The Anabaptist reformation began in Zurich, Switzerland, in 1525. I composed this piece for the 500th anniversary celebration in Zurich in 2025. The text is an excerpt from a letter by Conrad Grebel, one of the movement’s early leaders in Zurich:

“Rechte gleubige Christen sind schaff mitten under den wölfen, schaff der schlachtung, müssend in angst und nott trübsal ferfolgung liden und sterben getoufft werden, in dem für probiert werden, und daß vatterland der ewigen růw nit mit erwürgung liplicher finden, sunder der geistlichen erlangen. Sy gebrūchend ouch weder weltlichs schwert nach krieg, wann bÿ inen ist daß tötten gar abgetan.”

“True believing Christians are sheep among wolves, sheep for the slaughter. They must be baptized in anxiety, distress, affliction, persecution, suffering, and death. They must pass through the probation of fire, and reach the Fatherland of eternal rest, not by slaying their bodily [enemies] but by mortifying their spiritual enemies. They employ neither worldly sword nor war, since with them killing is absolutely renounced.”