IT WAS ONE of those moments that I did not see coming. I am not a journalist, bilingual or even Catholic. Yet as the sun set on the last Saturday of 2012, I was happy to be on my knees on the cold stone of the piazza in front of St. Peter's Basilica in Rome.

I was eagerly waiting, with photojournalists and worshippers from all over the world, for a very special service to begin.

It was a traditional Taize service, rich with beauty and filled with music and words spoken in so many languages that few, if any, would understand all of it.

As I waited for the service to begin, the crowd behind me grew to include 45,000 young people from all over the world. They were in Rome to participate in a Taize Community "pilgrimage of trust on earth."

Taize is a monastic community, centered in Taize, France, and ecumenical in nature. It has a particular form of worship service that includes silence, Scripture readings in multiple languages and special chant-like hymns.

The Rome gathering was part of ongoing Taize-organized "pilgrimages of trust on earth." Prior to this event, the 2011 New Year's gathering was held in Berlin, Germany and, among other events, there was a November 2012 gathering in Kigali, Rwanda.

In Rome's five-day event, a key feature was a Saturday evening address by Pope Benedict XVI.

I had discovered Taize only six months prior on YouTube in the middle of the night. A death in the family had prompted some bouts of insomnia. So, lost between unsuccessful efforts to meditate and biding my time surfing the Web, I found the beautiful music of Taize services online to be meditative and peaceful.

Now, here I was in Rome, experiencing one of the services alongside young people of various denominations (including Catholic, Orthodox and various Protestant traditions) who had been welcomed into the homes of host families in Rome. Other participants, we were told, were sleeping on the floors of area meeting places.