A Pastor Challenging the Status Quo

Good. How are you?

My name is Justin Douglas. I'm lead pastor of a church community called The Belong Collective, and we are in the Harrisburg, Pennsylvania area. And I also have a podcast called Beyond Boundaries.

That's a good question. I became a pastor because I love serving people. I love journeying with people through the highs of life and even through the lows of life. That's been a privilege I've had as a pastor.

And I like challenging the status quo in a lot of ways, pushing boundaries, and not in a negative way, but more in a way of saying: how could we innovate? How can we include more people, pushing to the margins, I guess? The marginalized especially. So that's my calling in some ways, or what I would say I'm passionate about.

I guess I wanted to be a musician, probably. I play music, I write music and sing and stuff like that. I liked that a lot, but I also did that in church growing up, and I was exposed to opportunities to lead in the church from a young age. So when it came to both of those realities, doors just opened for me to be a pastor, and I walked through that.

Definitely. I've had a number of those situations in my life. I call them moments of deconstruction. Maybe you've been handed a certain way of believing or a certain way of seeing the world, and you've constructed that, or people have handed that to you, and it's what you've built off of. Then you get some new information, or you have an experience, or you hear someone's story, and it begins to challenge what you've constructed. You have to begin to deconstruct that and build something new. I can think of a couple of instances where that deconstruction has happened in my life.

One was when I moved to Boston for a season of my life. I realized how much I had to learn about injustice in the world, especially for minorities. I lived in a community of African-Americans and Dominican-Americans, people of color, so I was the minority living in that community, and I began to be in relationship with a lot of minorities.

It challenged a lot of the stereotypes that I had been handed growing up in what was probably the inverse of that, a 97% white community. That experience, and seeing some of the challenges that people faced that I was never aware of, really opened my mind to see things a little differently around issues of race. Ultimately it sparked my desire to become more educated, and I would say I'm still on that journey, even though it's been 10 plus years since I lived in Boston. That experience opened me up to begin building something different and to go down a different journey.

The other thing that challenged me was when I was a youth pastor. I was pastoring high school students, and a high schooler walked into my office and told me that they were gay. Having this experience and journeying with that student through that opened me up to a different way of approaching that particular subject, and sexuality in general. Again, it opened me up to try to become more informed, to try to understand, to try to figure out how to compassionately journey with a student who can't even tell their parents that they're having these feelings, but needs to tell somebody, and they chose to tell me.

Those are some moments on my journey that opened me up. And now I'm at the place where I want to live in enough humility that I'm open to whatever might need to be deconstructed of what I firmly believe right now. Does that make sense? So that's a little bit of my journey.

Well, I would say both have deeply impacted my life, the way I relate to people. But when I think about my church and my podcast, for example, one of the things that's interesting in my particular field of being a pastor is that the issue of sexuality is very polarizing in religion right now in general, but in Christianity, and especially evangelical Christianity, it's really polarizing.

In the last couple of years, through so many relationships with friends that I've had and people that I've pastored who are part of the LGBT community, I've come to the conclusion that the church should be an inclusive place for them. And because I've come to that conclusion, it challenged some of the connections that I had, and the connections even our church had. So that was a transition.

So I would say: not all change comes without cost. That's been an interesting reality that meant a job shift for me, changing our church's name and location, having to move into a new season, a season of building from the ground up.

It's been nine months now since that transition occurred. It's been a challenge, definitely. But I think back to even that first student that came out to me. Again, we're talking 10 years ago. It started me on a journey, on a course that opened me up to listening to people, quite honestly, to just being willing to empathize with others' circumstances and consider if there might be a different way of approaching some of the tough topics and tough realities that we're working through in my particular field, the church. And that's led me to a vision for a church that can be more inclusive. I think we need more spiritually inclusive places in our world today.

Well, as humans, the paradigm shift that I'm most interested in is to love in the way of self-sacrificial love. I think we are built and designed for that kind of love. There's something about a story that can move us like nothing else can, and typically that is when we hear or see or know someone who has sacrificed something personally out of love for someone else.

