• >
  • Around the World >
  • Europe >
  • At the end of every year >
  • Hospitality, A Face of God
  • Community
  • At the Wellspring of Faith
  • Coming to Taizé
  • Around the World


 
  • Regular prayers in Australia
  • Canada: Prayers
  • NZ: Prayers in Aotearoa-New Zealand
  • UK: News from Britain
  • UK: Prayers
  • USA: Prayer Contacts
  • Small Provisional Communities
    • Small Provisional Communities
    • Small Provisional Communities before 2018
    • News from the Small Provisional Communities
    • A Taizé Provisional Community on the Outskirts of Lyons
    • A Month in Morocco
  • Africa
    • South Africa: Regular prayers
    • Kenya 2019: Prison visits
    • Meeting in Cape Town
      • Cape Town 2019: Meditations by Brother Alois
      • Cape Town 2019: Echoes of the meeting
      • Documents for registered participants
      • Music and Prayer resources
      • Next African stage of the Pilgrimage of Trust
      • What is at stake in the Cape Town meeting?
      • Background and reflection
        • Taizé and South Africa
        • Cape Town 2019: Some material for reading/watching about Cape Town and South Africa
        • Cape Town 2019: A reflection on silence
        • Archbishop Tutu and Taizé
        • Visiting the Eastern Cape province
        • “Giving birth to a new people” - Jaco Botha
        • “All began with a step of trust...” - John de Gruchy
        • Reflection: “Next year gathering can be a place of healing..." Ntombekhaya
    • Africa 2009 - 2017
      • Algeria: A meeting at Tlemcen: August 2011
      • Burundi May 2009: Building new relationships
      • Democratic Republic of Congo: A visit to Goma
      • Meetings and retreats in Nairobi : program for 2017
      • Mauritania: A journey from Dakar to Nouadhibou
      • Rwanda: Visits in November 2010
      • A Brother Visits South Sudan
      • Two Taizé brothers in South Africa
      • In South Sudan, summer 2013
      • Tanzania: Meetings in June 2010
      • Togo, Benin and Burkina Faso: Visits and meetings
      • Visits in Uganda
    • 2016: Meeting in Cotonou
      • Cotonou 2016: Photos
      • Benin: International young adult meeting in Cotonou
      • Cotonou 2016: Echoes of the Preparation in Bénin and Neighbouring Countries
      • Video clip: The preparation of the meeting in Cotonou
      • Spring 2016: The Preparation Continues in Cotonou and Elsewhere
      • Cotonou 2016: Looking for Paths of Hope Together
      • Cotonou 2016: Hope and joyful gratitude
    • 2012: Meeting in Kigali
      • Pilgrimage of Trust on Earth
      • How to prepare for the meeting
      • Kigali: Echoes from the Meeting
      • Preparation of the meeting
        • Practical information
        • Rwanda 2011: A new stage towards the meeting in Kigali in 2012
        • Kigali: The preparation in March
        • February-March 2012: Travel Log
        • June 2012: Travellog
        • Rwanda, September 2012 : News of the preparation
        • Kigali : Testimonies from Young People
        • Kigali Meeting: The last stage of the preparation...
      • Contacts
      • Photos
      • From Kigali to Rome
    • 2008: Meeting in Nairobi
      • With 7000 young Africans in Nairobi Taizé creates a sign of peace
      • The meeting in Nairobi: Day by day
      • Nairobi: Meditations by Brother Alois
      • Photos: Meeting in Nairobi
    • Africa 2006 - 2008
      • February-March 2006 : In East Africa
      • February 2007 : In East Africa
      • November 2007: A visit to South Africa
      • April-May 2007: In West Africa
      • Malawi: "A house that’s complete"
  • Americas
    • Argentina: An important small step forward in reconciliation
    • Prayers with songs from Taizé in Panama
    • Bolivia October 2009: Meetings in Santa Cruz de la Sierra, Cochabamaba and El Alto
    • Pilgrimage of Trust in the Caribbean
    • Chile: A new stage in the pilgrimage of trust
    • Haiti: Messages from young people
    • Spring 2014: Pilgrimage of Trust in America
    • Mexico: Faith is alive everywhere
    • Visits in Peru
    • USA: Pilgrimage of Trust in St. Louis
      • Spring 2017: Pilgrims of Trust in Saint Louis
