Every now and again I have someone ask me about the history of the Taize community in France so I thought I'd post the information that I usually include on the back of the bulletin when I lead these services. The notes below are taken (with permission, of course!) from my major professor in graduate school, the incredible C. Michael Hawn. I was blessed to travel with several of my classmates when I was in seminary on a pilgrimage, led by Dr. Hawn, to the Taize community. When we were in Taize (which is outside of Cluny) we lived, worked, fellowshiped and worshiped in the community for a week. That week changed my life in several key ways. If you have any questions or would like to share your experience of Taize, I'd love to talk with you!
Notes on the Taizé Community
The Taizé Community has become a place of pilgrimage for young people from around the world. In July 1940 Roger Louis Schutz-Marsauche, a Reformed minister, arrived in the tiny community of Taizé in the southeastern part of France, approximately one hundred miles from the Swiss border. Roger had many doubts about his faith during his seminary years at Lausanne. In response to this and to the conditions of occupied France, he cast his lot with the poor and disadvantaged. His dream was to live in community with others who would practice the essential dimensions of the Gospel in a manner that would offer a response of Christian reconciliation and hope in the face of the horrors of the war. Brother Roger, as he became known, found a place for such a community in the village of Taizé, just north of Cluny. One thousand years earlier, Cluny had been the site of one of the great medieval monastic traditions of the church. The community of Taizé would draw from this heritage but expand it to fit the needs of a conquered France in search of hope.
Today, over fifty-five years later, Brother Roger’s work continues in this ecumenical community of approximately eighty brothers who, similar to their predecessors in Cluny, have taken vows of poverty and chastity. These brothers, however, come from all over the globe and represent a wide spectrum of denominational beliefs. The community includes Reformed, Anglican, Orthodox, and Roman Catholic Christians. The overarching theme of Taizé is reconciliation through prayer. The majority of the brothers divide their time between reflection and service—a reflective life in the rolling hills of Burgundy surrounding Taizé where they greet and counsel thousands of pilgrims annually from around the globe, and a life of service in some of the poorest and most helpless situation sin the world, such as Calcutta, Haiti, and New York City.
The usual Taizé service is based upon the historic service of the Word with some variations. Singing, silence, scripture (usually read in several languages) and prayer permeate morning, noon, and evening prayers. Daily worship at Taizé includes neither communion, except for morning prayer, nor a sermon. It draws from more contemplative roots where silence and reflection are central to worship and mantra-like music allows the participants to center their though on the adoration of God. To the average Protestant worshiper in the United States, prayer in the Taizé Community with fewer words and extended periods of silence may be at once disturbing and refreshing. Icons from the Orthodox tradition are used to provide a visual meditative setting. The icons are traditional representations of events in the life of Christ and provide “windows to heaven” in the words of the Orthodox church.
The music used in the three services of daily prayer was composed for the unique liturgical needs of the Community by the brothers in the Community and by Jacques Berthier, a composer and friend of Taizé who died in 1994. With young people coming from around the world to see this tiny hamlet, the worship calls for a kind of music that is accessible to these global pilgrims. Through the use of chorales, ostinatos (short, repetitive refrains), acclamations, responses and cannons, worshipers with radically diverse liturgical and linguistic backgrounds are able to participate immediately. While there are vernacular versions of Taizé songs available, worshipers often sing in Latin because it is an historical language of the church, unifying the singers in the mystery of prayer. After visiting Taizé, Pope John XXIII said, “Ah, Taizé—that little springtime!”
Information provided permissible by C. Michael Hawn, Professor of Sacred Music, SMU, Perkins School of Theology.
On August 16th, 2005, Brother Roger was assassinated during the evening prayer (with 2500 people in attendance) at Taizé by an untreated mentally ill woman.
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