126 PART TWO: AN EMPIRICAL ACCOUNT since it has significant implications for the relationships between the monastics in particular and the communities in general with the respective churches, as well as for their vision of ecumenism and Christian unity. For now, it is important to note that the wish for a shared life and common prayer is at the heart of the interviewees’ motivation to join Bose and Taizé. To a certain extent, this contradicts my own implicit assumption in the Catholica article (integrated in this dissertation as sections 1.3 and 1.4) that the ecumenical communities differ significantly from mixed couples with regard to their motivation for engaging in intimate relationships with Christians from other confessions. Since the communities explicitly highlight their ecumenical nature and mission, I had assumed that the motivation of individual members was primarily fueled by a similar intention. However, the interviews indicate that this is not necessarily the case: the monastics that I have interviewed stress the priority of their desire for communal life, leaving only a secondary role for ecumenical intentions. BE strikingly speaks in terms of falling in love when it comes to his motives to opt for the life in Bose. 300 Concerning his reasons to seek religious life, he states: I think, what attracted me to monastic or to religious life, uh, was just the fact that I saw communities of men and women, where um…. this form of life was lived… and was lived well {laughs}. Where people gave the impression to be glad and to be balanced persons, and to realize their life. And this witness gave me the impression, if they can be happy in this form of life, why not me?301 As such, it was not an intellectual decision but an intuition that he followed, centered on the common life in itself rather than on the promotion of ecumenical progress. The experiences of the interviewees resemble those of the founders. Both Brother Roger and Brother Enzo were driven by a desire for a communal life. In the case of Roger Schutz, this desire always had an ecumenical implication given that the Reformed tradition had abolished monastic life. He intended to restore monasticism, both by rooting his own community in the Catholic monastic tradition and by adapting it to Reformed insights and requirements. Concerning the former, it is symbolically highly significant that Taizé is located close to the ruins of the once so influential abbey of Cluny, a site so important for monastic reforms from the tenth century onward. 300 BE-2,20. 301 BE-1,58.
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