Christian History Home > Issue 12 > Pastor of Geneva
Pastor of Geneva
DR. OLIVIER FATIO Dr. Olivier Fatio is a Professor at the University of Geneva in Switzerland. | posted 10/01/1986 12:00AM
One is accustomed to speaking of Calvin as the Reformer of Geneva. It would be more precise, perhaps, to call him the pastor of Geneva, because Calvin was above all a pastor, and his work as a reformer was simply the extension of his pastoral ministry.
In fact, Calvin was not really prepared for pastoral ministry. Everyone knows how he was pushed in to it one fine day in July, 1536, by Guillaume Farel. Why did Farel take an interest in this 27-year-old, a lawyer, humanist, and self-taught theologian? Because for some months, the cultured public with its avid taste for Protestant theology could speak of nothing else than his book Christianae religionis institutio, published in March, 1536. In this pocket-size book, the young man presented Reformation doctrine in a systematic way with great clarity and strength of conviction. Calvin was an intellectual and was going to Strasbourg to continue his studies; pastoral ministry was not his forte. Yet Farel got him to stay.
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