Grossmünster
Twin-towered Romanesque church where a Lenten sausage supper helped ignite the Swiss Reformation.
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About this audio guide
This guide to the Grossmünster in Zurich turns on an ordinary Lenten supper in 1522, when a printer named Christoph Froschauer served his hungry workers smoked sausage and was arrested for breaking the fast. Preaching from this pulpit, Huldrych Zwingli defended him, arguing that conscience outranks any rule invented by men, and began reading the Gospel of Matthew straight through instead of following the church calendar. Within five years the council stripped the building of its organ, statues and stained glass, leaving the plain stone around you. Stand in the nave and consider what that austerity was meant to prove.
This audio guide was created using AI.
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