When monks pray the Psalms

In the monastic life, we pray the book of Psalms on a regular and routinary basis. We recite the 150 Psalms in a week subdivided from Sunday til Saturday of the week, hence, we recite them eight times a day in a week.

The chant tones of praying the Psalms each day becomes multifaceted, that is, God speaks to each of the praying monks through particular texts but God also speaks contemplatively at a deeper level that involves no words.

What is it that God wants to say to each one of the praying monks through the texts of the Psalms?

In everyday that the monks pray, they encounter words that are varied- sometimes they are challenging texts, sometimes they are comforting, sometimes they bring the stillness from the sound of silence and sometimes the roar of the devouring fire.

Lament Psalms give voice to the monks' raw emotions- in all the world's chaos, pains, ugliness, and honesty. This enables the praying monks to intercede on behalf of those who find it difficult to continue holding their hands up in prayer and supplication.

The monks pray these Psalms together with the suffering being lifted up before God. The world's pain, terror, and horror becomes theirs. In solidarity, the monks take on the mind and heart of the suffering, the possibility of their conversion and transformation. The monks pray these Psalms in witness and as protest against the unjust system and greed that inflict suffering. They pray these Psalms for the silenced, the ignored, and the oppressed to denounce evil and claim freedom as promised by our Liberating God.

As the monks pray these Psalms, they can enter fully into the emotions expressed in these rough texts, they can experience the feelings, emotions, and situations of the peoples' lives. They can pray in such a way that their hearts are stretched so that the pain of others becomes their pains as well. Their hearts will be transformed into tender, compassionate and listening hearts.

Monks pray these Psalms as denunciation of evil and the world's insensitivity to the plight of the majority of its people. This is a kind of denunciation that challenges the monks to see the injustice that is difficult for most people to look at.

Finally in praying the Psalms, the troublesome and horrific burdens of daily living move the monks' hearts to the core of their beings making them lift up these conditions before God.