0 Min Read

Katharina Zell: A Haven for Asylum Seekers

Katharina Zell is best known as the wife of the reformer Matthew Zell. She often described herself as “a splinter from the rib of that blessed man Matthew Zell” and reciprocally Zell referred to Katharina as “Mein Helfer”. Zell was a Catholic priest who became a reformer in Strasbourg. He arrived in Strasbourg in 1520 following his appointment to the Cathedral as a priest. His job was to levy fines while granting or withholding forgiveness of sins. Zell didn’t take his job as seriously as he should have. The bishop complained that he was egregiously lax in the discharge of his duties, absolving peasants from eating butter on fast days without a fine and other such failings.

Zell was a friend of Martin Bucer who would often stay in his home. During his stays with Zell, Bucer ardently and enthusiastically preached from the book of Romans. Convinced by the truth of righteousness by faith, Zell embraced Protestantism adding this most heinous of violations to his long list of infractions. In respone to his shifting loyalties church authorities charged him with a laundry list of heresies. He retorted with an equally lengthy reply which became the first manifesto of the reformation in Strasbourg. In it he stated “I follow Luther in so far as he follows Scripture…what a shame to be ashamed of the enteral work of God…Scripture, Scripture my Lords, I say, not the iron sword. Send out preachers. If you do not, they will come anyway. And though you issue a thousand Bulls against them, though you use up the whole Schwartzwald to burn them, though you scatter them over the earth, it will do you no good. If you root them out, from their roots will grow others.” Zell became the first Protestant minister in Strasbourg. Not long after, at Bucer’s urging Zell married Katharina Schutz on the 3rd of December 1523. After his marriage to Katharina, which was a flagrant violation of his vows, Zell was excommunicated from the church.

Petite France District, Strasbourg, France

Like Zell, Katharina had been freed from spiritual anguish by the writings of Martin Luther. When Zell proposed she was only too happy to accept his proposal and embrace her new role as a Protestant minister’s wife. When Luther heard of the union, which took place a year and a half before his own wedding to Katharina von Bora, he wrote to Katharina Schutz Zell congratulating her on her marriage. Though Zell was twenty years older than the 25-year-old Katharina when they married, their marriage proved to be both stable and happy.

Soon after their wedding when the bishop excommunicated Matthew Zell for breaking his vow of celibacy, Katharina wrote him a scathing letter, denouncing his actions. It was the first in a long line of instances when she would prove to everyone that she was unafraid to speak her mind when the need arose. Katharina’s letter to the bishop was so eloquent and persuasive that when the Strasnbourg City Council read it, they renounced Zell's ex-communication, embraced Protestantism and allowed Zell to conduct Protestant serviced inside the Strasbourg Cathedral. Often Matthew Zell would preach to about 3,000 people, all eager to hear the truths of righteousness by faith.

Church of St. Paul, Strasbourg, France

The Zells had two children, both of whom died in infancy. After losing her children Katharina devoted herself wholeheartedly to the work of supporting her husband’s ministry. Like Luther she often struggled with depression because of the perceived weight of her sins. While the truth of justification by faith provided her with immense comfort the old ideology of an angry God demanding to be appeased by a ceaseless cycle of penance and ritual was deeply ingrained in her psyche, and was difficult to discard or overlook. She was often tempted to believe that her childlessness was a mark of Divine displeasure.

One of the key aspects of Katharina’s ministry was caring for refuges. Strasbourg, like Geneva, had become a city of refuge for many who were embracing the Reformation and who faced persecution in their homelands. She also spent a great deal of time caring for her neighbours as well as her husband’s parishioners. Once an entire congregation of nearly 150 men, were forced to flee persecution. When they arrived in Strasbourg, Katharina immediately took charge of them all, sheltering 80 in her own home, while finding alternative accommodation for the remaining 70 and managing the task of providing meals for them all. She then wrote letters of encouragement to the wives who had been left behind, attempting to strengthen their faith.

In 1525 when Peasants’ Revolts broke out across Germany, Wolfgang Capito and Matthew Zell tried to broker peace. Undaunted by the dangers Katharina accompanied them, working alongside them to stem the tide of violence. Unfortunately their efforts were fruitless, and the bloodshed continued unabated for quite some time.

Strasbourg Cathedral, Strasbourg, France

During Zell’s tenure as Protestant minister of the Cathedral, the city of Strasbourg focused on revamping its entire system of poor relief. Luther had begun to teach that almsgiving didn’t facilitate entry into heaven. He also proposed suppressing begging which had become an easy default position for those who did not wish to work. Instead he advocated that those who could work should and those who couldn’t be supported by the community. Adopting Luther’s reforms overhauled the entire socio-economic structure of the city.

Strasbourg offered relief to its poor citizens but with the large influx of refugees seeking religious asylum the city had acquired 3,000 residents who were not citizen, with numerous cases among that number needing social support. Lucas Hackfurt, the director of the committee for municipal relief and an Anabaptist was tasked with tackling this problem alongside Katharina Zell. Together they worked to provide necessities for these refugees – organising housing in the Franciscan monastery while soliciting help from citizens for food and other provisions. As the refugee influx swelled it became Katharina’s job to care for them and to see that they were provided with what they needed.

