SOME NOTES ON OUR TAIZÉ SERVICE

The Worship Committee at St. James' Church uses "fifth Sundays" in order to create new worship opportunities for us. Our worship leaders, especially music leaders, have taken some time to prepare for this service, in order to provide reverent and joyful worship to God. We hope you will enter into this experience with hearts open to worship our Lord. Here are some additional notes to help you today:

Taizé is an ecumenical, international community founded in 1940, in Taizé , France , by Brother Roger. 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. Their main work is worship. In Taizé, three times each day all those present gather for prayer, worshipping God together in singing and silence.

Taizé worship is patterned after the worship of the Taizé community, and is characterized by:

Singing is one of the most essential elements of worship. Short songs or chants, repeated again and again, give it a meditative character. Using just a few words they express a basic reality of faith, quickly grasped by the mind. As the words are sung over many times, this reality gradually penetrates the whole being. Meditative singing thus becomes a way of listening to God, and becomes a form of prayer. It allows everyone to take part in a time of prayer together and to remain together in attentive waiting on God, without having to fix the length of time too exactly. Through them, little by little, our being finds an inner unity in God. They can continue in the silence of our hearts when we are at work, speaking with others or resting. In this way prayer and daily life are united. They allow us to keep on praying even when we are unaware of it, in the silence of our hearts.

Silence Three times a day, everything on the hill of Taizé stops: the work, the Bible studies, the discussions. The bells call everyone to church for prayer. Hundreds or even thousands of mainly young people from all over the world pray and sing together with the brothers of the community. Scripture is read in several languages. In the middle of each common prayer, there is a long period of silence, a unique moment for meeting with God. We will ask that you follow the service in your bulletin, which contains the service in its entirety. This will minimize the giving of direction during our worship and allow for more silence.

Icons contribute to the beauty of worship. They are like windows open on the realities of the Kingdom of God , making them present in our prayer on earth. Although icons are images, they are not simply illustrations or decorations. They are symbols of the incarnation, a presence which offers to the eyes the spiritual message that the Word addresses to the ears.

Updated: July 21, 2008

Created: 12/14/06