Especially when they could have totally gone the other way, and no one would have blamed them for not making the sacrifice. Does that make sense? When people lay down something of theirs for someone else, I don't know that there's anything more beautiful in our world.

I look to Jesus as a model for that. I see that in the life of Jesus and the ministry of Jesus. But you certainly have all kinds of other leaders throughout history. I think of American history, Martin Luther King Jr. I think of Gandhi, for example. There are all kinds of different people we can look to who loved in self-sacrificial ways, and ultimately that type of love leaves a legacy.

The problem in our world is that we're inherently selfish, and everything seems to be working toward us being selfish. The things that are advertised to us are all about us: about us feeling better about ourselves, or getting something that we want or need, or convincing us that what we want is what we need.

So what are the things that are going to ground us back to self-sacrificial love in every moment of every day, recognizing that that's the way we're meant to live and that it will ultimately leave a legacy? I'm very interested in that paradigm shift. I guess I would call it a disruptive energy in our world, but disrupting in a good way.

So what rhythms, what practices can help bring that to the forefront? When we're driving down the road and someone cuts us off, the first thing we want to do is curse at them. How do we begin to realize that? How do we begin to import empathy into that? Maybe we consider that person and what they might be going through.

It can be so hard in our world to do that, to pause. But I'm interested in championing that in every single form, for every single person, because I think that builds a more beautiful world. And ultimately, I think that is the center of what Jesus was all about.

How about you? I'm interested in hearing from you on that one, as an innovator as well. The paradigms, and what you see even in people in spirituality. I'd be interested.

No, that's good. I think you're onto it. I think creation care, as I would call it, really matters: how we care for God's creation, how we care for this world. We only have one, so we really need to take care of it, and I think there's a lot of change that has to happen in that.

Some people say it's too late. Some people say there's still a chance to right some of the wrongs, whatever's happening. I'm not a scientist, so I don't know, but I do know that it's not good, and we need to consider all the remedies that are out there to help our world. There are a lot of scientists who have a lot of great ideas, and hopefully some of those can be put into place.

When it comes to artificial intelligence, I'm very interested in that conversation. I actually did a whole podcast episode, I think it was episode number 10 of my podcast, where we talked a little bit about that. I talked with a doctor about that.

The thing I'm interested in is twofold, and I'll speak to my profession, the church and pastors. I think it's going to affect us in a lot of ways. One is the reason you're asking: how does this affect how we view consciousness? How does this affect what we think in that particular area? Especially when we begin to merge with technology. We already have in a lot of ways. If you're an amputee, for example, you may have access to certain technologies that would have been sci-fi 50 years ago. So we've already merged with technology, and you could even argue everyone's merged with technology, in that we always have our phones with us.

It's just a matter of time before they become implanted in some way, so that we'll never lose them. Some people are going to be very uncomfortable with that transition, but I think you'd be ignorant to believe that that transition isn't fast approaching. We are going to merge at some point. I'm wearing AirPods in my ears. How much easier to implant something that's standardized? I'm not saying that's a good thing. I'm not saying I support that idea. I'm just saying it's coming. The reality is that we are always seeking convenience.

So at some point we're going to have that. And I think that's going to be a conversation spiritually, because, as I like to say, as humans sometimes we need to disconnect to reconnect. What I mean by that is: we are of the dirt and from the dirt, maybe, is the way of saying it, and we need to reconnect to something that grounds us.

Technology doesn't always do that. And as spiritual beings, and I believe we are inherently spiritual beings, how will we be able to disconnect when technology becomes a part of us in a way that makes it really incredibly difficult, or maybe even impossible, to disconnect?

These are important questions, and we should answer them not from a position of fear, which I think the church typically does. The church typically answers questions like that from a position of fear: "Stay away from it. Don't do it!" And it all becomes about the prohibition of technology. "Stay away! Don't do it! It's bad! It's evil!"

