Worship Weblog

Your Psalms Stories – Request from David Van Biema

Posted by Nathan Bierma

Thursday, March 25th, 2010

We were delighted to have David Van Biema, whose religion reporting you’ve probably read in Time magazine, with us at Symposium 2010. If you attended you may have seen the below request on a flyer. Please note that as David explains, if you responded to this request at or just after Symposium, you’re asked to respond again. We’ve given David a few ideas already of people to talk to, but we want to encourage everyone reading (not just Symposium attendees) to tell him your story (or point him to someone else’s.) Thanks in advance!

Dear Symposium Attendee:

My name is David Van Biema. I’m a former chief religion writer at Time Magazine now working on a book about the Psalms for the publisher Simon & Schuster.

The book will cover the Psalms’ history and their vast number of applications in several faith traditions. A significant part of it will be devoted to the stories of believers in whose life one or more of the Psalms has played a special role.

This is a request for your assistance. If you have a special relationship with one or more psalms, or did during a particular period in your life I’d be extremely grateful if you get in touch via the e-mail address below.

Likewise, if you’re willing and know someone else in your congregation who fits the description, I would be obliged if you would pass the e-mail address to them.

psalmsproject@earthlink.net

Many many thanks for your attention and help.

David Van Biema
646 567 8461

P.S. This request may seem very familiar to some of you. I photocopied and disseminated it at the Symposium. Unfortunately, the e-mail had not yet been
activated. If you or any of your congregants tried to get and touch and the e-mail bounced back, I am extremely sorry. It works now.

Tags: Books, David Van Biema, journalism, psalms, stories, Time magazine