    • USA: Meeting in Pine Ridge
      • Pilgrimage of trust in the USA: Taizé at Pine Ridge: “Our pot is empty - you have to fill it”
      • Photos: Meeting in Pine Ridge
    • 2007: Meeting in Cochabamba
      • Day by day during the meeting
      • Photos: Meeting in Cochabamba
      • Taizé and Bolivia
    • 2010: Meeting in Santiago
      • Taizé and Latin America
      • The evening before Palm Sunday
      • A welcome that is warm, close and simple
      • Celebrating life with the people of Chile
      • In Argentina: An un-hoped for joy
      • For a fraternal world: Meeting in Santiago, Chile
      • In Chile: the pilgrimage of trust continues…
      • Photos
    • 2012: Meeting in Chicago
      • Meeting in Chicago: An interview with two of the brothers
      • Meeting in Chicago: Taizé-Chicago: Three-minute version
      • May 2012 meeting: Taizé in Chicago
      • Photos of the meeting in Chicago
    • 2019: Two Taizé Brothers in the USA in September-October 2019
  • Asia Pacific
    • Video: An introduction to Taizé
    • Australia: News of prayers, meetings and gatherings
    • Cambodia: Visits of Brothers
    • Taizé and China
    • China: Regular prayers in Shanghai
    • Taiwan: Meetings with a brother from Taizé in April 2015
    • Hong Kong: Prayers and meetings to "uncover the wellspring of trust in God"
    • Hong Kong: Preparatory Prayers for International Meeting 2018
    • Visit by two brothers to Indonesia
    • Indonesia: October 2011: At the World Christian Forum in Manado
    • Visits of Brother Alois in Asia
    • Japan 2014: Meetings with a brother from Taize
    • Japan, spring 2016: "How to awaken in us the courage of mercy? "
    • Kazakhstan : A visit in August 2010
    • Laos: Young Laotians and the pilgrimage of trust
    • East Malaysia: Easter in Kuching
    • A visit in Mongolia
    • Myanmar: “What is the source from which we draw life?”
    • The Courage of Mercy in the Philippines
    • The Philippines, 2016: Living the Courage of Mercy
    • August 2018: Two brothers in the Philippines
    • India, February-March 2013: Visits to Vasai and Mumbai
    • India 2018: Visits and prayers
    • Several prayers in India on the pilgrimage of Trust 2019
    • Sri Lanka: Visits in 2012
    • Thailand: Next prayers in Bangkok
    • Timor Leste: Visits in 2012
    • In Vietnam
    • Aotearoa-New Zealand: 2019 Pilgrimage in Aotearoa
    • Regular prayers in Asia
      • Regular Prayer in the Philippines
      • Regular prayer in Macau
      • Regular prayers in Hong-Kong
      • Regular prayers in Indonesia
      • Regular prayers in Singapore
      • Regular prayer in Malaysia
      • Japan: Regular prayers in Japan
      • Regular prayers in India
      • Prayers in Vietnam
    • 2018 Meeting in Hong Kong
      • August 2018: Pilgrimage of Trust in Hong Kong
      • Meeting in Hong Kong, August 2018: Practical information
      • Hong-Kong 2018: Meditations by Brother Alois
    • 2010 Meeting in Manila, Philippines
      • Philippines: Meeting in Manila: "Most simply I am grateful for life"
      • Pilgrimage of trust meeting in the Philippines
      • Meditations by Brother Alois
      • Photos
      • Brother Alois 2010: Liham mula sa Ttsina
      • Brother Alois 2010: Sulat gikan sa Ttsina
    • 2006 Meeting in Kolkata, India
      • Pilgrimage of Trust in Kolkata: On the Road of Trust, Towards a Future of Peace
      • Kolkata: Meditations by Brother Alois
      • Taizé and India
      • Photos: Meeting in Kolkata
    • September 2017: Visits and prayers in India
  • Europe
    • European Meeting in Wrocław
      • The Next Taizé European Meeting Will Be Held in Poland
      • Meeting in Wrocław: Provisional Programme
      • Practical information
    • At the end of every year
      • Madrid 2018
        • Registration
        • Meditations by Brother Alois
        • Madrid 2018: Photos
        • Messages received for the meeting
        • Madrid 2018: Programme of Workshops
      • Basel 2017
        • Next European Meeting: At the end of 2018 in Madrid
        • Basel 2017: Next European Meeting of Young Adults in Basel
        • Meditations by Brother Alois
        • Basel 2017: Photos