I think we need to be thinking differently. We need to be thinking about why people will say yes to this, and how we can integrate spirituality within it, maybe, and how we can ensure these new pathways of consciousness. Not that AI is necessarily going to provide us that, but we will in some ways be merging with that technology, or at least associating with it very closely and consistently, so we need to be thinking about how we integrate our spiritual essence with that. Right? That should be something the church is legitimately thinking about. It should be one of the top three problems we're thinking about in the church.

And the truth is, I don't know many pastors or people in the church who are legitimately giving this time and thought. And I think it's already going to be too late by the time they even start considering ways in which that can happen.

In some ways it's like what Elon Musk would say about artificial intelligence. I'm not super confident that by the time we get there, we're going to have much of, I guess, the guardrails in place. I think it's almost going to be the wild, wild West in some ways by that time. He gives a great analogy about cars, for example: it's not until a certain number of people died that we decided seatbelts were necessary. And with artificial intelligence, I feel like we're not going to actually address the problems we need to address until we've seen them long enough. And by that point, I just wonder if the cat will be too far out of the bag. Does that make sense? And that's unfortunate.

You can stop me if you have other questions, but one other way I think it's deeply going to impact the church is this: the church is usually at the forefront of ministries of compassion.

For example, our church partners with an organization in Harrisburg that serves the homeless in Harrisburg. We're serving people who are poor, who are without food, without shelter, and we're seeking to help bring hope and hopefully some semblance of dignity into their lives.

I think most churches are working in some capacity to do that kind of compassion ministry. Well, one of the things I think artificial intelligence may very well do is put a lot of people out of work, and create a lot of situations where you're going to have individuals who once were able to have an income, but now that particular job has been handed over to a computer or to a robot, or whatever.

It could, in essence, create mass poverty if not done well, I guess would be a way of saying it, or if we don't create some solutions. I know there are some people who are saying a UBI, a universal basic income, is something we need to be considering. I know in the States that's been talked about a little bit, and we may be really far off from a need for something like that.

But I think it could very well transform the church as those needs become larger within our communities, because more people are out of work or more people are barely getting by. It could also transform the church's mobilization toward those compassion ministries, and that's something we should be thinking about: how we potentially can expand those programs, or be ready to expand if necessary. I know I said a lot, but that's some of what I think about when I think about artificial intelligence affecting the church especially.

When it comes to the Bible, I would simply say that I think the Bible should be read and understood as literature [written] at a time and place, which was ultimately speaking to that time and that place. So we should not read the Bible literally, we should read it literately: the Bible is literature and should be understood as such. And just to be clear, that doesn't remove the power of the text. That doesn't remove the inspiration of the text, in my mind. It just puts the text in its right place to be best understood. So that's how I read the Bible.

Now, with the question you asked, some people would immediately go to the Book of Revelation and begin pulling out passages and connecting them to the end of the world, right? I hear that a lot in Christian circles. The struggle is that that particular book is Jewish apocalyptic literature, of which we only have a few books that really fall under that category.

They were largely coded messages that were trying to communicate, usually, a revolutionary idea: follow Jesus through the persecution that you're going through. In the Book of Revelation there's a lot of symbolism that seems to be pointing toward Nero. Christians were very persecuted at that time under Emperor Nero. And it is about following the Lamb, the Lamb being the model of Jesus, self-sacrificial love, back to that. Following that even in the midst of deeper persecution and even martyrdom.

So I don't necessarily look at the Book of Revelation as a book that's full of prophecies, if we could just understand it. But what I do think is unique and interesting is that when we look at the whole Bible, we have one particular story that maybe is helpful when we think about innovation.

That story, I think, would be the Tower of Babel. In the Tower of Babel story, bricks begin to be built. It seems like maybe for the first time in human history, or at least for the first time in these particular individuals' history, they discover bricks and they're able to build. And ultimately, with that technology, they determine that they want to be like God.

So they begin to build this tower to heaven. Does that make sense? Ultimately with this idea of holding power in a way that would make them like God, or like gods. And that did not end well for those individuals in that story. The story goes that they were all speaking one language, and then they began to speak different languages and were not able to understand and coordinate with one another to continue to build that tower.

