Chapter 18: The order for reciting the psalms (paragraph 4)

Above all else we urge that if people find this distribution of the psalms unsatisfactory, they should arrange whatever they judge better, provided that the full complement of one hundred and fifty psalms is by all means carefully maintained every week, and that the series begins anew each Sunday at Vigils. For members who in a week's time say less than the full psalter with the customary canticles betray extreme indolence and lack of devotion in their service. We read, after all, that our holy ancestors, energetic as they were, did all this in a single day. Let us hope that we, lukewarm as we are, can achieve it in a whole week.  (From para. 4 of Saint Benedict's Rule, trans. by Patrick Barry, OSB, 1997.)

Benedict sees my extreme indolence, lack of devotion, and lukewarmness. And yet, I find in his guidance an urging respect the tradition of saying the psalms, along with encouragement to discern what pattern of devotion works in my life. Fr John has taught me the firm discipline of the mantra, as a way of devotion, and as a way of discernment.