Reformation Wall in Geneva vandalised

The monument depicting Calvin, Farel, Bèze and Knox appeared covered in paint with the rainbow colours. The city files a complaint.

Evangelical Focus

GENEVA · 16 JULY 2019 · 10:32 CET

The paint on the Wall of Reformers, in Geneva, 15 July 2019. / Image: LemanBleu.ch,
The paint on the Wall of Reformers, in Geneva, 15 July 2019. / Image: LemanBleu.ch

Toursits walking through the Parc des Bastions in Geneva (Switzerland) discovered on July 15 that the Reformation Wall had been vandalised.

The monument is one of the main touristic attractions of the city in which Jean Calvin, one of the key French Protestant Reformers, developed his work after 1536.

The wall, inaugurated in 1909, also honours the influence of Guillaume Farel, Théodore de Bèze and John Knox.

 

Tourists passing by the vandalised monument. / Image: LemanBleu.ch

The paint was thrown on the monument forming a rainbow, a symbol of the LGBT groups.

In the first reaction, the police said no-one had claimed the attack.

According to local website LemanBleu, the city council of Geneva will file a criminal complaint. Staff working in the park said the monument would be cleaned as soon as possible.

 

The paint was spilled on the monument from above. / Image: LemanBleu.ch

There have been a number of vandalic acts against the Protestant monument in the past. According to newspaper Le Matin, in March, feminist activists wrote a graffiti on the wall reading, “Where are the women?”

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