A fully spiritual experience... Building Life and Peace trought compassion, tolerance, understanding, spirituality and love.

More information in the Taizé Web Site: www.taize.fr

“Every time I come here, I have the impression that I discover in a concrete way what hope means...Taizé fills me with inner peace" - (Raul, a medical student from Spain)

Read a detailed experience that the Founder of InfoNature.Org had in Taizé in the summer of 2001

Everything began in 1940 when, at the age of twenty-five, Brother Roger left Switzerland, the country where he was born, to go and live in France, where his mother came from. For years he had been an invalid, suffering from tuberculosis. During that long illness, the call had taken shape in him to create a community where simplicity and kind-heartedness would be lived out as essential Gospel realities.

When the Second World War started, he had the conviction that he should begin at once to offer assistance to people in difficult straits, just as his grandmother had done during the First World War. The small village of Taizé, where he settled, was close to the demarcation line that divided France in half, and so was well situated to be a place of welcome for refugees fleeing the war. Friends from Lyon were happy to give the address of Taizé to people seeking refuge.

Thanks to a modest loan, Brother Roger was able to buy a house in Taizé that had been uninhabited for years, with the outlying buildings. He asked one of his sisters, Genevieve, to come and help him offer hospitality. Among the refugees they sheltered were Jews.

Material resources were limited. There was no running water, so for drinking water they had to go to the village well. Food was simple, in particular soups made from corn flour bought cheaply at the nearby mill.

In order not to put any pressure on those he was sheltering, Brother Roger prayed alone; he often went into the woods near the house to sing. So that none of the refugees, in particular those who were Jews or agnostics, would feel ill-at-ease, Genevieve explained to each of them that it was better for those who wished to pray to do so alone in their rooms.

Brother Roger’s parents, knowing that their son and daughter were at risk, asked a friend of the family, a retired French officer, to keep an eye on them. He did so conscientiously. In the autumn of 1942, he warned them that they had been found out and that everyone should leave at once. Brother Roger was able to return in 1944, and then he was not alone. In the meantime a few brothers had joined him, and they had begun a life together that continued in Taizé.

A "parable of community"

In 1945, a young man from the region created an association to take charge of young boys orphaned by the war. When he suggested to the brothers that they welcome some of them in Taizé, Brother Roger asked his sister Genevieve to come back and take care of them. She became their mother. On Sundays, the brothers also welcomed German prisoners-of-war interned in a nearby camp. Gradually other young men arrived and joined the original group, and on Easter Day 1949, the first brothers committed themselves for their whole life to celibacy, to material and spiritual sharing and to a great simplicity of life.

Today, the Taizé Community is made up of over a hundred brothers, Catholics and from various Protestant backgrounds, coming from more than twenty-five nations. By its very existence, the community is thus a concrete sign of reconciliation between divided Christians and separated peoples.

The brothers live by their own work. They do not accept gifts or donations for themselves, not even their own personal inheritances, which are given by the community to the poor.

Already in the 1950s, brothers went to live in disadvantaged places to be with people who were suffering from poverty or divisions. Today, small groups of brothers are present in Asia, Africa and South America. As far as possible they share the living conditions of those who surround them, striving to be a presence of love among the very poor, street children, prisoners, the dying, and those who are wounded in their depths by broken relationships, by being abandoned.

Church leaders also come to Taizé. The community has welcomed Pope John Paul II, three Archbishops of Canterbury, Orthodox metropolitans, the fourteen Lutheran bishops of Sweden, and countless pastors from all over the world.

Over the years, the number of visitors to Taizé has continued to grow. At the end of the 1950s, young adults between the ages of 17 and 30 began to arrive in ever-greater numbers. In 1966 the Sisters of Saint Andrew, an international Catholic community founded seven centuries ago, came to live in the next village and began to take on some of the tasks involved in welcoming people. Much later, a small group of Polish Ursuline sisters came to help with the welcome of the young.

From 1962 on, brothers and young people sent by Taizé came and went continually to the countries of Eastern Europe, always very discreetly, to be close to those who were trapped within their borders. Now that walls have fallen and travel is easier between East and West, contacts with Orthodox Christians, always important, have increased significantly.

Intercontinental meetings of young adults

Every week from early spring to late autumn, young adults from different continents arrive on the hill of Taizé. They are searching for meaning in their lives, in communion with many others. By going to the wellsprings of trust in God, they set out on an inner pilgrimage that encourages them to build relationships of trust among human beings.

