Influences

	Kinser, Kinzer, Kincer, Kinsar, Kinsor Kintzer, Künzer, Kuentzer, Küntzer One Immigrant Family

Influences

Immigrants to America came for many reasons but foremost among those was probably to escape religious persecution. These worshipers came from Germany, France, England, Scotland, and Ireland as well as other countries. Some came as missionaries to the Indians but most came seeking a place where they could be free practice their faith without persecution. The immigrants who formed branches on the Kinser family tree came from a number of these various groups seeking religious freedom. Leaders of several of these religious groups were very influential in producing a nation where freedom of religion is written into the constitution. The following paragraphs give a brief history of some of the groups and individuals that influenced the lives and actions of the Kinser family immigrants.

Lutheran

: Martin Luther is considered the leader in the Protestant reformation in Europe. He is also considered the founder of the Lutheran Church. Born in Eisle, Saxony, Germany on November 11, 1483. Luther first studied law, then changed to the priesthood. Ordained as a Catholic priest in 1507 he became disenchanted with the corruption within the church. Pope Leo X was selling indulgences to help build St. Peter's Church in Rome and to pay off the debt of Prince of Brandenburg who had purchased his position as Bishop.
An Indulgence was a purchased forgiveness for sin which could be bought before or after the fact. Luther nailed his 95 Theses, primarily opposing these sales and advocating reforms, to the church door at Wittenburg to emphasize his belief that "the just shall live by faith." His original intent was not to start a new faith but to reform the Catholic Church.
Luther's refusal to recant his criticism of the Church led to his expulsion from the church, after which his followers provided the beginnings of the Lutheran Church. Luther perhaps would have met the same fate as John Huss, another reformer who was burned at the stake, if he had not been protected by a German Ruler. The doctrines and beliefs of the Lutherans are contained in the Augsburg Confession of Faith. They are primarily based on the terms of a treaty of peace between the Protestants and the Catholic Church, arranged by Charles V at Augsburg, Germany in 1530. The Catholic Church never signed the treaty and a cleavage resulted in the church. This cleavage was a major factor in the Protestant reformation. Continuing persecution of these German Protestants resulted in the emigration of many to England and to America. This exodus reached a peak in the late 1600's and early 1700's.

Mennonites

The several branches of this group, associated with the Anabaptist Movement, derive their name form Menno Simons, a Dutch Roman Catholic Priest who took part in the Reformation in Northern Germany. The Mennonites appear to have formally organized in Zurich, Switzerland in 1525.
Deprived of personal rights, religious freedom, and property, persecuted by the Roman Catholics and other Protestants, and opposed to bearing arms they sought refuge in several other countries. William Penn offered them land and religious freedom in his Pennsylvania Colony. The first group settled in Germantown in 1663. The best known Mennonite group is probably the Amish named after a Swiss named Jacob Amman.

Methodist

The origin of the Methodist Church lies with John and Charles Wesley. Children of a High Church priest of the Church of England, they never intended to form a new religion but rather to remain a part of the Church of England. When General James Edward Oglethorpe was given a charter to found a colony in Georgia he asked John Wesley to become chaplain. Their mother urged both John and Charles to accompany the General. Aboard the ship taking the settlers to Georgia were several Moravians whose religious beliefs had a profound effect upon John Wesley. John's concept of methodical orderly study led to the founding of a United Society stressing Bible study and a strict moral and ethical conduct in the life of the members and thence came the name Methodist.

Moravians

During the 15th century Moravia and Bohemia produced a reform group first known as Unitas Fratrum, the Latin name for Unity of Brethren. In following the teachings of John Huss, the martyred Roman Catholic priest of Prague University, they became a persecuted reform group. They first found refuge in Germany where Count Nicholas Zenzindorf allowed them to settle on his estate in Saxony. The Count was responsible for sending the Moravian missionaries who had such a profound effect on John and Charles Wesley to the colony of Georgia .
Some Moravians left Georgia to settle in Pennsylvania establishing the town of Bethlehem. Later, Moravian Bishop August Gottlieb purchased 100,000 acres of land from Lord Granvilles tract in the Carolina Colony. In 1756 some 500 Moravians walked overland from the town of Bethlehem to the center of this tract to establish the settlement called Betharba, the "Old Town" later called "Wachau" which Anglicized to "Wachovia." Bishop Spangenberg gave it that name because it reminded him of Count Zenzindorf's estate in the Wauchau valley of Austria.
This settlement became the town of Salem, part of present day Winston-Salem, in 1766. When the League of Nations partitioned Europe after World War I, Moravia, Bohemia and part of Hungary, Slovakia, became Czechoslovakia

Presbyterians

John Calvin, a French lawyer turned reformer who established a theocracy in Switzerland, wrote "Institutes of the Christian Religion" which has had its impact on every Protestant denomination. His greatest disciple was John Knox of Scotland, an ordained Roman Catholic priest. Knox was captured by the French and made a galley slave for nineteen months. When freed he returned to England an became chaplain to Edward VI, a leader in the Reformation.
Calvin carried on a running battle with Queen Mary, a devout Roman Catholic, who eventually forced him to flee to Switzerland. Returning to Scotland he began preaching reform. when Mary was involved in a scandal, he aroused the Scots to such a degree that Mary was forced off her throne and the Protestant religion was made the official state church. As a member of a committee of Parliament he wrote the First Scottish Confession of Faith.
This Westminster Confession of Faith became a statement of the basic beliefs of the Scottish Church.
His preaching was based on John Calvin's theology: God is absolute sovereign in his creation. God foreordains and foreknows all things. Man was created pure in God's image, and fell into sin by his own acts. Man is saved through the unmerited favor of God in Jesus Christ and cannot, through works, bring about his own salvation. Some are predestined to be saved, others lost. The predestined never fall from the Grace of God.
These Scottish Presbyterians made up a large portion of the Scots-Irish when they moved to Northern Ireland seeking religious freedom. Later events caused large numbers to flee Ireland for the American colonies.