      • Riga 2016
        • A novel European meeting at Riga in Latvia
        • Riga 2016: Film
        • A short history of Latvia (1)
        • A short history of Latvia (2)
        • Riga: Photos
        • Meditations by Brother Alois
      • Valencia 2015
        • Meditations by Brother Alois
        • Photos
      • Prague 2014
        • Prague: Some clips on the European Meeting
        • Meditations by Brother Alois
        • The meeting from day to day
        • Photos
      • Strasbourg 2013
        • Strasbourg: 30,000 young Europeans make “a large community of friendship” visible
        • Strasbourg meeting: Meditations by Brother Alois
        • Words of welcome from representatives of the Churches of Alsace and Ortenau
        • Strasbourg: Echoes from the Strasbourg Meeting
        • Photos
      • Rome 2012
        • Rome, January 2013: Some weeks after the European Meeting
        • The meeting from day to day
        • Meditations by Brother Alois
        • 45 000 young people in Saint Peter’s Square to pray with Pope Benedict
        • Rome 2012: The faith of a scientist - one of the afternoon workshops
        • Photos
      • Berlin 2011
        • Meeting in Berlin: 30 000 young adults on the road towards a new solidarity
        • The Meeting Day by Day
        • Meditations by Brother Alois
        • Photos
      • Rotterdam 2010
        • 30 000 young people invited to reflect on joy and solidarity
        • The Meeting Day by Day
        • Meditations by Brother Alois
        • “The party is over but the legacy remains.”
        • Photos
      • Poznań 2009
        • Photos
        • “Poznań, capital of European Christian youth”
        • Meditations by Brother Alois
      • Brussels 2008
        • From the newspapers
        • Meeting in Brussels: Meditations by Brother Alois
        • Two addresses by Cardinal Danneels
        • Photos
      • Geneva 2007
        • Geneva elated to have welcomed the 40,000 young adults of Taizé
        • Photos
      • 2006: 40,000 young Europeans fill up with hope
      • 2005: Milan filled with the spirit of Brother Roger
      • 2004 Lisbon: The Urgency of Peace
      • 2003 Hamburg: The Face of the Church as Communion
      • 2002 Paris: A Larger Europe Breathes the Good News
      • 2001 Budapest: Hospitality, A Face of God
      • 2000 Barcelona: Sharing a Hope
    • Lviv 2018
      • Lviv 2018: Provisional programme
      • Lviv 2018: Practical information
      • Lviv 2018: Prayers with songs from Taizé
      • Meeting Booklet
      • Lviv 2018: End of April, First Taizé Meeting in Ukraine
      • Lviv 2018: A first meeting of Taizé in Ukraine in the spring sunshine
      • Lviv 2018: Pictures
      • Lviv 2018: Meditations by Brother Alois
    • Albania: “Visits from abroad”
    • Austria, March 2011: Meeting in Vienna
    • Austria: Meeting in Graz
      • Graz 2018: Graz 2018: Sharing the Future
      • Graz 2018: Practical Information
      • Graz 2018: program and songsheet
    • Belarus, September 2014: Discovering the Source of a Unity Beyond Borders
    • Autumn 2016: A Visit to Belarus
    • Bosnia-Herzegovina: After the meeting in Sarajevo
    • Bulgaria: 2010: Welcomed as long lost friends
    • Croatia: “Something that they want to share with others”
    • Czech Republic: Preparing “Vigils of Trust” in Prague, November 2012
    • Denmark: Visits in May 2010
    • Estonia 2012: Renewing trust
    • Hamina, City of Peace
    • Finland : A Chain of Friendship
    • Finland: Meeting in Helsinki
    • Germany, 2012: A visit to Cologne
    • France, All Saints 2016 : The testimony of refugees in Taizé
    • Present day Greece: a land of contrasts
    • Spring 2016: On the island of Lesbos with those who had to leave everything
    • April 2016: A Volunteer on a Boat Saving Refugees in the Mediterranean
    • Hungary: Accompanying the refugees
    • Hungary Octobre 2009: Meeting in Pécs, October 2009
    • Ireland: News from Ireland
    • Italy: March 2011: Prayers and visits
    • Mantova, September 2012: Brothers and volunteers visit a sorely tried region
    • Riga, September 2014: To the Baltic Countries as Pilgrims of Peace and Trust
