[Translated into 60 languages (including 21 Asian languages and 9 African
languages), this letter was written by Brother Roger for the European
meeting of young adults which brought to PARIS for five days, from 28
December 1994 to 1 January 1995, more than 100,000 participants from all
the countries of Eastern and Western Europe, as well as young people from
54 countries on other continents. The meeting in PARIS is the seventeenth
annual European meeting. It is a stage in the "pilgrimage of trust on
earth" animated by Taize. 

Taize-Community, 71250 TAIZE, France  email: community@taize.fr ]


The Wonder of a Love

By night, we will go to the spring. Deep within us there sparkles living
water where we can quench our thirsts.

By night and by day, as we move forward from beginning to new beginning, a
whole life is built up.

Could the human soul be that, too: the secret heartbeat of a happiness
almost beyond words?

In the presence of physical violence or moral torture a question plagues
us: if God is love, where does evil come from?

No one can explain the why of evil. In the Gospel, Christ enters into
solidarity with the incomprehensible suffering of the innocent; he weeps
at the death of someone he loves. 1

Did not Christ come to earth so that every human being might know that he
or she is loved? 2

When we can sense hardly anything of God's presence, what good is
agonizing over it?

It is enough to have the desire to welcome God's love for a flame to be
kindled, little by little, in the secret recesses of our being. "Filled by
his love, the heart opens to others."  3

Animated by the Holy Spirit, this flame of love can be quite faint. And
yet it keeps burning.

And the Holy Spirit stirs us up and is at work within us, reorienting the
depths of our being, 4  preparing us to dare to live lives of forgiveness
and reconciliation.

...And the heart awakens to the wonder of a love.

T o let ourselves be refreshed by living water welling up in us, it is
good to go off for a few days in silence and peace.

In ancient times Elijah, the believer, set out in search of a place to
listen to God. And there he made this discovery: God's voice finds a way
of making itself understood in a breath of silence. 5

God is familiar with our longings. He perceives better than we do
ourselves our most basic intentions and what lies deep within us. What we
have trouble grasping in prayer, God has already understood.

When we pray and nothing seems to happen, does our prayer remain
unanswered? No. The fire of a love penetrates even the arid regions, even
the contradictions of our being.

In quiet trust in God, all prayer finds some kind of fulfillment. Perhaps
it is different than we expected... Does not God answer us with a view to
a greater love? 6

The beauty of prayer with others is an incomparable support. Through
simple words and symbols, it communicates a discreet and silent joy.

Who will find ways of preparing and opening children and young people to
the mystery of trust in Christ? 7 Already glimpsed in a person's early
years, an intuition of faith develops in their heart of hearts. Even if it
is forgotten, it can reappear throughout their life. 8

But why are some people seized by the wonder of a love and know that they
are loved, and even filled to overflowing? Why do others have the
impression that they are neglected, loved little for what they are? 9

Every human being yearns to be loved as well as to love. It is not for
nothing that the Gospel alerts us about not becoming locked up in
isolation.

When we are listened to, obstacles fall away that were created by
frustrations of the heart, wounds from a recent or distant past. Being
listened to is the beginning of a healing of the soul. 10

And the breath of a trust arises... And a gateway to freedom begins to
open up.

Though there are fragilities in human beings, there is also a fathomless
thirst for freedom.

Like the most beautiful of coins, freedom can have an other side. What
kind of freedom would it be if, used in a self-centred way, it harmed the
freedom of others? Freedom is intimately linked to forgiveness and
reconciliation. 11

Here too Christ invites us to a humble repentance. And what does
repentance express? It is a surge of trusting by which we place our
failings in him, surrendering ourselves to him in silence and in love.

Jesus was a human being. He knows how humans aspire to inner peace. And
before leaving those he loved, he assured them that they would receive a
comfort. 12

Could there be in us a chasm of fears, doubts or loneliness? Joy! Joy of
the soul! The depths of worry in us call out to other depths, the
inexhaustible compassion of his love. 13

And what a surprise: trust was at hand, and so often we were unaware of
it. 14

Jesus, the Christ, never abandons us to the anguish of a solitude where
all that remains is greyness, morosity and sadness.

Ever since he rose from the dead, his presence has been made tangible
through a mystical and visible communion, that communion of love which is
the Body of Christ, his Church.

Finding fulfillment in this communion requires a simplicity of heart and
of life. Without such simplicity, how can we go forward trusting in
Christ?

Is the Church not entering a period today when it is being stripped to the
essentials? Its credibility is at stake. This is all the more the case
since, in some parts of the world, people are moving away from the faith.

Trust in Christ is not conveyed by means of arguments which want to
persuade at all costs and so end up causing anxiety, and even fear.

In the younger generations, some remain at a distance from that communion
which is the Church. The question arises: could they too be victims of
age-old and brand-new divisions?

