Johann Konrad Wilhelm Loehe
Wilhelm Loehe became a pastor in a small village of Neuendettelsau, Germany.
The first four pastors at Holy Cross in Collinsville, Il, from 1848 to 1900, were trained by Loehe. The chapel at Wartburg Seminary, Dubuque, Iowa is named in his honor. His name is on the wall of the library of Concordia Seminary, St. Louis, along with one of his students, Frederick Lochner, first pastor at Holy Cross.
Loehe founded the Neuendettelsau Foreign Mission Society where he trained and sent pastors, to North America, Australia, Brazil, New Guinea and the Ukraine. He founded a deaconess training house and homes for the aged. He helped establish a seminary in Fort Wayne, Indiana and a teacher’s college in Saginaw, Michigan.
He developed a service in which catechumens were questioned weekly on Luther’s Small Catechism. Holy Cross, Collinsville used the service until the early 20th century. The service of Prayer and Preaching in LSB, pp. 260-267, follows the same pattern.
Loehe never moved to a larger congregation. He died in 1872, having had a significant impact on the church worldwide.
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