    • Latvia 2012: Seeking signs of hope
    • Lithuania: Meeting in Vilnius in May 2009
    • Malta: “A silent cry that no one hears”
    • Moldova, February 2016: Come Back in the Spring!
    • Norway, Spring 2013: "We are truly one in Christ"
    • Pilgrimage of trust in Norway: Weekend meeting in Oslo and Trondheim
    • Sweden: Pilgrimage and apples
    • Taizé in Brussels: New paths of trust
    • Poland, October 2014: „Days of Communion” in Katowice
    • WYD 2016: Praying with the Songs of Taizé in Kraków
    • Portugal: Evening prayer in Porto
    • Romania, Easter 2016: Pilgrimage to Bucharest
      • Pilgrimage to Bucharest
      • Getting ready to take part
      • Celebrating Easter in Bucharest: Day by Day
      • Echoes from participants: To the Wellsprings of the Romanian Orthodox Tradition
      • Pictures from the Pilgrimage
    • Romania: Brother Alois’ visit in May 2008
    • Russia: Pilgrimage to a second springtime
    • Russia, Easter 2015: A Pilgrimage to Moscow, in the Light of the Resurrection
    • Russia: Easter 2011
      • Easter Celebrations in Taizé and Moscow
      • A Pilgrimage to Moscow
      • The pilgrimage to Moscow day by day
      • Pilgrimage to Moscow: Saturday 23 April
      • Pilgrimage to Moscow: Sunday 24 April
      • Message from Metropolitan Hilarion
      • Words of thanks of Brother Alois to Metropolitan Hilarion
      • Short film of the pilgrimage
      • Russia: Easter 2011: What did you experience in Moscow during the pilgrimage?
    • 2016: Continuing pilgrimage in Russia
    • Ljubljana, May 2012: A mosaic of encounters in the midst of the Slovenian springtime
    • Spain: Meeting in Seville: May 2009
    • Sweden 2016: Refugees, coffee and prayer
    • Sweden 2016: Prayer with Brother Alois in Lund
    • Istanbul, January 2013
      • Taizé and the Ecumenical Patriarchate of Constantinople
      • Pilgrimage, day by day
      • A word of welcome by Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew
      • Meditation by brother Alois
      • Photos of the pilgrimage
      • Young People’s Impressions
    • Turkey: Prayers in Istanbul
    • UK: Birmingham 2017
      • Echoes of Birmingham 2017
      • Workshops
      • Birmingham 2017: St. Chad’s Sanctuary
      • Birmingham 2017: Changing Tunes
      • Birmingham 2017: “Bringing Hope”
      • Birmingham 2017: Meeting Christ in the discarded
    • UK: Weekend in Edinburgh
      15-16 March 2014
    • Ukraine, October 2014: Faces of Hope
    • Ukraine, April 2015: An Eastertide Pilgrimage, between suffering and hope
    • Europe 2006 2007 2008
      • Austria: A journey through Austria
      • Bosnia-Herzegovina and Taizé
      • Denmark: “The great day of prayer"
      • Germany: In the North of Germany
      • In Greece and the Republic of Macedonia
      • Kosovo, Serbia, Bosnia-Herzegovina
      • In Latvia and Estonia: 2008
      • Russia: Brother Alois in Moscow in 2006
      • Russia: In Moscow in 2006: Taizé’s gratefulness for the Russian Orthodox Church
      • Russia: A visit in October 2006
      • Russia: A visit in November 2007
      • In Spain: 2008
      • Sweden: 2007 Meeting in Stockholm
      • Sweden: 2007 Stockholm meeting day by day
      • UK: 2006: Prayers in Bradford Cathedral and Westminster Abbey
      • Ukraine 2006: Just before the elections
  • Middle East
    • Visits to United Arab Emirates (UAE) 2019
    • Lebanon 2019: International Ecumenical Youth Meeting in Beirut
    • 2017: Pilgrimage of Trust in Egypt
    • Egypt 2017: Taizé on Pilgrimage to Egypt with Coptic Christians
    • Egypt 2017: Pictures of the pilgrimage
    • 2017: A Christian-Muslim initiative of hope in northern Lebanon
    • A Jew’s prayer for the children of Gaza
    • Prayers in Jerusalem
    • Israël, Palestinian Territories, Lebanon: Journal of a pilgrim of trust
    • Lebanon 2013: Visit of a brother
    • Autumn 2015: Two Brothers in the Middle East
    • International ecumenical meeting of young adults in Lebanon (22-26 March, 2019)
    • Beirut 2019: Testimonies from young people
    • Beirut 2019: Meditations by Brother Alois
    • Beirut 2019: Photos
2001 Budapest
 

