER WITH DIE AUGSBURGISCHE CONFESSION [aka BIBLE: ALL THE HOLY SCRIPTURES, OLD AND NEW TESTAMENTS, TRANSLATED BY D. MARTIN LUTHER, WITH THE AUGSBURG CONFESSION] by Martin Luther. (Luneburg: Sternischen Buchdruderen, 1740]. 20th Century binding or modeled and incised calfskin by Ernst Rückert.

18th Century Lutheran Bible in Lutheran with copper-engraved allegorical illustrated title page and 145 woodcuts in the text by Jakob Mores (c.1540-1612)

source

[religion-is-a-mental-illness]

By: Notes From Poland

Published: Sep 29, 2023

The proportion of people in Poland identifying as Roman Catholics has fallen to 71% in the latest national census, down from 88% a decade earlier.

The figures mirror other findings from recent years showing declining attachment to Poland’s Catholic church, which has been hit by a series of scandals over child sex abuse by clergy and has faced criticism for its support of an unpopular near-total ban on abortion.

The new data, released by Statistics Poland (GUS), a state agency, show that in the 2021 census, 27.1 million people (71.3%) identified themselves as followers of the Roman Catholic church. That was down from 33.7 million (87.6%) at the last census a decade earlier.

Meanwhile, the proportion saying that they belonged to no faith almost tripled, from 2.4% in 2011 to 6.9% in 2021. Likewise, those who refused to answer the question also almost tripled, from 7.1% to 20.5%.

The highest proportions of Roman Catholics were found in the eastern provinces of Subcarpathia (82.9%), Świętokrzyskie (81.2%), and Lublin (80.7%). The lowest were in West Pomerania (64.5%), Lower Silesia (65.3%) and Pomerania (67.2%)

Apart from Roman Catholicism, all other religious denominations remained small in the 2021 census, with the Orthodox church the second largest (151,648 believers, 0.4% of the population), followed by Jehovah’s Witnesses (108,754, 0.3%) and Lutherans belonging to the Evangelical Church of the Augsburg Confession (65,407, 0.2%).

Among non-Christian denominations, none were larger than 0.1% of the population. The biggest, with 3,236 followers, was Diamond Way Buddhism.

Meanwhile, the number belonging to the Muslim Religious Union (2,209) was smaller than the number identifying as Pastafarians (2,312) – followers of the Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster, a parody religion.

Regular polling by state research agency CBOS shows that the proportion of Poles who declare themselves to be religious believers fell from 94% in 1992 to 87% in 2021. Over the same period, those regularly practising their religion dropped from 70% to 43%.

Among young Poles, the decline was even more dramatic: from 69% practising regularly in 1992 to 23% in 2021. Last year, the Catholic Primate of Poland, Archbishop Wojciech Polak, admitted that the decline in religious practice among young Poles was “devastating”.

The church’s own figures show that the proportion of Catholics in Poland attending mass fell from 37% in 2019 to 28% in 2021. While the pandemic played a part, the church admits that “socio-cultural factors” were also involved. It has also noted a growing number of people formally leaving the church through apostasy.

==

Good News for Poland.

[buggie-hagen]

This theology [of the Augsburg Confession] did not belong to Luther, nor did it belong to Melanchthon; it belonged to Christ. ~Scott Keith, Meeting Melanchthon, 31.

[prolifeproliberty]

What does it mean to be a Confessional Lutheran?

Confessional Lutherans are those who hold to the Lutheran Confessions - hence the name.

We believe that the Confessions correctly explain what God's Word says - they do not add to God's Word or take away from it.

The Small Catechism is intended for the average person to have a basic understanding of the Faith - in fact, it was written for fathers to use in teaching their children.

The Large Catechism takes the same basic structure but goes more in-depth, for those with questions beyond the Small Catechism.

The other documents, including the Augsburg Confession, Apology to the Augsburg Confession, the Smalcald Articles, and The Formula of Concord, go into much, much more detail and specifically outline not only what we believe, but what we reject - that is, things that other churches teach that are contrary to Scripture.

