The relentless realism of the psalms is not depressing in the way that television news can be, although many of the same events are reported: massacres, injustices to those who have no one to defend them, people tried in public by malicious tongues. As a book of praises, meant to be sung, the Psalter contains a hope that "human interest" stories tacked on to the end of a news broadcast cannot provide. The psalms mirror our world but do not allow us to become voyeurs. In a nation unwilling to look at is own violence, they force us to recognize our part in it. They make us reexamine our values.
Kathleen Norris
The Cloister Walk
The Cloister Walk
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