Hospitality, A Face of God

Opening one’s door to strangers is never easy. As a result of months of work, many people could be welcomed not just in Budapest but in many places in the surrounding area.

The morning of December 28th, thousands of Hungarian families were impatiently waiting to meet the young people they would be hosting for the next five days. Will they manage to arrive? Will they be delayed by the snowstorm blanketing part of central Europe? Will customs formalities at the border take an incredibly long time? How will we deal with the language problem? In addition to these fears, the international situation was not very reassuring.

As a result of months of work, hundreds and hundreds of preparation meetings, not just in Budapest but in many places in the surrounding area, 180 parishes of different denominations were able to prepare a welcome. Some were an hour away from the capital, close to the Slovakian border. Many schools were also made available. And thanks to appeals on Hungarian radio and television, thousands of places were also found in families that usually do not go to church.

Three thousand young adults from throughout Europe arrived on December 26th to organize the welcome on the 28th. A news program on French television emphasized the astonishing sense of service still alive in the young. Thanks in large part to those who came early, it was possible to welcome the 70,000 participants in the meeting and to pray with them.

While most of the other nations received their first welcome in schools throughout the city, the Poles arrived at the Exhibition Centre itself before being sent to their host parishes. They were the most numerous nationality present. Many people wonder why so many thousands of young Poles participate in the meeting year after year. It does not seem to be a simple flash in the pan: throughout the autumn months, two hundred preparation points in Poland not only distributed information about the meeting and the journey, but also offered times of prayer and of reflection together. “In Wroclaw in December, before I left for Budapest, each day there was a prayer using Taizé songs in one of the churches in the city,” said Alicia, a political science student.

But 4,000 Romanians also came, and just as many Italians. The Ukrainians, the German-speakers, the Croatians and the French were almost as numerous. Never before were so many people from the Balkans present, which increased the welcome presence of Orthodox Christians. To reach Budapest, some of the 300 Portuguese had to leave home on Christmas Day.

Doubts and Surprises

The often tense relations between Romania and Hungary awakened doubts about the welcome of the Romanians. Doubts on both sides of the border. This was one of the most joyful surprises of this “pilgrimage of trust.” For the Romanians: “We never imagined we would be welcomed this way in Hungary!” For the Hungarians: “We never realized we could become so attached to Romanians!” One of the host families had already had the experience in 1991 during the first meeting in Budapest. They had written on their registration form: “We can welcome four persons, but no Romanians please.” On the day of the meeting, four Romanians showed up at their door. To understand what happened in the days together, all you had to do was look at their registration form this year: “Four persons, Romanians please!”

A young Hungarian architect wrote: “I had planned to welcome four persons in my flat. In the end I welcomed six, and four others for the meal on January 1st. The trust I showed them was given back to me a hundredfold. It is amazing to see how everything worked out in the end. Many others would say the same thing. I was not full of despair beforehand, but those days spent together certainly reinforced my hope, and perhaps the ability to look toward the future with confidence. And I know this is due to the goodness and the simplicity of those I met.”
Many people’s experience was similar and echo what the first Christians already knew: offering hospitality is, as for the disciples of Emmaus, discovering the face of God. The word “miracle” was on many people’s lips. “We communicated without speaking the same language.” A young man from Budapest said with a smile, “At Babel, God mixed up the languages because people were working against him. In Budapest, our common desire to live out the Gospel brought us together and made it possible for us to communicate.”