Is it not urgent today to be reconciled by love? And when Christ calls,
who can refuse? Who can forget his words: be reconciled without delay? 15

Will we have hearts large enough, imaginations open enough, love burning
enough to enter upon that Gospel way: to live as people who are
reconciled, without delaying a single day? 16

When the Church listens, heals, reconciles, it becomes what it is at its
most luminous - the limpid reflection of a love and, still more, an
abyss of consolation. 17

Never distant, never on the defensive, freed from all forms of severity,
the Church can let the humble trusting of faith shine right into our human
hearts.

AGospel light, however feeble it may be, pierces our darkness with its
rays. 18  It is fire; it is Spirit. It enables us to live Christ's life
both within ourselves and for others.

In this period of history, there is an unprecedented awakening of the
Christian conscience with regard to human suffering.

Everywhere in the world, there are Christians who are giving their lives.
They are trying to be present amidst the increasingly rapid evolutions of
society. In the midst of such changes that come faster and faster, an
astonishment arises, astonishment at all that is made possible by love.
Wherever they live, these Christians take on responsibilities that are
often very specific. 19

In vast regions of the world, human beings are measured above all in
economic terms, and the desire to get rich through the market becomes an
overriding obsession.

The consciences of a great many Christians cannot be satisfied by an
economic growth that benefits only part of a country's population.

>From the time of the apostles, the Virgin Mary and the first believers,
there has been a call to live in great simplicity.

One of the pure joys of the Gospel is to go further and further toward a
simplicity of heart that leads to a simplicity of life.

Attentive to building up the human family, how can we remain unaware that
every people has its own genius? 20 And so many peoples on earth today
reflect the mysterious figure of the "suffering servant" 21 : humiliated,
ill-treated, with nothing to attract us, they bear our diseases. 22

W hatever point we may be at, the Risen Christ searches tirelessly for us
and he always comes to us. Let us hear him knocking at our door when he
tells us: come, follow me! 23

He desires that, with almost nothing, both fire and Spirit be made
perceptible in us, above all through the gift of our lives. 24

However poor we may be, let us not quench the fire, let us not quench the
Spirit. 25  In them are kindled the wonder of a love.

And the humble trusting of faith is communicated like fire spreading from
one person to the next.

NOTES

1 John 11,35-36.

2 "There is no violence in God. God sent Christ not to accuse us, but to
call us to himself, not to judge us, but because he loves us" (Letter to
Diognetus, second century after Christ). There are physical forms of
violence on earth, including war, torture, murder... There are other forms
of violence too, those that are concealed in the ploys of mistrust and of
cunning, in suspicion, humiliation, an unkept promise...

3 An Orthodox theologian from Bucharest who died in 1993, Father
Staniloae, and who had been in prison for his beliefs, wrote words so
essential that we would like to know them by heart: "I looked for God in
the human beings of my village, then in books and in ideas. But that
brought me neither peace nor love. One day, while reading the Church
Fathers, I discovered that it was possible to encounter God through
prayer. I gradually realized that God was close to me, that he loved me,
and that filled by his love, my heart opened to others. I realized that
love was a communion, with God and with others. And without that
communion, everything is only sadness and desolation."

4 In the depths of our being, a little part of ourselves remains solid,
unshakeable as rock.

5 I Kings 19,3-13.

6 Happy those who live in trust of heart; they will see God! How will they
see him? Like Mary who, attentive, "kept everything in her heart" (Luke
2,19.51) and saw God with her inward eye. A vision can be given by the
Holy Spirit, but it is not the appearance of a person, known or unknown,
who stands alongside us. It is an image drawn from within ourselves, clear
enough to allow us to "see" a loved or venerated being. It is possible to
love Christ so much that we have such a vision, brought into being by the
Holy Spirit. But what are visions or ecstasies when compared to an act of
love, of forgiveness, of reconciliation?

7 Take a child by the hand, go with that child into a church to pray...and
he or she can be awakened to the mystery of faith. This is possible at
home, too. In the fourth century, Saint John Chrysostom wrote: "The home
is a little church." Today, in secularized societies, it is good for our
homes to give glimpses of an invisible presence by means of a few symbols
of Christ. At home we can set up a corner for prayer, however small, with
an icon, a candle... Of course, making one's home a little church, an
"ecclesiola," can never mean becoming a closed group and so forgetting the
universal dimension of the Church.

8 Faith can reappear in adulthood in people who prayed with members of
their family as children. When there is a void in childhood, however, it
can happen that this void is filled in whatever way possible, using the
elements that happen to be at hand. How could a child have the maturity to
sort out all those elements?

9 As a result of different events, a child can experience a feeling of
rejection. And in that child, an inner appeal is born not to be abandoned.
It happens that children are wounded by tensions in their family, by
explanations given by adults in their presence. Understanding a child, or
a young person, requires a great deal of discernment. Often the question
can arise: Will someone be present to help them pass through a void that
affects them in their heart of hearts?

