Taize, the nearest to Heaven on Earth?

The Taize Community is a large ecumenical Christian community situated in the south of Burgundy in France. It was established by Brother Roger in the early 1940s. Brother Roger's desire was to find a place where he could devote his life to God in prayer and worship. During the second world war Brother Roger sheltered Jews who were escaping from Nazi persecution. Eventually the Gestapo learnt of Brother Roger's activities and he was forced to flee to his homeland in Switzerland. At the end of the war Brother Roger returned to Taize with some other men, and this was the start of the Taize Community. Brother Roger's vision was to create a community that would be committed to reconciliation, particularly amongst the different Christian denominations. In the 1960s young people from around Europe started arriving at Taize, wanting to spend time living and worshipping with the community, and today thousands of young people from all around the world visit Taize for a week or longer to share in the life of the community.

Taize has a very distinctive style of worship, it makes use of simple chants which are sung in many different languages (in any given week there can be up to 40 different nationalities in Taize). They also make use of silence, which is an important part of the daily prayer (which takes place three times a day in the Church of Reconciliation). I had always loved Taize worship, and was desperate to visit. I got this opportunity in the summer of 1996, I was 19 at the time, and had just completed my first year at Durham University. I fell in love with Taize immediately, all I can say is that it is the closest to Heaven that I've ever been, it's as though it's Heaven on Earth. There is something so wonderful about the worship, and being able to pray with thousands of other people from different countries and churches.

During your time in Taize you have a choice of what to do in the week. One of the most popular options is the Bible introductions, which are led by one of the brothers in the morning, and then in the afternoon we divide into small groups to discuss the topic of the day. It was mid way through the week in Taize, when a couple of Polish people came to our group and asked if they could join us. I think that they were keen to practice their English, and had heard that our group seemed to have a lot of fun. One of the Polish people that turned up was a 19 year old girl called Beata Nalinska, who had a heavily bandaged knee, which she had damaged whilst running. I don't know what it was about her, but I felt an immediate attraction (which I gather was mutual). There was something so special about this girl, and I think I fell immediately in love with her (the first and only time it's ever happened in my life). The photo below was taken on the first day we met, Beata can be seen wearing a white top with her crutches near by!

A lot of my spare time during those last few days in Taize were spent with Beata, and when it came time for me to leave we exchanged addresses and promised to write to one another. The picture below (the first one of us together) was taken just before I boarded the bus home.

The journey home to England was a very difficult, not only did I miss Taize and the rhythm of prayer, but I also missed Beata. As soon as I got home I wrote a letter to her, and this started many years of correspondence. A lot happened over the following years, we attempted to meet up several times, but it never worked out, it was two years before I was to see her again, this time in England. The irony was that I was going to Taize to see her, something we'd arranged long ago, but at short notice she was given the chance to come to England, something she'd dreamed about for many years, so in the end I was only able to spend a few days with her, before I headed to Taize, although I did manage to meet up with her in London a couple of weeks later. I knew that she was heading back to Poland, and that she was spending a couple of days in a youth hostel near St Paul's Cathedral, so without knowing exactly when or where she would be there, I decided to go to London and search for her. She knew nothing about my plan, and as I was leaving one hostel after failing to find her, who should walk through the door but Beata!

There were times when it looked as though we weren't going to be together, times when we drifted apart, but in February 2002, having not been in regular touch for quite some time, I arranged to visit Beata in Poland. Two weeks later she came to visit me in Cumbria, and then in August of that same year she came to England to work at Rydal Hall, a Christian conference centre, that was only eight miles from where I lived. She'd only been in England a week, before I asked her to marry me, I had to wait three months before I got the definitive answer which came in November, and the following February (three months later) we got married in my church in Bowness on Windermere. I have absolutely no doubt that God drew us together, I had no idea that my first trip to Taize would be such a life changing one! The great irony is that although Taize has played a huge part in our lives, we had never managed to meet up in Taize again (we'd both been back there but never at the same time). So this year, ten years after our initial meeting we returned to Taize together, but this time with our two boys, Tomek & Adam. The photo of Beata myself and the boys was taken this summer in Taize, with two Polish Sisters, friends of Beata.