“In the Beginning, Chaos…”

The oldest Catholic weekly newspaper in Hungary published this article by a member of a parish that welcomed 700 young people: “At first, everything was a bit chaotic. On December 28th, everyone arrived practically at the same time. It took time to welcome them and it was not easy. Our little church and parish house resembled a waiting room at a railway station in a war film! The welcome team worked well and our guests deserved an award for their patience and understanding. Thousands of persons in our capital discovered that offering their time and temporarily leaving the peace and quiet of their homes is not just an act of kindness, but also the experience that it is good to do this. In each parish, families opened their homes to strangers for a few days and discovered that we are rich. We are linked to one another more than we realize. On January 1st, our church was so full that the priests could hardly make their way to the altar. Those days carried an important message: the Christian faith is universal. Hungarian, Romanians, Italians, Japanese, Lithuanians, French: we are all members of the same family. We discovered that each of us has unique treasures, but also that these treasures can be shared. And that the act of sharing them does not compromise them but helps them to grow. In this way they are even more precious and belong to us more.”

Kofi Annan’s Message

This discovery corresponds well to the message that the United Nations’ Secretary General, Mr Kofi Annan, addressed to the participants: “At a time when some are trying to divide the human family, it is comforting to know that so many of you—from different backgrounds, nationalities and cultures—are united in a common desire to meet and to share.”

Ukrainians United

The 3000 Ukrainians had this same experience during the meeting, and in an even more surprising manner during the trip home: “I was struck by how united the Ukrainians were in Budapest,” wrote one of those in charge of a group. “The barriers that usually separate us fell down. We came from different churches and different regions, but we understood one another and we felt united. On the way home, in the Carpathian mountains, we saw this when a snowstorm made it impossible to continue. Groups from every region and every church came together to help one another. Aware of our serious problem of divisions, we are grateful for the gift we received in Budapest.”

Prayer Together and Workshops

To help them to get around in Budapest, the participants received a map on which were marked the names of the parishes and the main meeting-places. Trams, train stations and the underground were filled to overflowing. The visible joy of the young people made passers-by stop and wonder.

For the times of prayer that brought together this immense crowd at midday and in the evening, two halls of the Exposition Centre were set up. They were not large enough. Hall A was certainly the largest ever used for a Taizé European meeting. The decoration was tasteful and discreet. Orange fabric, some icons, a Christ inspired by the crown of Saint Stephen, so precious for the history of Hungary. Icons of John the Baptist and Mary, those two witnesses to God’s Incarnation, expressed the hope that was at the heart of the Budapest meeting.

The first evening, few people sang, exhausted as they were by the journey. Things had already changed on December 29th when the prayer was shown live on national television. On the 30th and 31st practically everyone sang, even in Swedish and Polish. “There is so much beauty in this prayer,” wrote Father Peter Varnai, youth chaplain for the diocese of Budapest, “that it is impossible to imagine a bleak future.”

A brief meditation by Brother Roger was translated each evening into some twenty different languages. It completed the letter Love and say it with your life, used by the participants for the times of sharing in the morning. The Bible introductions that followed the midday prayers were also drawn from this letter: “Opening up roads of trust,” “Dare to give your life,” “The desire for God restores our soul to life.”

The prayer around the icon of the cross that ended the evening prayer is always a moving moment. A number of Church leaders—Catholics, Reformed, Lutheran, Orthodox—prayed together with the brothers, then the young people kept coming up to the cross until the halls were closed for the night.

How Can We Transmit the Hope of the Gospel Today?

After the evening prayer, that question was asked in the press room to the Archbishop of Eger, president of the Hungarian bishops’ conference. And the sincerity of his reply was striking: “Do you have an answer to that question? I don’t. But my sole objective for the time that remains to me here on earth is to try and find an answer.” Cardinal Paskai, the archbishop of Budapest, and other bishops came each evening to speak with the journalists present. A beautiful way of considering the young and the meeting was shown by Bishop Balas (see below) and by the Lutheran bishop Béla Harmati: “If the young have such a spiritual thirst, then there is a future for Europe.”

On December 29th and 30th, workshops were offered. The final day was devoted to meetings by country on the topic: how can we continue at home after this meeting? Several workshops were held in the Exposition Centre, but others took place in places rich in symbolism and which expressed the warm welcome from Hungary and the attentiveness to the meeting on the part of national leaders (the President of the Republic took part in one of the prayers). The workshop on Europe took place in the Hungarian Parliament and was led by the head of the Supreme Court. And another workshop was held at the Supreme Court.