Some weeks in the summer months, more than 5000 young people from 75 different countries thus take part in a common adventure. And this adventure continues when they return home. It is expressed in their concern to deepen an inner life and by their readiness to take on responsibilities in order to make the world a better place to live in.

In Taizé, the visitors are welcomed by a community of brothers who have committed themselves to follow Christ by a yes for life. The two communities of sisters present on the hill also take part in the welcome. During the meetings, three times each day all those present gather for prayer, worshipping God together in singing and silence.

Each day, brothers of the community give Bible introductions that are followed by times of reflection and discussion, participants also help with practical tasks. One can also spend the week in silence as a way of letting the Gospel illuminate one’s life in greater depth.

In the afternoon, groups devoted to specific topics allow people to make the connection between the wellsprings of the faith and the pluralistic reality of contemporary society: "Is forgiveness possible?" "The challenge of globalisation," "How can we respond to God’s call?" "What kind of Europe do we want?"… There are also topics related to art and music.

A week in Taizé is a way of realising the intimate relationship between an experience of communion with God in prayer and personal reflection on the one hand, and an experience of communion and solidarity among peoples on the other.

By meeting other young people from throughout the world in a climate of openness and listening, participants discover that roads to unity can be opened up amidst the diversity of cultures and Christian traditions. This provides a solid basis to be creators of trust and peace in a world wounded by divisions, violence and isolation.

In undertaking a "pilgrimage of trust on earth," Taizé does not organise a movement around the community. Each person is invited, after his or her stay, to live out in their own situation what they have understood, with greater awareness of the inner life within them as well as of their bonds with many others who are involved in a similar search for what really matters.

The summer in Taizé

“Keeping peace” is perhaps one of the most precious realities that was lived out this past summer in Taizé: discovering that peace is possible, in a multicoloured crowd of several thousand young adults who came every week from up to eighty different countries, and discovering that praying together can be a simple way of welcoming peace in order to communicate it to others.

“Every time I come here, I have the impression that I discover in a concrete way what hope means. Taizé fills me with inner peace. Keeping peace is not easy when we return home; we have to work at it, not going back to our cities and simply remaining passive in the face of existence. Keeping peace could perhaps mean realizing that the simple fact of coming here is already a small commitment in the life of a young person, one that can lead to taking on responsibilities. I feel inner peace in Valencia, where I live, when I take responsibility for creating a better Church. Peace is found in creativity, in prayer, in action. In Taizé I discover the connection between all these things.”
These were the words of Raul, a medical student from Spain, summing up his experience of a few days spent on the hill in early July.

“Begin the work of peace within yourself so that, once you are at peace yourself, you can bring peace to others.”
One morning a week, a time of small-group sharing, following a Bible introduction, was based on these words of Saint Ambrose.

“Peace is found in creativity.”

Each week, several topics were offered for reflection along the lines of the letter Love and Say It With Your Life. A large map of Taizé was distributed to all those who arrived on Sunday, containing practical information and the different ways of spending the week.

One possibility involved reflecting on Bible texts that showed how Jesus led his disciples to live in “faith and hope”: How is it possible to believe today? How can trust in God change our lives? Then there were two biblical topics: “How can I discover what God wants of me?” and “Encountering God in the Psalms”. For the families, each morning a brother, a sister of Saint Andrew and some young people from other continents presented to the children and their parents a little puppet-show on the story of the prophet Elijah. Then, the children met in small groups like the young adults do, mixing nationalities, while the parents listened to a Bible introduction on the same theme as the puppet-show.The group for adults also used the story of Elijah as a basis for reflection during the week. In addition, each young person could choose to help for half a day with the work necessary for life on the hill.

“Peace is found in creativity.” The challenge of welcoming so many people, 500 per week more than last year, and in particular many young people from central and eastern Europe, was a constant call to creativity throughout the summer.

“Everything goes well in Taizé because those who come set to work with generosity. What astonishes me the most is the joy of working together, as if the simple fact of working for others – cooking, washing dishes, or putting up large tents – could make people happy,”
Explained a young man from Gabon who was sent by his Church to help with the welcome during the summer.