10 Being listened to by someone with experience in reading what lies
beneath the contradictions of the human being. To listen, it is not
necessary to have a method, but to know how to discern the gifts, the
wounds, the thirst for God, in those who come with something to confide.
Some elderly persons are able to listen, to understand the young, to
unburden them of a load of worry.

11 Even under the guise of loving someone, it is possible to keep them
captive in that desert which is emotional blackmail. Even in the name of
freedom, it is possible to manipulate another person.

12 Jesus told his disciples that, when he left them, the Holy Spirit would
be their comfort, their support (John 14,16-18.26-27). "God is called the
`God of consolation,' the `God of mercies,' because his constant concern
is to comfort, to encourage the unfortunate and the afflicted, even if
they have committed thousands of sins" (Saint John Chrysostom, fourth
century).

13 "Deep calls to deep" (Psalm 42,7). Experiencing a kind of inner void,
some come to the point of asking themselves: but where is God? There can
be doubts in us, and God does not love us any the less for that. Does not
the Risen Christ remain alongside every person, even those who do not know
him? Some Christians are utterly disconcerted when they hear that their
faith is supposedly the projection of an unconsciously infantile attitude.
And doubt can creep into the soul. But doubt is not always redoubtable.
The maturity of an inner life enables us to discover a way forward that
goes from hesitation, or doubt, to a humble trusting in God.

14 When it comes to trusting in God, it is good to remain attached to a
few Gospel realities and to go back to them constantly: "In all things
peace of heart, joy, simplicity, mercy." "Forget in Christ what assails
the heart." "God buries our past in the heart of Christ and is going to
take care of our future."

15 Matthew 5,23-24. Is hope for a reconciliation among Christians
vanishing, like a wave that falls back? Perhaps, but does not God always
open up new ways? Reconciliation is born from within, in the heart of each
person, in their own life. The ecumenical vocation of the baptized is
above all to be creators of a reconciliation made concrete each day, both
near and afar. Lived out within one's own being, reconciliation acquires a
credibility and can lead to a reconciliation in that communion of love
which is the Church. What matters is to live as people who are reconciled.
Documents will come later. Does not devoting too much energy to documents,
in the end, take us away from putting into practice concretely the Gospel
call: to be reconciled without delay?

16 There are countless Christians who undergo an inner struggle, and
sometimes suffering, in their attempt to be bearers of peace in that
communion of love which is the Body of Christ, his Church. They are not
naive when confronted with abuses that corrode communion. They could
criticize the inflexible attitudes of some people. Far from allowing
themselves to be drawn in that direction, they strive for silence and love
with all their soul. When they express their desires, they are careful not
to dig ditches which would separate people still more. They search for all
that stimulates us to live as people who are already reconciled. They know
that, with a view to the continuities of Christ in the human family, it is
so essential for there to appear the reality of a communion, of a
reconciled Church, where joy, simplicity and mercy dwell.

17 Because of the separations between Christians, some find themselves in
a situation where they cannot receive the Eucharist. Rather than becoming
upset over this difficulty, it is possible to offer "blessed bread" to
every person present at the celebration of the Eucharist, to all without
exception, both believers and non-believers. This sign of hospitality is
rooted in the story of the multiplication of the loaves: one day Christ
blessed five loaves of bread and distributed them to all without
distinction (Matthew 14,13-21). This leads us to reflect on the Church's
motherly love; because of it she has managed to discover the unexpected.
Does not this gesture, brought into being long ago among Eastern
Christians, offer a concrete response in certain contemporary situations?

18 "God is light; in him there is no darkness."  (I John 1,5)

19 Among Christians, there are many who refuse to accept any form of
exclusion, unemployment, underprivileged areas of large cities... There
are young people, as well as not-so-young and even elderly persons, who
devote part of their time to volunteer service for others, for example by
going to be with children or old people in their neighbourhood. Some
support this volunteer work by collecting funds, and this is fine. But it
is desirable that young people accomplish such service without any appeal
for funds: three or four persons can help others by sharing their meagre
resources.

20 We are in a period when a crisis of confidence in man is widespread.
Particularly noticeable in Europe, it sets before us this challenge: what
responsibilities can we take on so that a new confidence can be born,
utterly indispensable for the building up of Europe?

21 See Isaiah 53,2-4.7.

22 Happy those who, in recent years, have done all they could to bring
about the freedom of their peoples! Who will uphold these freedoms in
places where they are still quite young?

23 See Revelation 3,20 and Mark 10,21. Going to the very extreme of the
gift of ourselves by a yes for an entire lifetime can be a support for
those who take to heart the continuities of Christ. This yes is an anchor
for inner freedom and the reminder of a clear meaning of life in the
Gospel: to give it forc others. They are well present throughout the
world, those who, by the gift of themselves, reflect something of the
holiness of Christ without even realizing it.

24 John the Baptist announced that Christ would baptize "in the Holy
Spirit and in fire" (Matthew 3,11).

25 I Thessalonians 5,19.

end



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