Creative Christianity

Near Hall A, young French people listened to someone read the list of themes that would enable each person to choose a group for the afternoon: Seeking God in prayer; The Holy Spirit : breath of life, witness to truth, comforter; Building the European family: Europe seen from Budapest, Moscow; How to react in the face of suffering? Violence affects the young: how can we react? A universal communion in Christ : discover all the dimensions of the Church; Is forgiveness possible? God’s call invites us to give ourselves; Living the simplicity of the Beatitudes; Making cities places to live for all; What can I do for an economy of solidarity? Budapest, a bridge between East and West: discovering a place of memory in Hungary; Concert of Orthodox liturgical chants by a youth choir from Novi Sad.

There was also a space for silence and personal prayer.
What do all these themes have in common? Perhaps this: the call to put a creative Christianity into practice and the desire to prepare the young not to flee the challenges of our societies but rather to go towards them and to be present there. For example, those young people from Transylvania who, with a priest, have taken charge of 300 street children and who are living examples that “a few people with very little can do a lot.”

The View of a Hungarian Bishop

One of the outstanding figures of the Hungarian Church, looked up to by the young, known for his candour that created problems for him during the Communist period (he was only named bishop after the fall of the Berlin Wall), Bishop Balas Béla, of Kaposvar, is the chairman of the Youth Commission of the Hungarian Bishops’ Conference:
“We always have to encourage the young. A hundred came to the meeting from my diocese of Kaposvar. I prepared them personally not just for a powerful spiritual experience but also for possible difficulties. In such a crowd, many things can happen. I would like them to have the humor and the realism in their behavior towards people and towards society, which are never perfect. It was the Bolshevik error not to realize this; they didn’t take original sin seriously. You have to know how to deal with difficulties and problems.

“We were born torn apart philosophically at the end of the Middle Ages, then torn apart religiously in the sixteenth century, then came political, military and ethnic divisions. The cause of this tearing apart was on the one hand a great diversity of intellectual viewpoints, but I think it was due mainly to a cooling down of the heart. That is what Taizé heals. The Taizé meetings are a remedy for the evils from which the world suffers.

“There are no intellectual debates there, but at Taizé the young people are in touch with the world of beauty, with music, silence, prayer and friendship, and that is what reconciles the world.”

Last updated: 22 May 2002

Daily Bible Reading

SUN, 15 December
Jesus said of John the Baptist: He is the one of whom scripture says: Look, I am going to send my messenger before you to prepare your way.
Matthew 11:2-15
more...

For the Diary

 Search events

Podcasts

2019-12-12 : Espère en Dieu + Psalms 90 / Mt 3,13-17 / Bogoroditse Dievo II / Prayer by Brother Alois / C’est toi ma lampe
IMG/mp3/podcast_2019-12-12.mp3
12 December 2019
2019-12-05 : Espère en Dieu + Psalms 80 / Eph 2:19-22 / Wait for the Lord / Notre père / Prayer by Brother Alois / Nimm alles von mir
IMG/mp3/podcast_2019-12-05.mp3
5 December 2019
more...

New CD: «LAUDAMUS TE»


Community

  • Some Recent News
  • Visit of Patriarch Bartholomew to Taizé
  • Vocation and History
  • Brother Roger, Founder of Taizé
  • Other people on Taizé
  • Brothers living in other places
  • The Brothers’ Work
  • Solidarity: Operation Hope
  • Anniversaries 2015: Towards a new solidarity

At the Wellspring of Faith

  • Prayer
  • Songs
  • Meditations and Reflections

Coming to Taizé

  • Youth Meetings
  • Specific information for 2019
  • Specific information for 2020
  • Travel to Taizé
  • UK School & College Weeks
  • UK University Weeks
  • Testimonies by young adults
  • Multimedia
  • Some Recent News

Around the World

  • Small Provisional Communities
  • Africa
  • Americas
  • Asia Pacific
  • Europe
  • Middle East

Copyright © Ateliers et Presses de Taizé

This website

[ top | Sitemap | Home]

  • Contact
  • Times of prayers at Taizé
  • News by email