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The General Council of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in North America, or, in brief, the General Council was a conservative Lutheran church body, formed as a reaction against the new "Americanized Lutheranism" of Samuel Simon Schmucker and the Evangelical Lutheran General Synod of the United States of North America. The General Council was founded in November, 1867, with ten Lutheran synods becoming members Founded at the instigation of the Pennsylvania Ministerium, the General Council placed special emphasis on the Lutheran Confessions and their role in the life of the church. In 1872, the General Council adopted the Akron-Galesburg Rule, written by Charles Porterfield Krauth, reserving Lutheran pulpits for Lutheran pastors and Lutheran altars for Lutheran communicants. Theodore Emanuel Schmauk was President of the General Council from 1903 until the formation of the United Lutheran Church in America in 1918. The United Lutheran Church in America (ULCA) was formed from the merger of three independent German-language synods: the General Synod, the General Council and the United Synod of the South. ==Beginning of the General Council== At the one hundred and nineteenth convention of the Pennsylvania Ministerium in 1866, a fraternal address was issued "to Evangelical Lutheran Synods, ministers and congregations in the United States and Canadas, which confess the Unaltered Augsburg Confession, inviting them to unite in a convention for the purpose of forming a union of Lutheran Synods." This call urged "the needs of a general organization, first and supremely for the maintenance of unity in the true faith of the Gospel, and in the uncorrupted Sacraments, as the Word of God teaches and our Church confesses them; and furthermore for the preservation of her genuine spirit and worship, and for the development of her practical life in all her forms." Although none of the synods remaining in the General Synod responded favorably to this official letter, representatives from the Synod of Pennsylvania, the English Synod, the English District, and the Joint Synod of Ohio, and from the Wisconsin, Michigan, Pittsburg, Minnesota, Iowa, Missouri, Canada, New York, and Norwegian synods assembled at Reading, Pennsylvania, on December 11, 1866. The Augustana Synod was represented by letter. There they unanimously adopted a statement on the "Fundamental principals of Faith and Church Polity." A committee was appointed to outline a constitution to be submitted to the respective District Synods. They required ten synods to accept the constitution before it would go into effect, uniting the synods as district synods in the new ''General Council of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in North America''. Ten synods adopted the constitution and the first convention met on November 20, 1867, at Fort Wayne, Indiana, where the General Synod had suffered a schism the previous year. A total of twelve synods sent representatives. Several districts of the Missouri Synod sent a letter proposing a series of free conferences to discuss theology before joining together. Likewise, the Ohio Synod declined to join, but sent representatives to discuss differences of theology and practice. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「General Council of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in North America」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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