La Petite France, Strasbourg, France

Despite being a haven for Protestant refugees with strong leadership in place, Strasbourg encountered its share of theological strife. The city was equally influenced by the theology of Luther and Zwingli which immediately caused division because of the divergent views Luther and Zwingli shared about communion. While Luther believed in a hybrid communion that fell somewhere between the traditional Catholic understanding of transubstantiation and the more progressive Protestant understanding of Sacramentarians, Zwingli was a strict Sacramentarian.

While Luther didn’t fully believe that the wine and bread physically became the body and blood of Jesus, which was the essence of transubstantiation, he believed that it was more than a commemorative symbol. Zwingli, like all other Sacramentarians, believed that communion was nothing more than a commemorative ordinance celebrated in harmony with Jesus words in Luke 22:19; “Do this in remembrance of me…” The division between Lutherans and the followers of Zwingli created tensions within the city from time to time no doubt drawing Matthew Zell and by extension Katharina, into its orbit.

In 1529, at the apex of the argument Philip of Hesse, one of the most prominent German Protestant princes, attempted to broker peace between Germans and the Swiss in his capital city of Marburg. Zwingli and his right-hand man Oecolampadius travelled through Strasbourg on their way to Marburg and were entertained by the Zell. Reminiscing on the encounter Katharina later wrote “for fourteen days I was their cook and maid.”

When Calvin was expelled from Geneva by the Libertines in 1538, he ended up in Strasbourg sheltered by the unfailing hospitality of the Zells with Katharina acting as a tireless and able hostess once more. Again in 1540 during a meeting of prominent reformers in Strasbourg Katharina entertained 30 delegates from various parts of Germany and other areas in her home.

Strasbourg, France

Like Katharina Luther and Anna Zwingli, Katharina Zell was a role model of Protestant femininity and more importantly of how a Protestant ministers wife behaved. She most likely understood that her role was new - no other women had been Protestant minister’s wives in Strasbourg before her - and she rose to the challenge of modelling what a Protestant home and family could look like as a counterfoil against the celibacy of Catholic clergy.

Katharina Zell was also an itinerant traveller, often accompanying her husband as he travelled for meetings or speaking engagements. In 1539, when cross country travel would have been by wagon, the Zell’s travelled 600 miles to visit Luther and Melanchthon in Wittenberg. On other occasions they travelled to Switzerland, Constance, Nuremburg, and the Palatinate.

Over time, as Protestants faced increasing persecution, Strasbourg, became a lightning rod for all types of reformers, some merely differed from the slowly emerging Protestant norm while others were decidedly fanatical in their outlook.

At first the resident reformers of Strasbourg were indulgent – after all many of these brothers and sisters had faced traumatic, life-threatening situations. However after being given sufficient time and instruction to assimilate to Strasbourg’s special brand of reformed theology, some of these dissenters refused to conform. Their refusal to submit caused the leaders of the city to become increasingly coercive.

Matthew and Katharina Zell hosted numerous dissenters, offering them a gracious place at their table and an opportunity to share their ideas. Unlike most other reformers the Zells were remarkably open to the idea of religious liberty. When the fanatical Anabaptist preacher Melchior Hoffman was thrown into prison Katharina Zell visited him, offering him comfort and encouragement. Though his views were alarmingly divergent from biblical truth, and she didn’t agree with or endorse them, she nevertheless showed him Christian compassion rather than simply turning against him or dismissing him out of hand. It was a testament to their faith that the Zells never persecuted or mistreated those who had differing theological viewpoints.

Statue of Strasbourg, Place de la Concorde, Paris, France

In January 1548 Matthew Zell passed to his rest. After Martin Bucer presented the eulogy, Katharina delivered an address, a highly unusual move for a woman of the time. She moved to Basel for a period where she was hosted by a Protestant minister and his family. From Basel she moved to Zurich and then finally back to Strasbourg in 1549. The Strasbourg City Council allowed her to keep the parsonage she had lived in with Zell and she continued to extend hospitality to anyone who needed assistance. Describing the state of her home to a friend she wrote that she was always full. She was allowed to remain in the parsonage for three years until changes in the city forced her to leave.

Not long after Matthew Zell’s death Strasbourg, which had long been a Protestant bastion, partially reverted to Catholicism. The mass was reinstated and though Protestant preaching was allowed it was greatly censored. Martin Bucer and other Protestant ministers were exiled, escaping to England where they sought refuge with Thomas Cranmer under the reign of Edward VI. Unfortunately they overstayed their stipulated departure date from Strasbourg by three weeks and were hidden by Katharina Zell until they were able to leave for England. They left her two gold coins for assisting them and she used a portion of the money to help other Protestant refugees – one an impoverished Protestant minister with five children and another a widow who had fled after she had been forced to witness her husband beheaded for his faith.

Though no longer able to live in the parsonage Katharina continued to use her new home as a haven for those in need, ministering to the sick even as she grew older, and her own health began to fail. She was in Strasbourg to witness its return to the Reformation in 1555 and no doubt the return of many of its exiles. She passed to her rest in 1562, a woman who had lived a fruitful life of service to others and devotion to Jesus.

Katharina Zell: A Haven for Asylum Seekers

CONTINUE YOUR LEARNING JOURNEY

Anne of Bohemia: The Queen's Legacy