Visiting Kendall’s place, I read this shocking news: Brother Roger, founder of the Taize Community, was murdered last night at a prayer service in France. He was ninety.
I am stunned and saddened at the violent death of this remarkable man. My main exposure to Taize has come through its now world-famous meditative worship. When I was prayer commission chair at Pasadena Mennonite, we organized a couple of mini-retreats to the beach, with Taize music and liturgy. Here’s a good Lutheran website quickly summarizing Taize worship; the instantly recognizable music has played a huge part in my prayer life.
Brother Roger was a man of enormous influence and extraordinary generosity. And though he had reached four score and ten, I grieve the circumstances of his passing.
I had the great honor (and pleasure) of visiting Taize for a span of two weeks three times while I was a high school student. It was a place of amazing peace and holiness - an indescribable sense of “stillness” permeated the place, and the meditative worship holds a special place in my heart. I give Taize full credit for bringing me out of the small, petty world of high school intrigue I lived in. It is really a tragedy that Brother Roger has passed, and I hope his successor can continue the mission of the monastery.
This is a sad event, and apparently the assailant was a mentally ill woman. In a similar fashion, one of the staff of the downtown Episcopal cathedral was stabbed to death by a mentally ill homeless man that was a regular at the soup kitchen there.