Now, whether or not that story is an allegory for technology and for man's desire to be God or be like God, I think the story shares a lot about what we do with new technologies. Do we take these bricks and try to use them to make ourselves like gods, like God, to take power and to take our place on a throne? Or do we begin to think about how we use technology to serve other people and to provide something for others?

I think that story can teach us a lot about what typically is the downfall when technology is used simply to grow our own power and amass our own wealth. These are all important things to consider when it comes to new technologies of any kind, but certainly artificial intelligence. Because if there's anything that's going to convince us we can be like God, it's something like artificial intelligence, right? That will convince us.

We can create, and I do believe we're created to create. In the Genesis story, we are made in the image of God, and ultimately the image of God is a creator. God is creating, God is creative. You're doing a podcast, which is a creative endeavor. We're created to be creative. So it's not negative that we create. The question is how responsible we are for what we create, and ultimately the ramifications it will have on humanity. And I would say artificial intelligence could very well have some negative while also positive [outcomes]. So we need to be thinking about the outcomes, even in the midst of our creations.

It's a hard concept to really put into a TED talk, because you have a limited period of time. You have to get people's attention, and then you have to explain what I think is in a lot of ways a simple system, but it's also complex when you start to put it into play. Right?

Sure. I would actually echo exactly what you just said: bounded set tends to be our default. Just so everybody understands bounded set, and you can watch the TED talk if you'd like. It's called "Beyond Boundaries". You just google "Beyond Boundaries" and my name, Justin Douglas, and you'll find it if you want to watch it.

The bounded set is this idea that most communities, and again, as a pastor, I'll speak as a pastor, but you could apply this to a private school, a government, whatever. Communities typically organize around their values, their beliefs, in church dogma, theology, whatever it would be.

And you create a boundary, a circle around your group that defines in a lot of ways who you are and what you're about, and it lets people know the boxes they have to check to get in. And it lets people know that if they uncheck the boxes, they're going to be kicked out. In a lot of ways, we're tribal beings. It describes the identifying factors of the tribe, and what makes you part of the tribe or out of the tribe.

Now, bounded set is not always unhealthy. I think that's important to reference. We need boundaries in some places. Usually the pushback I get is, for example: if you go to Harvard, you're part of a bounded set. You are going to Harvard, there are people who aren't, and that is a boundary right there. You applied, you got in, others didn't. But that's not inherently negative. It becomes negative if, for some reason, you aren't going to Harvard because of the color of your skin. Now we have a problem!

Does that make sense? Now we have a reason you're outside that ultimately is unhealthy and unhelpful. And I would say that throughout church history, again, I'm speaking to my particular circle, we've operated in bounded set in some very unhealthy and unhelpful ways.

My vision is that we would consider what it would look like to have a centered set model. The centered set says: here's what we're all aiming for, here's the target that we're all going for. That would be your values, your beliefs, all of that, right? But everyone's invited to participate and to move in that direction.

An example that I like to use: myself and another pastor on our staff at the time had a conversation about racism, and we had asked an individual in our community to be on the panel for that. That individual was not a follower of Jesus, and that wasn't a problem for us. We were fine with them being on the panel that we were going to have about racism. They were someone in our community that we deeply respected, and we wanted their voice to be heard at this event that our church was sponsoring.

So we asked them, and a week later we were sitting and talking with them, and the individual said: "I just really feel like God is calling me to do this, and I've been praying about it." And for us, we were like: "What? You've told us you don't pray!" And that was a celebration for us, a moment of celebration, because we felt like we had had a small part in connecting them to some movement that was happening in their life spiritually, something that was moving them closer to the center.

Had we been bought into bounded set, we would never have seen that, and we would never have celebrated it. Because ultimately the only thing you celebrate in bounded set is when someone comes over the boundary. And this person hadn't come over the boundary of a typical Christian tradition, right? But what they had done is open up to something, even open up to prayer. And that was something that we really celebrated, the movement they were making towards God in some way, right?

I think the church needs to become more open in the sense of centered set, so that we can journey with people right where they are, instead of expecting them to come all the way up to the boundary and cross the boundary before we ever get to know them in a real, true, intimate way.

