It was the Bible of the speeches of Abraham Lincoln and Martin Luther King Jr., says author Jon Sweeney. “It’s the basis of cultural identity in the United States more than any other book.”

Brother Paul Quenon, who was inspired to write by his mentor Thomas Merton, says “the purpose of the monastic life in the modern world is to show that we don’t need a purpose. The purpose of life is life.”

Read four poems by Brother Paul Quenon, who entered the Abbey of Gethsemani, a Trappist monastery in Kentucky, in 1958.

Welsh poet and Anglican priest R.S. Thomas (1913-2000) has been described as "a poet of the cross, the unanswered prayer, the bleak trek through darkness.”

Writer Mary Karr says what struck her about Catholicism "wasn't the grandeur of the Mass, it was the simple faith of the people" and "the carnality of the church. There was a body on the cross."

Watch much more of correspondent Judy Valente's conversation with Mary Karr about God, prayer, poetry, and the Catholic faith.

"The psalms continue to be wholly relevant to our spiritual quests today," says poet, writer, and former rabbinical student Pamela Greenberg.

Watch more of producer Susan Goldstein's interview with writer Pamela Greenberg, whose new translation of the Book of Psalms is being praised for its literary beauty.

View a gallery of images illuminating the psalms by Hebrew manuscript artist Debra Band.

"One day a year we make a journey in the company of the whole community of Israel—all of us together, each of us alone."