Words to the Wise

In my Psalms class, in preparation for our study of Psalm 130, Sr. Irene Nowell asked us to find repeated words and phrases in verses 5 to 8. Repeated words indicate what is important to the psalmist. A “word cloud” (that is, a graphical image of the most frequently used words) of these verses might look something like this:

We all have our own personal “word cloud” hovering over us every day. Since I became a postulant at Mount St. Scholastica, my word cloud might look something like this:

St. Benedict says, “The 11th degree of humility is that when a monk speaks he do so gently and without laughter, humbly and seriously, in few and sensible words, and that he be not noisy in his speech,” which gives us a clue about what a Benedictine word cloud would look like. May our words reflect the life we are striving to live!