The first part of Ernst Pepping's Choralsuite is a setting of Martin Luther's three-verse hymn, written to replace the Latin Credo in the Reformation German mass. Luther also adapted Catholic statements ('unam sanctam catholicam ecclesiam' was changed to 'die ganz Christenheit auf Erden' [the whole Christian church on earth]) as well as incorporating a number of his own theological convictions. Pepping orientates his highly contrapuntal choral texture to the vocal style of the 16th and 17th centuries and uses traditional church modes.