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Wends of Texas
- Boogie_Man 2y agoTry to make me go to church with the Calvinists I'll flee the country too
- timeon 2y agoBut why to most Calvinists influenced country?
- Boogie_Man 2y agoProbably because Texas had just recently become a state at that point and because of the Adelsverein and/or the number of ethnic Germans already there. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adelsverein https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adelsverein https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Texas_Germans https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Texas_Germans Das Yehaw
- nine_k 2y agoNo, to the most explicitly religion-tolerant country. The US was really unusual in many regards at that time, compared to most of Europe.
- willvarfar 2y agoIts funny because the original pilgrim fathers emigrated from the UK because they believed the UK too _tolerant_ of religious differences, and were worried their children would stray because of the temptation of a less strict doctrine. And a few generations in America later, and their children and children's children had indeed strayed. It's saying something about your religion if the only way you can get your kids to practice it is to isolate them!
- mjdiloreto 2y agoI appreciate the humor but this confuses me. I also read in a biography of Thomas Jefferson that he reviled Calvinists, going so far as to say their God is not the God of the Bible. I genuinely do not understand what is so reprehensible about Calvinist doctrine. There is just so much theological noise to parse through whenever I research it. Is pre-determination the biggest issue?
- EdwardDiego 2y agoYeah, predeterminism, along with limited atonement, and perseverance of the saints, combines to form, IMO, a theology that is toxic at best, abusive at worst. If I can massively oversimplify, it's a theology where Jesus came to redeem only the Elect that God had already chosen to be saved while he had chosen to send everyone else to hell, so that the Elect could see His mercy (to them, not those poor bastards on the down escalator). And, perseverance of the saints is the icing on the cake, because it came to mean that if you ever disagreed with your church or its elders, well, you obviously weren't one of the Elect at all, enjoy the hellfire. So it's a great theology if you want to run a small, obviously better than everyone else, in-group of the Saved, vs. all the unsaved sinners God has already condemned. To see how perverse it could become in the extremes, look at the role it played in apartheid. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Afrikaner_Calvinism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Afrikaner_Calvinism
- nine_k 2y agoYes, the predestination. It removes from humans any agency in their own salvation, and any action of consequence in their lives. Everything is predetermined, the whole world is just a mechanical puppet show. It's an internally consistent view of the world. But it turns all the biblical events where humans appear to have agency into just silly scripted scenes, and it also turns the passion and self-sacrifice of Christ another scripted scene (with the Gethsemane episode thrown in for sadistic melodrama, apparently). I'd say that (strict) Calvinism is the least Christian of the various sects that have attained mainstream success. Paradoxically, it produced some very sober and ultimately successful approaches to the earthly life.
- Boogie_Man 2y agoMan, multiple people were ready to "go in on" Calvin which really wasn't what I intended. I was recently drafting a little ten part quick and dirty comparison of Christian denominational views on the most important/relevant theological concepts and reading about the Old Lutherans in this post really made me think about how seriously they took these things because they were literally true to them. It is either an admirable or a terrifying thing depending on your perspective. To answer your question as well as I can from their perspective, the reformed understanding of pneumatic presence vs their understanding of the sacramental union and being forced to participate in the eucharist in that heretical way, would quite literally be grounds for leaving the continent.
- pavel_lishin 2y agoThere are so many people who came to Texas from that part of Europe. German names are everywhere! Shiner Bock, brewed by the Spoetzl brewery, also started by German immigrants, brewing the kind of beer they were used to. And of course between Dallas and Texas, you have the Czech Stop in West, Texas (which is not in west Texas) which is a great place to stop for some kolaches on the rip.
- _bin_ 2y agoYep, I grew up in Texas and tons of German-Czech influence. Hruska's beats on kolaches for my money, if it's on your way :) There are also some hidden historic dance halls that are great if you can make it by. I know one dates to 1912 and a buddy's family refurbished it last year; lovely place.
- dylan604 2y agoGruene Hall is the classic example. If you’re into red dirt and have not made the pilgrimage, then you’re just doing it wrong https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gruene_Hall https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gruene_Hall
- EdwardDiego 2y agoRed dirt?
- dylan604 2y agohttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red_dirt_music https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red_dirt_music
- EdwardDiego 2y agoThank you :)
- scarecrowbob 2y agoGruene is good. Luckenback was always more fun for me, but I lived in Fredericksburg and enjoyed the picking circle. Coupland was cool- cooler than Gruene, at least to me. We played there once to about 4 people and I quit the band because that night was supposed to be the "paid" gig after the band hauled me all the way from Lubbock to play the Saxon for free.
- croisillon 2y agoit would be funny if they had Umgebindehäuser in Texas: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Upper_Lusatian_house https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Upper_Lusatian_house
- willf 2y agoMy wife is a Wend, and so we visited this area in Texas. One of the things I found interesting was that there was a local paper that printed articles in German, English, and Wendish (Sorbian) – there’s a link in the Wiki article. The church we visited was so beautiful.
- bad_haircut72 2y agoStop in at some of the antique shops in New Braunfels & you can find all Nazi medals the germans brought with em in their last wave!
- thechao 2y agoGruene has a fossil shop with a no returns policy. The sign used to say something along the lines of "you can't return it, no matter how much your pastor says you'll go to hell; if you're that worried, bury it: that's where it came from!"
- arschfick 2y ago[dead]
- grendelt 2y agoDriving through Giddings you can still see signs for the annual Wendish festival. Pondering what that was all about I did some Googling and learned about the Wends as I drove through.
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- bjackman 2y agoRelated: for anyone who speaks a bit of German, check out Texas German: https://youtu.be/1_dH403pqRU?si=KuSDR51w-_ZXmTdT https://youtu.be/1_dH403pqRU?si=KuSDR51w-_ZXmTdT Really lucky that these dialects persisted long enough that we have recordings of them.