Today many people are incapable of living intensely in the present, of feeling what they experience. The old monks developed a method of living completely in the present...a method of meditation they called ruminatio...to chew over. So they took words from scripture into their mouth and kept chewing them over. They repeated them in their hearts, considered and reconsidered them, looked at the word from all sides. The word became flesh in them. It changed them. It gave them something to hold onto in their spiritual unrest and the noisy world. It enabled them to live completely for the moment.
Mattie Stepanik is a personal friend and one of the most remarkable young people I have known. He wanted to be a peacemaker and through his poems and own courageous example, he proves that finding peace within one's self can lead to harmony among families, communities, and nations. With wisdom and uncomplicated vision Mattie reminds us how easy it is to forgive others, to find something amazing even in the most trivial things, and to celebrate the little gifts of each day.
~ President Jimmy Carter in JOURNEY THROUGH HEARTSONGS by Mattie Stepanik (age 10)