The Taizé Community is an ecumenical Christian monastic order in Taizé, Burgundy, France. The founder , Brother Roger, was born in Switzerland in 1915. After studying theology in in Strasbourg and Lausanne he searched in France for a suitable location to found a religous community. The derelict rural village of Taizé, near the Abbey of Cluny, was chosen. The hamlet was just a few kilometres from the demarcation line separating unoccupied France from the Nazi occupied zone. The Community sheltered many refugees, including Jews, at considerable risk to Brother Roger, who had to flee to Switzerland at one point to avoid arrest by theGestapo. When France was liberated the Community also worked with German prisoners of war.

Taizé has spawned a unique style of worship music that reflects the meditative nature of the community. The music emphasises simple phrases, usually lines from Psalms or other pieces of Scripture, repeated and sometimes also sung in canon. The repetition is intended to aid meditation and prayer. Much of the Taizé community music was conceived and composed by Jacques Berthier. Berthier, who studied at the César Frank School in Paris, had an extraordinary ability to write truly functional music that could be sung in more than twenty languages on a wide variety of instruments ranging from guitar and keyboard to full orchestra. 

The community, though Western European in origin, seeks to welcome people and traditions from across the globe. This internationalism is reflected by the music and prayers where songs are sung in many languages and increasingly include chants and icons from the Eastern Orthodox tradition. 

At the heart of Taizé there is a passion for the church. That is why the community has never wanted to create a movement or organization centred on itself, but rather to send the young back from the youth meetings to their local church, group or community, to undertake with many others a pilgrimage of trust on earth. In many places across the world, ecumenical prayers using music from Taizé are organised by people, young and old, who have been in touch with the community. These times of prayer are varied and are integrated in appropriate ways into the life of the local church.

Since the late 1950s, the Taizé community has become an important destination for Christian pilgrimage with the number of visitors ranging from a few hundred to several thousand during summer vacations, with the week of Easter being an exception with a peak of more than 5,000 people. The weekly international youth meetings, primarily for young adults between 17 and 30 years of age, are the community’s priority.

Helped by its music the teachings of the Taizé Community have spread through Western Europe, and into the United States. The annual New Year meetings, which are attended by tens of thousands of young people, have been hosted by most leading European cities including former communist countries. The 90 year old Brother Roger was killed in August 2005 when an apparently mentally-disturbed Romanian woman stabbed him during evening prayer at Taizé. 

In 1991, the asteroid 100033 Taizé was named in honour of the community.

As I go about my things; what I do, who I see, where I go, I must remember that I am simply a vehicle for this flowing energy that resides within me. It is not an alien presence, it is a true living energy that thrives within every second of my life, within every cell and every action. I am simply a container for that force. And all around me the same phenomenon is taking place within every rock, plant, molecule of air and drop of water.

For me to think I own any of this is beyond my comprehension. It all works together, and it is the manifestation of divine goodness within everything that has ever been or will be. It has always been here doing what it does. It’s a constant doing. When there is emptiness it is there. Where there is sadness it is there. It never gives up and is always giving.

With all this generosity it is easy to think of being well, of living in truth and achieving success. I no longer think of things not happening correctly, because it is all the one presence of perfection and knowing. Deep within I can tap into this energy and perceive the absolute power of the oneness flowing through myself and all. There is no suffering or pain and desire is eliminated.

This is the power of meditation. It is the core of my being and is the true state of existence. Just as the fish know only how to swim, the flowers know only how to transmit vibrant color, the sky knows only how to change and progress. That is the state of love and strength I know to be true. When I deviate from that simple path is when I become unfinished, unloved, not true to the whole of being.

Just a few thousand years ago, our planet was living this truth. There was only this oneness within everyone. Then there emerged the ego of empire and the relentless need to conquer and own everything. Like a bottomless pit of desire, the mind of man found itself unable to connect with the one true power of goodness. It became what it is today, and it is only by allowing ourselves to return to the state of true being that we will come back to what we really are.

And so each day I am making a contribution to the return of mankind to the original state. Some day there will be enough, there will be goodness and sharing, there will be satisfaction and contentment. The earth will live again and the spirit within all will emerge in its gentle loving way to revive back to consciousness again.