150. Attitude toward Non-Lutheran Denominations.--The United Synod as such did not establish an exchange of delegates with any of the non-Lutheran churches. However, invitations to preach in their pulpits on the occasion of synodical conventions were not refused. The _Lutheran Church Visitor_, March 15, 1917: "Our United Synod ministers are not ashamed to speak of our Evangelical Lutheran testimony before Methodists, Baptists, Presbyterians, _et al., et id genus omne._" But the fact is that at such occasions the distinctive features of Lutheranism are, as a rule, passed over in silence; that full fellowship of prayer and service is indulged in; and that the spirit of indifferentism as well as the desire, on the part of the Lutheran synods and congregations, for returning the comity and kindness received at the hands of Methodists, etc., is encouraged and strengthened. As such, furthermore, the United Synod did not take an active part in interdenominational organizations, but, on the other hand, did not consider it a denial of the truth when its pastors openly and heartily participated in local ministerial unions, or when its congregations occasionally joined in union religious meetings. Thus Drs. Horn and Drach took part in the Interdenominational Conference at Edinburgh in 1910. The _Lutheran Church Visitor_ encouraged participation in interdenominational meetings; _e.g._, in its issue of April 6, 1916, the Men's National Missionary Congress in Washington, D.C. "So it has done, does, and shall continue to do, and not be ashamed," declared the _Visitor_, March 15, 1917, and explained in defense of this attitude toward non-Lutheran bodies: "The United Synod believes that the lump [non-Lutheran churches] cannot receive 'absent treatment,' and that the Lutheran leaven cannot be placed in the lump from a prohibitive distance." However, according to the history of the Lutheran Church in America, in practically all of the interdenominational movements and meetings participated in by Lutherans, the rule has been not to confess, but, directly or indirectly, to deny the distinctive truths of Lutheranism. Speaking of the United Synod, Dr. Voigt remarked: "Rigid exclusiveness is quite foreign to its spirit." TENNESSEE AND HOLSTON SYNODS.