Peace is created step by step

Each week, eight buses came from Romania, twice as many as last year, along with hundreds of Poles and Lithuanians. Several thousand Italians, Portuguese and Germans passed through Taizé during the summer. Peace is perhaps created step by step, discreetly, in relationships between individuals, tiny bridges of friendship across the map of Europe and of the world. It would take too much time to mention all the countries present, but the surprise visit of fifteen young priests from China was a moving moment that bore witness to the new vitality that characterizes the Church in that land.

There were beautiful moments when people whose history has involved mutual hostility met and began to talk together spontaneously: Japanese and Koreans, people from Timor and Indonesians, Serbs and Croats…
Japan and Korea have a painful history linked to the colonization of one by the other in a still recent past; political relations between the two countries are often ambiguous, sometimes even tense.

The meetings between young Japanese and Koreans allowed them to get to know one another and to create friendships. For most Koreans, it was the first opportunity for them to take the time to speak with Japanese. A young Japanese woman said, “In my small group, there are Croats and Serbs, and it is not always easy because of their recent history. Listening to them, I thought straightaway about the relationship between Japanese and Koreans. I know how much suffering the Japanese inflicted on the Koreans in the course of history.” In one meeting, the Koreans were asked to introduce themselves to the Japanese and vice versa, and everyone was touched and tried to do it as best they could.

At the end of July, a group of students from East Timor who were studying in Portugal spent a few days in Taizé. One afternoon, with some young people from Indonesia, they decided to make a common presentation of both their countries, which had been divided by a genocidal war made by Indonesia against the people in East Timor (Timor Lorosae). These young people that everything seems to separate were astonished themselves that they could sing together.

“Keep peace, work for peace” was also the theme of groups led by two government experts in international relations and the building up of Europe. How can we realize that globalization, the end of the cold war, far from leading inevitably to a “clash of civilizations,” carries with it the seeds of true understanding among nations, of course with obvious limits, but also holding out a new hope in the history of humankind? How can we begin to trust in all simplicity?

It was perhaps the meeting on Africa which took place every Thursday afternoon that offered some responses to the challenge of the contact between different cultures: dances, songs, sketches about daily life in Africa were presented by young Africans who had come to Taizé for the whole summer, sent by their local Church to bear witness to their commitment. “The hope of Africa,” said the brother who introduced the meeting, “is that we can do a lot with very little, if we do it with the heart.”

Life-commitment

On two occasions, the community of brothers shared festive events with the visitors. At the beginning of August, a young German brother made his life-commitment in the community, in celibacy, life together, and a great simplicity of life. And at the end of that month, a young man from the Dominican Republic entered the community.

Throughout the summer months, different Church leaders came to Taizé. Several Anglican bishops spent a week here, accompanying young people from Britain and South Africa. Cardinal Keeler from Baltimore arrived one afternoon by surprise. The bishop of Santander in Spain spent a few days in Taizé with young people from his diocese. The archbishop of Perth in Australia, the archbishop of Algiers, a Czech bishop and a bishop from Senegal were present as well. The bishop from India in charge of pastoral work with the young stayed a week, with a group of young people from his country.

In addition to these Catholic bishops, the Lutheran bishop of Berlin, the president of the French Protestant Federation, and an Orthodox bishop from the USA visited the hill. Finally, the young people from Braga, in Portugal, found on the Friday before they left for Taizé that one place in the coach that would take them there was still empty. On a whim, they called their young bishop, Antonio Dias, to offer him the seat, and the bishop accepted spontaneously to join this pilgrimage, lasting more than twenty hours by bus, with the young people of his diocese.

Knowing how to leave

“The simple fact of coming here is already a small commitment in the life of a young person” said Raul: a small commitment that is not afraid of an adventure.

“Keeping peace is not easy when we return home; we have to work at it, not going back to our cities and simply remaining passive in the face of existence.”

In order to offer concrete paths to enable people to keep on going once they return home, more than thirty different workshops were offered each week. “How can we discover beauty in everyday life?” A brother offered a reflection on the work of four painters: Cezanne, Chardin, Manet and Morandi, followed by a practical exercise, for which drawing-paper and pastels were distributed to those who wanted to try and draw beauty. The idea also arose of having workshops linked to career choices: “Meeting for social workers and volunteers involved in social work”; “Meeting for teachers and those preparing to teach: What values can we transmit? How to keep going?”; “Take your bed and walk: meeting for those who work in the health field”; “How to listen?”

CREDITS/SOURCES:
Taizé Community

Building Life and Peace trought compassion, tolerance, understanding, spirituality and love.

More information in the Taizé Web Site: www.taize.fr