French Huguenots

: The French Huguenots were French Protestant followers of John Calvin whose beliefs are very similar to the Scottish Presbyterians. Hounded and persecuted by the Roman Catholic Church many fled to the British Isles and to the American Colonies

Quakers

The Society of Friends, or Friends church, a Christian group that stresses the guidance of the Holy Spirit. The Friends reject ritual or an ordained ministry. The Society of Friends has a long tradition of working actively for peace and opposing war. Founder of the society in England, George Fox, asserted that "Justice Bennet of Derby first called us Quakers because we bid them tremble at the word of God."
Originally derisive, likely the name Quaker was also used because many early Friends trembled in their religious meetings and showed other physical manifestations of religious emotions themselves. Despite early derisive use, Friends used the term themselves in such phrases as "the people of God in scorn called Quakers." No embarrassment is caused by using the term today.

Protestant Reformation

In the 16th century a religious revolution took place in the Roman Catholic Church. By the 16th century the Roman Catholic Church was deeply involved in Western European political life. As the church became more deeply involved in politics and intrigues it grew in wealth and political power but was bankrupt as a spiritual force. The spiritual authority of the Church diminished by the corruption of the clergy combined with abuses such as the sale of indulgences and relics.
Several reformers including John Huss and John Wycliffe spoke out against these abuses of power by the church but Martin Luther is usually given major credit for the birth of the Protestent Reformation.
On October 31, 1517 Luther nailed his ninety-five theses to the Castle Church in Wittenburg. Luther viewed his attack on the perversion of the church's doctrine rather than preaching against corruption in the church. Luther based his message on the scripture that states, "The just shall live by faith."
His ninety-five thesis sought to reform the doctrines of the church but offended the Church hierarchy. They demanded he recant his assertions that the church had departed from biblical teachings. Luther refused to recant and was eventually excommunicated.
Luther began to preach his "gospel of living by faith." The seeds of Luther's message fell on fertile ground among the common people and the message from several sources quickly grew into the Protestent Revolution. Over the next century Protestantism supplanted the Catholic church as the majority religious faith in Western Europe.
A resurgence in the power of the Roman Catholic Church led by the militant Society of Jesus (Jesuits) produced a new era of harsh persecution of Protestants, a major factor in the decision of many to emigrate to the American colonies.

William Penn

William Penn, son of Admiral Sir William Penn, first came under the influence of the Quakers as a child when his father invited a Quaker, Thomas Loe, to preach to his family.
William was later expelled from Oxford University for his religious non conformity. In 1666 Admiral Penn sent William to Ireland to manage the family estates. There he crossed paths again with Thomas Loe and, after hearing him preach, decided to join the Quakers (the Society of Friends), a sect of religious radicals who were reviled by respectable society and subject to official persecution. Penn became a Quaker and was eventually imprisoned four times for publicly stating his beliefs. While imprisoned in the Tower of London Penn authored his most famous book, No Cross, No Crown
When a Quaker meetinghouse Penn attended was padlocked he preached on the London streets. Imprisoned for inciting a riot Penn's defense skillfully exposed the illegality of the charges against him and the jury refused to convict establishing an important precedent, the complete independence of the jury. Penn earned his right to a place in English history as a protagonist of Religious liberty
In 1681 Penn and along with other Quakers bought the proprietary rights to East New Jersey. Penn became discouraged by the turn of political events in England where, under Charles II, prospects for religious freedom seemed dark.
Penn's father was owed a large debt by King Charles II. To cancel the debt Penn sought and received a vast province on the west bank of the Delaware River which he named Pennsylvania. A few months later the Duke of York granted him the three "lower counties" (later Delaware). In Pennsylvania Penn hoped to provide a refuge for Quakers and other persecuted people built along ideal Christian ideals. "There may be room there, though not here" he wrote to a friend in America. Penn first become involved in American colonization as a trustee for Edward Byllynge, one of the two Quaker proprietors of West New Jersey.
As proprietor, Penn seized the opportunity to create a government that would embody his Quaker-Whig ideas. In 1682 he drew up a Frame of Government for the colony that would, he said, leave himself and his successors "no power of doing mischief, that the will of one man may not hinder the good of a whole country." Freedom of worship in the colony was to be absolute, and all the traditional rights of Englishmen were carefully safeguarded. The actual machinery of government outlined in the Frame proved in some respects to be clumsy and unworkable, but Penn wisely included in the Frame an amending clause--the first in any written constitution--so that it could be amended if necessary.
When Penn himself arrived in Pennsylvania he found his experiment already well under way. The city of Philadelphia was already laid out on a grid pattern as he had instructed and settlers were pouring in to take up the fertile lands. Later while affairs were going badly in Pennsylvania and Penn was under suspicion the government of the colony was taken from him and given to the governor of New York for a period of two years. When Penn returned to the province he resolved many of the outstanding problems but, in 1701 in a revised constitution known as the Charter of Privileges, he was forced to grant the Pennsylvania Assembly greater authority in governing the colony. Less than two years later Penn's affairs in England demanded his presence, and he left the province in 1701, never to see it again.
Penn's heritage in the colony of Pennsylvania was a guarantee of universal personal and religious liberty, the first in any of the American colonies.