The Taize Experience
Whether in its home setting in the community in France or in our own quiet environment, Taizé prayer provides an experience that at once draws us outside our daily routine and also allows us to enter into our usual activities with a greater thoughtfulness and care. It may be described as the experience of finding, dwelling in, and living from our spiritual centre.
The music of Taizé flows both in and out of silence. With its mantra-like quality, it creates a heightened awareness that both allows and leads one to feel and express the words contained in the music from a progressively deeper place within.
In this style of song and prayer, the listener is invited to hear, feel, and gently digest what he/she and the community are singing. In this invitational manner, the music penetrates beneath the surface and evokes a deeper response–a sense of being fully present.
Excerpts
from a talk on the Taize experience. © 2005
Norm and Jane facilitate Taize style prayer in several communities in Southwestern Ontario, and are available to speak on this style of prayer and also on the Taize experience. They have both spent a week in Taize in each of the past two years.