You can find these documents here:

If you are curious about Lutheranism, I recommend beginning with the Small and Large Catechisms, as beyond that the reading gets heavy and can be overwhelming.

[postcard-from-the-past]

400-year anniversary of the Augsburg Confession in 1930, the primary confession of faith of the Lutheran Church

German vintage postcard

[6rookie-writer0110]

Alo how are you? Could you make a ranger x reader Gretel (Gemma Arterton) from Hansel and Gretel the Witch Hunters smut?

The reader is a ranger who is an old friend who was always in love with Gretel and she was in love with the reader, but she believed that he died when he disappeared, what she does not know is that he became a ranger, one day he becomes He meets the brothers in the city of Augsburg, during that moment he begins to talk to Gretel, resuming what happened, they begin to flirt a lot, but when the city is attacked, the reader takes an unconscious Gretel to his home in his arms. hid in the woods, when she wakes up she remembers little of what happened. The reader tells her about the attack and that she couldn't see what happened to her brother. Later, he helps her with her wounds. They both confess that they are in love with each other. They suddenly begin a passionate kissing session that intensifies and they have sex. Later, the reader helps his now girlfriend conspire with the evil witches along with his brother and his new apprentice Ben. They finally defeat them and Gretel and the reader continue with the work, very much in love.

Oh I remember the movie. Ok sure 👍

[bythewassern]

Allhallowtide is nigh!

The Hallowtide season is a Christian solemnity beginning on Halloween. This fixed triduum (or three-day season) is celebrated late in the liturgical year and encompasses multiple holidays:

All Hallow's Eve (as well as Reformation Day for us Protestants) on October 31st

All Saints' Day (or Allhallows) on November 1st

All Souls' Day on November 2nd

Frequently included is the modern International Day of Prayer for the Persecuted Church, which, as it is observed the first Sunday in November, often coincides with Allhallowtide. Mass prayer and fasting for our brethren worldwide, consequential activism and almsgiving to trustworthy charities facilitating aid or protection for the persecuted body of Christ are encouraged.

Why are these holidays observed?

Reformation Day commemorates the rescue of the Gospel from the hands of satan. We celebrate the lives of the brave reformers of the Christian faith - from King Josiah who repented upon his servants' rediscovery of the Holy Scriptures and cleansed the corrupted church of it's false worship restoring it to it's former purity - to the Proto-Protestant forerunners (Peter Waldo, William of Ockham, John Wycliffe, Jan Hus) - to the heroes of the Reformation itself, Martin Luther as our brave and bellicose torchbearer in pure doctrine, and all of those who played their role - the clergyman and theologians, the signers of the Augsburg Confession, the writers and signers of our creeds, the Christian kings and princes who took up arms to defend the Lutheran cause, the blessed martyrs, the great artists, the great inventors, the zealous laymen, the soldiers and the workers and all who were willing to dedicate their lives to the cause and sacrifice everything for victory. Thanks be to God.

All Hallow's Eve (Halloween) is a holiday focused on the remembrance of death - a day for observing our various customary cultural festivities, but more importantly for contemplating our own mortality and the necessity of repentance. Halloween begins this three-day holiday season focused on remembrance of the dead as well as celebration of the living faithful.

All Saints' Day celebrates the Church as the Body and the Bride of Christ. We celebrate all Christian saints, whether known or unknown, dead or alive - all who have been justified by Christ, sanctified by the Holy Spirit, crucified with him and bear the fruits of true belief. We remember all those who have glorified - or continue to glorify - our Lord with their lives. We remember the sacrifices of these saints and meditate upon where we personally are at in our marathon, and how we have been spending our earthly lives as the Church militant - we living believers, who in this life are still fighting under the banner of Christ against the enemy, the world and the flesh.

All Souls' Day is when the faithful departed specifically are commemorated. We acknowledge the Church triumphant - all who have fallen asleep in the true faith. We thank God for creating us, for loving us, and for being the fountain of all life and life itself. We as Christians again meditate upon the curse of death, thank God for the gift of life both temporal and eternal, and look forward to the resurrection of the dead and the life of the world to come.