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Your Turn / Johnson's book
« on: February 16, 2018, 01:55:52 PM »
I am re-posting this from another thread because the other thread wasn't getting any traffic, and I want people to know my regard for Changing World, Changeless Christ by Richard Johnson.
The book in brief is a remarkable history of the American Lutheran Publicity Bureau, largely because it is also a history of American Lutherans in their denominational manifestations over the past century. The ALPB became a significant part of my life first as a seminarian, then as a pastor, then as an occasional contributor and, ultimately as editor of Forum Letter.
It was also, as I told Richard Johnson, something of a visit to Nostalgia World with a short stop at Melancholic Village.
The latter was due to the names of those now deceased, prominent in ALPB history, people who became guides, mentors, friends to me, even some fine critics, now gone. I do not like reading biographies for that reason – I become friends with the subject and then, damn, he dies. For the ALPB names given to my memory, I shall ever thank God that I knew them and was blessed by their proximity to my life.
There was nothing inevitable about the ALPB and its publications. It was conceived to address a need that wasn’t even acknowledged, something to aid the transition from German language to English language; to explain to American society what was then an invisible collection of congregations. From that the ALPB exposed other equally unacknowledged needs among Lutherans in America: liturgics, church cooperation, confessional renewal, others. The influence of ALPB publications, my estimation, always far exceeded actual readership, and produced more friends than opponents.
There was no reason, Neuhaus once told me, Lutheran Forum and Forum Letter should not have 10,000 subscribers. True. That those publications never reached the Neuhausan vision is merely, I'd guess, an instance of more unacknowledged needs. Making those needs evident, as well as answering critics who do not in the first place even recognize them, is what the ALPB does, and along the way produces remarkable things.
A couple notes about Johnson's the book that caught my attention; well, just one thing, the disbursement of index references. The lines of index references to myself are 5. Lines of index for Neuhaus, also 5. Lines of index for my daughter, Hattie, 1. Lines of index for Paul Hinlicky's daughter, Sarah, 2. I have no idea what any of it means; I just started counting. Richard might care to explain it in a second printing.
I have not posted in this forum since becoming Roman Catholic, but I read it. Maybe you need to know, for the record, I have not heard one Romanist sermon that could not pass my innate Lutheran smell test for gospel grace. I’ve heard some bad sermons badly delivered (a risk we all run wherever) and some very good ones delivered well, but never anything that would send me bolting from the building.
Nowadays, I write regularly for Aleteia.org https://aleteia.org/author/russell-e-saltzman/, a Catholic web magazine, as well as, now and again, for the diocesan newspaper. I also teach adult catechism (RCIA) for folks entering the Catholic Church, and distribute communion weekly at a nursing home for resident members of the parish. Minor note: diocesan priests gathered in September for a review of Martin E. Marty's biography of Luther. Contact: You can find me on Facebook as Russ Saltzman. But if you are obviously a young girl and evidently friendless, you won't hear from me.
Peace and God bless, Russ
The book in brief is a remarkable history of the American Lutheran Publicity Bureau, largely because it is also a history of American Lutherans in their denominational manifestations over the past century. The ALPB became a significant part of my life first as a seminarian, then as a pastor, then as an occasional contributor and, ultimately as editor of Forum Letter.
It was also, as I told Richard Johnson, something of a visit to Nostalgia World with a short stop at Melancholic Village.
The latter was due to the names of those now deceased, prominent in ALPB history, people who became guides, mentors, friends to me, even some fine critics, now gone. I do not like reading biographies for that reason – I become friends with the subject and then, damn, he dies. For the ALPB names given to my memory, I shall ever thank God that I knew them and was blessed by their proximity to my life.
There was nothing inevitable about the ALPB and its publications. It was conceived to address a need that wasn’t even acknowledged, something to aid the transition from German language to English language; to explain to American society what was then an invisible collection of congregations. From that the ALPB exposed other equally unacknowledged needs among Lutherans in America: liturgics, church cooperation, confessional renewal, others. The influence of ALPB publications, my estimation, always far exceeded actual readership, and produced more friends than opponents.
There was no reason, Neuhaus once told me, Lutheran Forum and Forum Letter should not have 10,000 subscribers. True. That those publications never reached the Neuhausan vision is merely, I'd guess, an instance of more unacknowledged needs. Making those needs evident, as well as answering critics who do not in the first place even recognize them, is what the ALPB does, and along the way produces remarkable things.
A couple notes about Johnson's the book that caught my attention; well, just one thing, the disbursement of index references. The lines of index references to myself are 5. Lines of index for Neuhaus, also 5. Lines of index for my daughter, Hattie, 1. Lines of index for Paul Hinlicky's daughter, Sarah, 2. I have no idea what any of it means; I just started counting. Richard might care to explain it in a second printing.
I have not posted in this forum since becoming Roman Catholic, but I read it. Maybe you need to know, for the record, I have not heard one Romanist sermon that could not pass my innate Lutheran smell test for gospel grace. I’ve heard some bad sermons badly delivered (a risk we all run wherever) and some very good ones delivered well, but never anything that would send me bolting from the building.
Nowadays, I write regularly for Aleteia.org https://aleteia.org/author/russell-e-saltzman/, a Catholic web magazine, as well as, now and again, for the diocesan newspaper. I also teach adult catechism (RCIA) for folks entering the Catholic Church, and distribute communion weekly at a nursing home for resident members of the parish. Minor note: diocesan priests gathered in September for a review of Martin E. Marty's biography of Luther. Contact: You can find me on Facebook as Russ Saltzman. But if you are obviously a young girl and evidently friendless, you won't hear from me.
Peace and God bless, Russ