That, to me, is the vision I have for the church. And look, centered set falls apart in a lot of ways. Just like any system, you can break it down and share all the reasons it won't work. But what I do think it helps us do is shift our thinking and our paradigm, to at least acknowledge when we're operating in bounded set and when we're operating in centered set, how we should be operating, and whether or not it's loving.

Does that make sense? Again, boundaries are in some ways necessary, or just part of the human experience. But they don't always have to be. And often we create boundaries around what we're afraid of before we ever understand it. So it can be a mechanism that insulates us from the experiences of others.

So we have to be conscious and aware of how we use bounded set. And I think centered set gives us a more open spirit and a more open platform to experience the journeys of others and consider what they need and where they're at. Does that help a little bit?

Yeah, sure.

Yes. Any centered set can quickly become a bounded set, if those values become things that keep other people out. You just might have a bigger, wider circle, right? So I think it's important to say there are some healthier bounded sets, and there are some really, really toxic bounded sets. It's not that all bounded sets are bad.

But the way I would define it is: yes, the center may be, in our case at The Belong Collective, the church that I'm a part of, we say: "The Belong Collective is a fully inclusive, Jesus-shaped community, practicing the way of love for the good of all." That is our center.

Everyone is invited to join in on that. Everyone! No one's left out. If you don't identify with the idea of a church that's inclusive, then you may not want to be a part of it, but we're not telling you you can't be here. Does that make sense?

Because sometimes with bounded set, we're saying: you don't belong here. And with centered set, I think we're inviting everyone, even people who don't agree with us. The difference is: if you come here and you don't like it, you might not want to stay. We're not going to change for you, but you don't have to change for us to be here. Does that make sense?

We've had people attend our church, for example, who are atheists. They don't believe in Jesus, but they're like: "I really love this community, and you guys really love people." We're not telling that person they have to follow Jesus. Now, I'm going to tell you I think following Jesus and the model of Jesus would be good for them. I think that would be a great example for them. But ultimately, we're not going to say: until you make that decision, you can't belong here. They can fully belong here. Why can't they be here?

So I think that becomes a factor, at least. Again, I'm applying this to the church world, but I do think there are business models that are interesting too. Think of a more philanthropic model like TOMS Shoes, for example. Most shoe companies are in the business of a bottom-line budget and making money, and that becomes the boundary they define everything by. All their values are about the bottom line: making money! Well, what if you flip that and create a centered set model that is a compassionate model around solving a need in our world, and you're inviting other people to participate in that?

Well, now it's less about what you get and more about what you give. And that's the mind shift that I think is ultimately motivated by compassion. Centered set tends to be motivated by compassion and by inclusion, including other people. So whatever field you're in, it's probably going to apply differently, and you're probably going to have to do some work to figure out exactly where you maybe need boundaries.

An example: we need boundaries in church too. We have a kids' ministry. If you're a registered sex offender, you cannot serve in our kids' ministry. That's a boundary. Does that make sense? I'm not saying we shouldn't have some boundaries to protect, because the scriptures tell us love protects.

So we should be protecting in love too. The difference, though, is: are we protecting from a place of a fear that's unfounded? In my country's history, we have a history of fear of African-Americans. And that motivated us towards some terrible things in our history, and in the church, terrible things. I think that happened because we had a boundary that didn't allow us to experience the humanity of one another and the fact that we were the same. And that's where I think centered set doesn't allow us to be comfortable within our boundary. We have to get outside of it, and we have to see others for who they are, and then determine at that point whether or not we're going to love. You know?

The way of saying it that might be easiest is: you don't have to believe the dogma of the community to be a part of the community. Whereas in bounded set, you have to believe what everyone else believes to belong. Does that make sense?

I think we're living in a world of tons and tons of new ideas and beliefs and worldviews, and the idea that you and I, for example, would believe the same thing about any number of things just seems silly. There are too many options. There are too many different beliefs. Why would we create a system where you and I have to believe the same to be in community with one another? I think there are ways to be in community with people you disagree with in a healthy way.

