Pierre Spoerri, 1926 - 2017

Pierre Spoerri was born in 1926. He died in late February after climbing into the backseat of a taxi in front of the Convita Bethanien, where he lived with his wife Fulvia. His memorial service was held at the French Reformed Church in Zürich on March 9, 2017.

It was my privilege to have been his pastor for the last three years.

Pierre and Fulvia could be seen most Sundays, sitting toward the front, Fulvia in a wheelchair. To me it was always a matter of concern when they were not there. I would assume – often correctly – that one of them was not feeling well.

As it turns out, their faithfulness to the church I serve in Switzerland went back a long, long time. Previous pastors with whom I have corresponded in the last few weeks report that Pierre was an unfailingly wise and supportive counselor and friend. As my pastor friends will recognize as I tell this story, people like Pierre come along only once or twice in a pastor’s life. They have a way of changing us (for the better) and inspiring us to be better people (than we usually are).

Soon after I moved to Zurich, I was a guest of Pierre and Fulvia at their home. We enjoyed strawberries and ice cream and some late afternoon sunshine, and I quickly realized that I was in the presence of remarkable people. Pierre gave me a copy that day of his most recent book, his memoir, which was titled No End to the Adventure. I started reading it as soon as I returned home. I forget when I finally turned out the light that night and went to bed.

Pierre’s father was a professor of romance languages at the University of Zürich, and he made sure Pierre developed a fluency in several languages, a skill Pierre was to use throughout his life. Pierre’s father was also a lay preacher in the Methodist church, and so Pierre’s spiritual formation began in the church where we hold evening worship each week.

Pierre studied medicine at the universities in Geneva and Zurich, but gave up his studies in 1946 as World War II was coming to an end. Instead of medicine, Pierre devoted the rest of his life to what was then called Moral Re-Armament (now Initiatives of Change), a moral and spiritual movement founded by the American minister Frank Buchman who had earlier been the driving force behind the Oxford Group.

A large, derelict hotel in Caux, Switzerland, near Lake Geneva, was transformed into a retreat center where, in the early years, Europeans would come together for healing and reconciliation following the war. Pierre’s stories about those conversations between French and German people were always moving to the point of tears. The hotel is still in use as a retreat and conference center, but today groups of people come from all over the world, not just Europe, and they are still finding healing and reconciliation.

Pierre and Fulvia lived all over the world – in places like India, Africa, and the Middle East, doing the work of peace-making and reconciliation. They had no children.

I was unaware of it when I was growing up, but Moral Re-Armament had a significant presence in my home state of Michigan. On Mackinac Island, beginning in 1942, Moral Re-Armament held conferences, like those in Caux, at the island’s famous Grand Hotel. By the early 1950s the movement had acquired a considerable amount of real estate on the island. I’ve made many trips to Mackinac over the years, but never knew of this presence.

As a writer myself, I was of course impressed with the number of books Pierre wrote. He filled many roles within the Moral Re-Armament movement, but he was clearly one of the most gifted communicators they had. He also had an extraordinary gift not only for listening, but for understanding. Every time I left after a visit with Pierre, I had the unmistakable feeling that he understood me, which is a rare gift to receive, something that always felt to me like grace.

Someone said to me before the memorial service, “Well, this must be the hardest part of your work.” And without thinking I said, “This is the time when I feel most like a pastor.”

I was glad to come together on a Thursday afternoon with so many of the people from Pierre’s life – his extended family and friends. His co-workers flew in from all over the world, more of them than we expected. In fact, we hadn’t printed nearly enough orders of worship for the occasion. Together we sang, prayed, and gave thanks (in a variety of languages) for Pierre’s life, and we gave witness, as Presbyterians like to say, to our hope in the resurrection.

I look forward, as I said in my prayer, to “a glad, heavenly reunion.” I am so blessed to have known Pierre.

(Note: I wrote something like this for my church’s monthly newsletter.)