Creator of all, you formed us in your image and filled us with life-giving breath.

We bless you: even your name is holy.

Redeemer of all, you have ransomed and healed us, restored and forgiven us.

We remember your blessings with thankful praise.

Sustainer of all, tune the very fiber of our being to resonate with the songs of angels.

We join the hymn of all creation, praising you,

Father, Son, and Holy Spirit—one God forever. Amen.

(Responses may be spoken or sung)

Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, from all eternity you have flourished together in self-giving love.
Bless the Lord, my soul, and bless God’s holy name.

You exalt each other, commune with each other, defer to one another.
Bless the Lord, my soul, and bless God’s holy name.

You are “in” each other, making room for each other.
Bless the Lord, my soul, and bless God’s holy name.

You have seen fit in creation and redemption to spread your life to us poor creatures.
Bless the Lord, my soul, and bless God’s holy name.
Bless the Lord, my soul, who leads me into life. Amen.

Psalm 103 has long been associated with the Lord’s Supper; Dutch Calvinists traditionally sang it at the conclusion of the Lord’s Supper. The psalm is also very appropriate for funeral services. This very short refrain from the Community of Taizé in France was first published in English in the early 1980’s, where it was included in Music from Taizé Volume II. The text read, “Bless the Lord my soul and bless his holy name. Bless the Lord my soul; he rescues me from death.” In 1991, another collection, Songs and Prayers from Taizé, the final line was changed to “who leads me into life” by Robert Batastini of GIA Publications, Inc., the North American agent for all music from the Community of Taizé.

 

Both editions provide musical descants to be played over the repeated meditative singing of the refrain, which is short enough to be learned by rote and is especially appropriate for singing as people come forward to receive the elements in a communion service. Both editions (as well as Sing! A New Creation) also include additional verses from Psalm 103 to be sung by a soloist over the singing (or humming) of the refrain; the instrumental descants should be reserved for the refrain.

For an increasing number of North Americans, the name Taizé evokes a certain style of singing that has become popular in more and more churches, retreat centers, and campus parishes. Taizé is in fact an ecumenical community of brothers located in the small village of that name in the Burgundy region of eastern France.

 

Taizé began with one man, Brother Roger. In 1940 he came to what was then a semi-abandoned village in Burgundy, his mother’s native region. He was twenty-five years old, and he had come there to offer a welcome to Jews fleeing the Nazi persecution and to work out a call to follow Christ in community, a community that would attempt to live out the Gospel call to reconciliation day by day. Today, the Taizé Community is composed of around a hundred brothers. They come from different Christian traditions and from over twenty-five different countries, and make a life commitment to live together in joy, simplicity, and mercy as a “parable of community,” a sign of the Gospel’s call to reconciliation at the heart of the world. Tens of thousands of people, mainly between the ages of 17 and 30, come throughout each year from around the world to spend a week going to the roots of the Christian faith. They join in the community’s worship three times a day, listen to Bible introductions on the sources of the faith, spend time reflecting in silence, and meet in small sharing-groups. The community encourages participants, when they return home, to take back what they have discovered and put it into practice in the concrete conditions of their life – in their parishes, their place of work or study, their families.

 

Life at Taizé, following the monastic tradition, has always turned around three main poles – prayer, work, and hospitality. The three times of worship create the basic rhythm of the day, with a very meditative form of prayer in which singing and silence have always played a large part. When the number of visitors to Taizé began to increase, and more and more young people started arriving, the brothers felt the need to find a way for everyone to join in the prayer and not simply be observers. At the same time, they felt it was essential to maintain the meditative quality of the prayer, to let it be an authentic encounter with the mystery of God revealed in Jesus Christ. Finally, it was found that chants made up of a few words repeated over and over again made possible a prayer that was both meditative and yet accessible to all. They were happy to develop a form of sung music that can be used just as well by a small group of students who meet weekly in a dorm to pray as in a celebration that fills the cathedral of a large city. The “songs of Taizé” thus make it possible for hundreds of thousands of people throughout the world to be linked in common praise of God.

 

With the help of the musician Jacques Berthier, friend of Taizé, different methods were tried out, and a solution was found in the use of repetitive structures, namely, short musical phrases with melodic units that could be readily memorized by everybody. The use of some very simple words in basic Latin to support the music and the theme of prayer was also dictated by pastoral needs. From practical experience it was the only way of solving the unavoidable problem of languages that arouse at international gatherings. On the other hand, living languages are widely used. Increasingly, song collections around the world, Protestant and Catholic, include songs from Taizé for congregational worship.

 

GIA Publications is the North American publisher of the many recordings and song collections from the Community of Taizé.

-from http://www.giamusic.com/bios/taize.cfm

Robert J. Batastini is the retired vice president and senior editor of GIA Publications, Inc., Chicago. Though retired from management, he maintains an active role at GIA Publications, Inc. Bob has over fifty-five years of service in pastoral music ministry, having served several parishes in the Archdiocese of Chicago and one in the Diocese of Joliet. He served as executive editor and project director for the Worship hymnals (three editions), Gather hymnals (three editions), Catholic Community Hymnal, and as executive editor of RitualSong. Since retirement, he has continued as project director for Lead Me, Guide Me—Second Edition, and served on the editorial committees for Worship—Fourth Edition, and Oramos Cantando.

In 1993 he became the first recipient of the Father Lawrence Heimann Citation for lifetime contribution to church music and liturgy in the U.S., awarded by St. Joseph's College, Rensselaer, Indiana, and was named "Pastoral Musician of the Year-2000" by the National Association of Pastoral Musicians (NPM). At its 2006 conference, he was named a Fellow of the Hymn Society in the United States and Canada.

Bob is past-president of the Hymn Society in the United States and Canada, served as a member of the Council for the National Association of Pastoral Musicians, and was a member of the Music Advisory Committee of the Bishops Committee on the Liturgy which drafted the Bishops’ document, “Sing to the Lord: Music in Divine Worship.”

He is active in the music ministry of St. Francis de Sales Parish, Holland, MI.