Psalms are an essential part of a christian spiritual life. Psalm study is often recommended on retreats or when learning about christian communities, saints, or mystics.
This book has helped me engage with the psalms.
Songs of the heart: reflections on the psalms
By Joan Chittister
Twenty Third Publications 2011
132 pages
Book size 4.5×6.5
I learned about Joan Chittister in the Traditions of Christian Spirituality class I took in 2021. My home office/sewing room had become the center of my spiritual world… well, all of my world. So, my project “Spirituality of Sewing” formalized a practice I’ve done unintentionally at different times in my life (praying over projects or finding myself in a meditative trans at the sewing machine, etc.) I used this book and a few others as my reading material. I would read, reflect, and sew stitching prayer and meditation as I went.
This book is small and easy to take on a retreat for spiritual reading. It is also small enough to sit next to my sewing machine and cutting mat without taking up a ton of physical space. This book did take up space in my heart.
The reflections are brief but offer a few ways to engage with the psalm: reflection, soul points, wisdom story, and activity. The soul points are two or three sentence stories or questions based on the theme of the reflection. The wisdom story is shorter than the first reflection but longer than the wisdom points and comes from someone living a contemplative life, that person might be a christian or not. The activities are a range of practices that can be contemplative if we are intentional, journaling, nature walk, gratitude lists, saying “I love you” to someone who might not expect to hear it from you.
The contents are arranged thematically, but each entry has a psalm associated with it. Those aren’t in the index so I wrote them in, again with the intention of making it easier for me to look for a particular psalm to study as is my habit, but certainly the book is lovely read as is.
