Hi Di Yes many were Lutheran. However, there were also many Catholics from the POSEN-West Prussia areas that are now part of Poland. Some of these areas had been taken from Poland in the third partitioning of Poland with Poland being divided up between Russia and Prussia sometime in the late 1700s I think. How strictly they adhered and continued in the Lutheran church varies from family to family. I think closeness to congregations is a factor. e.g my great-grandparents were farming at Flagstone Creek. Despite the large number of Lutheran families there the nearest church when they moved there was Mt Sylvia or Ropeley quite a hike on a Sunday morning by bush track when cows still had to be milked. However, when a congregation opened in Helidon my grandfather and his father were foundation members. However, by this time many of his brothers and sisters had drifted away from the church completely and their families since associated with all denominations. So simply put I think the strongest factor in staying close to the Lutheran Church is proximity to church and the availability of pastors to provide pastoral care. Simply because they engaged actively in mission work amongst the German settlers the Apostolic Church gained many followers even from amongst former Lutheran families like the BEUTELS. I dont thimnk too many Jews would for convenience sake name themselves Lutheran. Another factor in the German community in whether they stayed in the Lutheran church could be a desire to be seen to be more Australian. The Lutheran Church also in the early days conducted services in Germand and many of the young people of the next generation drifted away because it was not their local tongue. However, each family varied with what happened depending on the totality of the circumstances. Regards Chris --- Di Randell <[email protected]> wrote: > Thank you for the responses to my recent query, > showing my total lack of map-reading skills. > > They have opened up new leads for me that I am > perusing. > > Now I have another question: > > It seems to me, from most people on this list, that > their ancestors were pretty strongly Lutheran, and > stuck with this religion, at least for the first or > second generations. > > My LENZ ancestors were on the Susanne Godeffroy > which arrived in 1864. > A number of the other Germans on this voyage sought > out Bethania and had the usual squabbles of that > time, about the Church and pastors, while that > generation of my ancestors didn't join that lot of > Lutherans, and stayed in Brisbane at Downfall > Creek, now Chermside. > > The marriage of their first child to my G G > Grandparents was held at the German Lutheran Mission > Station, Nundah, in 1865, the year after their > arrival, and my G G Grandparents were witnesses: > their daughter was not yet "of age" and they would > have had to give permission. > > In 1884, 19 years later, when my G G Grandmother > died, she was buried by the Rites of the United > Methodist religion. Fifteen years after her death, > her husband was buried with Lutheran Rites. > > However, thereafter, most marriages and funerals for > their descendants were in every religion except > Lutheran: Church of England, Presbyterian, Joyful > News Mission, Salvation Army. > The exceptions were: the daughter who married in > 1865 kept being a Lutheran and her children were > christened as such and one of the girls did marry > the son of a Lutheran Minister, but this couple had > no children. > > My questions are: > ..... was this pattern of not being strongly > Lutheran an aberration for those times, with German > immigrants? > ..... could they originally have been Jews and for > whatever reason, went along with the idea of being > Lutherans? > > Di > Brisbane. > > > > > > > > > A List for the research for the descendants of the > Germans who migrated to South East Queensland, > Australia. > Archives - > http://lists.rootsweb.com/index/intl/AUS/AUS-QLD-SE-Germans.html > ------------------------------- > To unsubscribe from the list, please send an email > to [email protected] with the > word 'unsubscribe' without the quotes in the subject > and the body of the message > Make the switch to the world's best email. Get the new Yahoo!7 Mail now. http://au.yahoo.com/worldsbestmail/viagra/index.html