according to the
well-known saying: 'Disagreement in fasting does not destroy agreement
in faith.'" (Mueller 553, 7.) It cannot, then, be maintained
successfully that, according to the Lutheran symbols, some doctrines,
though clearly taught in the Bible, are irrelevant and not necessary to
church-fellowship. The Lutheran Confessions neither extend the
requirements for Christian union to human teachings and institutions,
nor do they limit them to merely a part of the divine doctrines of the
Bible. They err neither _in excessu_ nor _in defectu_. Accordingly,
Lutherans, though not unmindful of the admonition to bear patiently
with the weak, the weak also in doctrine and knowledge, dare not
countenance any denial on principle of any of the Christian doctrines,
nor sanction the unionistic attitude, which maintains that denial of
minor Christian truths does not and must not, in any way, affect
Christian union and fellowship. In the "Treatise on the Power of the
Pope" the Book of Concord says: "It is a hard thing to want to separate
from so many countries and people and maintain a separate doctrine. But
here stands God's command that every one shall be separate from, and not
be agreed with, those who teach falsely," etc. (Sec.42.)

6. Misguided Efforts at Christian Union.--Perhaps never before has
Christendom been divided in as many sects as at present.
Denominationalism, as advocated by Philip Schaff and many Unionists,
defends this condition. It views the various sects as lawful specific
developments of generic Christianity, or as different varieties of the
same spiritual life of the Church, as regiments of the same army,
marching separately, but attacking the same common foe. Judged in the
light of the Bible, however, the numerous sects, organized on various
aberrations from the plain Word of God, are, as such, not normal
developments, but corruptions, abnormal formations, and diseased
conditions of the Christian Church. Others, realizing the senseless
waste of moneys and men, and feeling the shame of the scandalous
controversies, the bitter conflicts, and the dishonorable competition of
the disrupted Christian sects, develop a feverish activity in
engineering and promoting external ecclesiastical unions, regardless of
internal doctrinal dissensions. For centuries the Pope has been
stretching out his arms to the Greek and Protestant Churches, even
making concessions to the Ruthenians and other Uniates as to the
language of