Hubertus Mass in Zurich: Pastor preaches vulnerability, but not for wild animals

On Sunday, 15 November 2026, the Reformed city church of St. Peter in Zurich will once again celebrate its Hubertus mass, organised by JagdZürich, the association of Zurich recreational hunters, including the certification of the canton's new recreational hunters and hunting wardens. The pastor in charge, Cornelia Camichel Bromeis, has asked the animal rights group Hunt Watch in writing to forgo its authorised vigil, as the IG Wild beim Wild has reported on. A look at her public work shows that the pastor knows exactly what the animal-friendly church thinks of Hubertus masses. She has had it preached in her own church.

A theology of vulnerability

Camichel Bromeis was the first dean of the Reformed Church of Grisons from 2014 to 2021 and has been pastor at St. Peter since August 2021. Vulnerability is her guiding theme. In 2022 she dedicated the Lenten season to a sermon series on 'vulnerability', and in 2023 to a second series on 'fragility'. In an interview with the Tages-Anzeiger in 2023, she described Christian theology as a theology of vulnerability. The vulnerability of 'all people, indeed of all life' carries too little weight in theology and the churches. The church, she said, must show solidarity with the victims, especially where dependencies exist.

Of all life. That is a weighty phrase. It includes the fox, which is shot in its thousands in the canton of Zurich without any benefit, as the dossier on fox hunting in the canton of Zurich shows, and the roe deer that is driven out of cover by dogs during a Driven hunt. A living being cannot be more defenceless against an armed human than these non-human animals.

The AKUT president in her pulpit

On 5 March 2023, their sermon series was on the theme "Vulnerability: Animals". The sermon was preached by Pastor Christoph Ammann, President of the Working Group on Church and Animals (AKUT). This is recorded in the official flyer for the sermon series. AKUT is a section of the Swiss Animal Protection STS and has for decades held an unambiguous position on Hubertus Masses.

In the Position paper "Hubertus Masses", which the association makes publicly available, AKUT rejects Hubertus Masses in church spaces and with the involvement of church staff. As early as 1996, its theological advisory board unanimously stated that such services glorify the "noble art of hunting" and gloss over the ethical and ecological problems of killing. They also turn the Hubertus legend on its head, since its core is the hunter's renunciation of hunting. Church people who celebrate such Masses, it argued, are deaf to the "groaning of creation". The advisory board rejects the killing of animals as a leisure pursuit or for supposed wildlife management.

In 2011, AKUT Switzerland added that the arguments also apply to Hubertus services held outdoors. And the association demands that the practice of the the canton of Geneva apply throughout Switzerland: hunting should be removed from the discretion of private individuals and made impossible as a leisure pursuit, with regulation placed in the hands of state-certified, salaried professionals. It is the same demand that IG Wild beim Wild has been making for years.

Eight months after the sermon on animals, in November 2023 the Hubertus Mass with a hunters' accreditation ceremony was once again on the programme in the same church, as it was on 17 November 2024 and 16 November 2025. IG Wild beim Wild has publicly criticised the Mass at St. Peter 2024 and 2025.

The collection does not change the substance

According to the pastor, the collection at this year's Mass goes to AKUT. It is a gesture similar to that of Arlesheim Cathedral, which handed the collection from its Hubertus Mass to Hunt Watch. It shows that the pastor is not indifferent to the concerns of animal welfare. It does not change the substance: St. Peter supports an association that rejects Hubertus Masses in churches, and nevertheless holds the Hubertus Mass.

Appeasement that she herself has criticised

In the same interview, Camichel Bromeis accused her own church of having kept silent for too long over the abuse scandal in the Catholic Church, so as not to get in the way of the other side. Asked whether the Reformed Church had thereby pursued a kind of policy of appeasement, she answered yes. When life and doctrine diverge, credibility suffers. Anyone who takes others seriously must object clearly where boundaries are crossed.

This standard does not apply to JagdZürich. In her reply to Hunt Watch, the pastor referred to many conversations with recreational hunters in which she had come to know a “careful and responsible approach to hunting”. JagdZürich, for its part, praised in 2022 that the pastor had conducted the liturgy and sermon with composure and empathy. The association itself describes the service as promoting hunting, a craft of considerable social importance. In the pews sit those who shoot. The vulnerability of those who are shot at has no place there.

Criticism from outside, but not in front of the church

While still a pastor in Davos, Camichel Bromeis told SRF, in a conversation about independent ritual celebrants and their criticism of the established church: “Criticism from outside prompts us to reflect on ourselves and to change.” Hunt Watch offers precisely that: a silent vigil, approved by the City of Zurich, that leaves access to the church free and does not disturb the service. The pastor would have welcomed it had the group refrained.

The difference from Arlesheim lies not in money but in how critics are treated. The senior pastor of the cathedral welcomed the vigil, received the participants with vegan refreshments and thanked every activist. In Zurich, they are meant not to come at all.

The criticism comes from within the church itself

Animal rights organisations have long said that a church blessing for recreational hunters sends the wrong signal. In 2023, IG Wild beim Wild cited a theologian from the circle of PETA Germany on this. In the case of AKUT, however, it is not an animal rights association speaking but a church working group chaired by Reformed pastors from Zurich, Bern and Aargau. The theological advisory board, which unanimously decided on the rejection in 1996, included the Basel theology professor Heinrich Ott and the Capuchin Anton Rotzetter, among others.

The position paper also recalls that, in the early Christian communities, hunting was regarded as incompatible with the faith. Hubertus himself laid down his weapon when the red deer appeared before him. On 15 November, the minister of St. Peter has the opportunity to preach the legend as it was meant: as the story of a conversion, not as a blessing to carry on.

Join us on 15 November

Hunt Watch's silent vigil begins on Sunday, 15 November 2026, at 9.15 am in front of St. Peter's Church on St. Peterhofstatt in Zurich and lasts until 12.15 pm at the latest. You can register via the Hunt Watch Facebook event. If you want to do more, write directly to the members of the Zurich cantonal parliament: addresses and a template letter are available on the page End fox hunting. IG Wild beim Wild lists all vigils against Hubertus Masses in Switzerland, Germany, Austria and Italy in the ticker on the Hubertus Masses 2026.