October 11 | Moments Almanac | Zwingli
He challenged the church, defended the authority of Scripture, and helped ignite the Protestant Reformation in Switzerland. But on October 11, 1531, Huldrych Zwingli's remarkable life came to a violent end—not in a pulpit, but on a battlefield.
In this episode of Moments Almanac, we explore the fascinating and sometimes troubling story of a reformer whose convictions changed Christianity. From a controversy over eating sausages during Lent to his famous theological disagreement with Martin Luther, Zwingli was a man determined to bring the church back to the Bible.
Yet his story takes a tragic turn when religious disagreements become political conflicts, and Christians find themselves fighting Christians.
Zwingli's legacy reminds us that even courageous defenders of truth are capable of losing sight of the love that truth demands.
Five centuries later, his life leaves us with a question worth considering: Are we more interested in winning arguments or reflecting the Christ we claim to follow?
Join us for a journey into Reformation history, where courage, conviction, controversy, and tragedy converge—and where an ancient battlefield still has something to teach us about grace.
Moments Almanac is part of Scattered Moments.
Take heart. Notice the scattered moments. Share the grace.
Welcome to Moments Almanac for October 11th. And on this day in 1531, on a battlefield in Switzerland, a 47-year-old minister lay dying. His name was Holdrich Zwingli. He'd spent much of his life calling the church back to the Bible, but on this day, he would die in a war between Christians. And that's one of the greatest tragedies of the Protestant Reformation. Let's go back a few years. Zwingli was born in Switzerland in 1484, just weeks after another future reformer named Martin Luther. Like Luther, Zwingli became a priest, and like Luther, he began to question whether the church had wandered away from the teachings of Scripture. In 1519, Zwingli became a preacher in Zurich. Instead of following the traditional schedule of prescribed Scripture readings, he began preaching straight through the Gospel of Matthew, verse by verse, chapter by chapter. He believed the Bible should shape the church rather than the church deciding what the Bible was allowed to say. And that conviction eventually got him into trouble. Over sausages. Yes, sausages. In 1522, during the season of Lent, when eating meat was forbidden by church rules, a group of men in Zurich decided to eat sausages. Zwingli was there, although he apparently didn't have any himself, but he defended their right to do so. His argument was that Scripture did not command a particular religious restriction. The church had no authority to impose it upon the conscience, and just like that, a plate of sausages became a theological controversy. Apparently, the Protestant Reformation wasn't just about a Wittenberg door. But the disagreements grew far more serious. Zwingli and Luther agreed on many things, especially the authority of Scripture and salvation by grace, but they disagreed over the meeting of the Lord's Supper. Luther insisted upon Christ's real presence in communion, and Zwingli emphasized the meal as a remembrance of Christ's sacrifice. They met in 1529, hoping to settle their differences, and they couldn't. And the division within the Reformation continued. Meanwhile, Switzerland itself was becoming increasingly divided. Some regions embraced Protestant Reformations, others remained Catholic. And these differences weren't merely discussed in churches, they became entangled with politics, economic pressure, military alliances, and even war. Zwingli himself supported measures against the Catholic territories, including an economic blockade. He was a brilliant reformer, but he was also a man of his age convinced that religious truth could be defended through political power. And on October 11, 1531, that conviction brought him to the battlefield of Capel. Zurich's forces were overwhelmed. Zwingli, who accompanied the army, was killed. His enemies later burned his body. He was forty-seven. And there's something profoundly heartbreaking about this story. Here was a man who had devoted his life to opening scriptures, a man who wanted Christians to rediscover the teachings of Jesus, and yet his life ended in a battle against other people who professed to follow Jesus. We can appreciate Zwingli's courage without defending every decision he made. We can honor his commitment to scripture while acknowledging the tragedy of religious violence. And that's the lesson history offers us today. It's possible to be patient about truth and still lose sight of love. It's possible to defend a doctrine while forgetting the Savior at its center. It's just as Jesus told his disciples, by this everyone will know you are my disciples, that you love one another. On October 11, 1531, Zweigli died on a battlefield. His influence would survive him, his reforms would help shape generations of Christians, but his death leaves us with a question worth carrying into our own disagreements. Are we simply trying to win the argument? Or are we trying to reflect the Christ we claim to follow? Because sometimes the greatest testimony to truth isn't found in winning a battle, it's found in loving the person standing on the other side. And that's a moment worth remembering, and it's Moments Almanac for today, October 11th. I hope you'll join me tomorrow. Until then, take heart. Notice the scattered moments, and share the grace.
