There are other marks of our Church, but these are its main
characteristics, and they suffice to indicate our general position in
relation to Christian thought.

If, now, we should be called upon to define in a single sentence the
distinctive features of Lutheranism, it might be done in these words of
an unknown writer:

"Lutheranism is that form of Protestant Christianity which makes Christ
the only foundation, faith the only condition, and the word of God the
only means of salvation."



THEIR STORY


In the Seventeenth Century
1648-1700

Under the administration of the Dutch West India Company the Reformed
Church was established in New Amsterdam in 1628. The policy of the
Company was to maintain the Reformed religion to the exclusion of all
other churches. But the cosmopolitan character of the future metropolis
was evident even in its earliest history. In 1643 the Jesuit missionary
Jogues reports that besides the Calvinists, Lutherans and Anabaptists
were to be found in the colony. In 1644 eighteen languages were spoken
by its inhabitants.

In 1648 the Lutheran community in the New Netherlands appealed to the