Huldreich Zwingli

At about the same time as Martin Luther was bringing about reformation in Germany, Huldreich Zwingli was doing a similar work in Switzerland. He studied at Bern, Vienna and Basle before becoming a priest. He was then appointed priest of Glarus. Eventually his brilliance as a scholar took him to Zurich Cathedral. He preached against corruption, superstition and the sale of indulgences. He attacked many of the non-Biblical doctrines of the Catholic Church and eventually broke away from allegiance to the Pope. He married and preached against enforced celibacy.

Unlike Luther, he did not immediately meet with bitter opposition. He presented his Sixty Seven Articles to Zurich City Council with such persuasion that they not only accepted them but urged other priests to follow Zwingli's methods.

Zwingli's reformation of the Church in Zurich was quite independent of Luther's and took different forms. Many of the clergy followed Zwigli's example and married, the mass was abolished and images removed. The reformation in Switzerland was much more radical than that in Germany and Zwingli developed a Eucharistic doctrine that was much simpler than Luther's. While the Catholics had believed in Transubstantiation - that the Bread and Wine literally became flesh and blood, the Lutherans had modified this to a doctrine of Consubstantiation - that the Body and Blood of Christ was there alongside the Bread and Wine. For Zwingli, however, the Bread and Wine were simply a remembrance of the Lord's sacrificial death. Although he later revised his thinking and moved towards a view of the spiritual presence of Christ in the elements of the Last Supper, this major difference in doctrine caused a rift between Zwingli and Luther.

While it is true that the German speaking Cantons of Switzerland generally accepted Zwingli's reforms with joy, many of the French and Italian Cantons opposed them. This opposition was in part because of loyalty to Catholicism but in part, also, because they were afraid of domination by Zurich. Whatever the reasons it resulted in war between 1529 and 1531. During the final stages of this war Zwingli, serving as a chaplain at the front, was killed. The victory went to the Catholics and the reformation lost ground but some of the Cantons retained their independence and Protestant faith which made way later for the further reforms of John Calvin.