And the truth is, at least in American politics, our politics are revealing the consequence of an idea that if I don't believe like you about a certain problem in our world, then we just shouldn't be friends anymore and we should cut each other off. That's very unhealthy. Cancel culture, canceling people because they believe differently than you, I think it's very unhealthy. It typically does not work well for either side, or for whatever you're trying to do in the world. If you cancel somebody, it pushes them further into their corner, if you're trying to expose them to a more compassionate ethic.

But it's also just not good for communities to think that we all have to believe the same. We all come from different experiences, and different fears that are often motivating our beliefs. That's important to acknowledge and affirm, and then to consider how we can do life together.

We're not going to get any closer to a solution if we keep dividing. That's not going to bring us closer to a solution in the church, it's not going to bring us closer to a solution in government, and ultimately, as people, it's not going to bring us closer together. So I think what bounded set does is it forces division, whereas centered set is always championing how we can stay in community with one another despite our differences of belief. Does that make sense?

It seems like, when we talked about technological advancement for artificial intelligence, the technological advancement of social media has not helped how we see each other, how we communicate with each other, or how we remain connected despite our differences.

Twitter, with a limited number of characters to communicate vastly complex ideas, sometimes isn't super helpful when it comes to that. Facebook the same. A lot of times these can be places that are working to cause divisions. And I would even say there's a certain amount of artificial intelligence happening there, in that the algorithms are sometimes built to breed discord. Because when those arguments happen, fingers are typing, the platform's getting used, the ads are being sold. So there is also an incentive for those platforms to champion hot topics that are going to get people talking and frustrated and angry.

That's definitely played a role in the fact that politicians who once could walk out of the governmental chambers and sit down for a meal and legitimately talk about their wives and kids and hopes and dreams and fears, and be in relationship with one another, now it seems like everything they say is deeply personal toward one another and isn't in any way championing common humanity.

So we need reform, I think, in every aspect of our life right now, because we're still reeling from the effects of, you could even argue, the internet in general and how connected we are in this new age. And then also social media. And it doesn't seem like it's getting less complex anytime soon. It's only going to grow in complexity. So we need to be thinking about how we can remain connected despite the complexity, despite the complexity of worldviews and differences of ideas, to solve the problems of our day. We should still remain connected to one another despite that, and that's really hard.

And centered set: I don't really like systems. Systems die. Centered set is just a system of thought that will die. If I thought it was the best system ever and it was going to live forever, I'd be trying to write a book and sell a book and doing all kinds of things about it.

I think all it does is help us mentally make a shift in how we approach people we disagree with, and how we see them as part of our tribe, not another tribe. That, I think, is really important, especially in our world today.

I have not read it, but I know it. It's on my list of things I need to read. Do you like it? Did you read it?

We see a lot of "We are great and they are not" in politics, for example, with Republicans or Democrats: our side's great and their side's awful. Well, that's better than self-centered, just about me. Does that make sense? But it can still breed some pretty destructive stuff.

When we can come to that conclusion of "we're working together, we're all moving together", there may be a need to sit down and wrestle through our ideas and compete with the ideas together. We're going to do that together, not separately. Does that make sense? We're not going to devalue someone's humanity because they have a different idea. We're not going to cancel somebody because they have a different idea.

Now, an idea may be very destructive, and we need to call out that destructiveness if it's a bad idea, or if it's an idea that's going to harm a lot of people. But ultimately, that person probably came to that conclusion because of something within the worldview or experience they were handed that needs to be deconstructed. And we should do the hard work of coming alongside them and helping them journey through what needs to be deconstructed, disrupted in their worldview that maybe has handed them a poor outlook.

I know I had gracious people in my life who were willing to journey with me when I walked into the streets of Boston thinking that I knew everything, but really I knew nothing about racial issues in America. Does that make sense? It took people who were gracious with me, and those people easily could have just canceled me. And I don't know what I would have done. I don't think I would have learned some of the lessons I needed to learn had I just been shut off. So I think that last stage you talk about is really something that we need to be striving for.

That's hard. It's so much easier to say "We're right, they're wrong", and it's that simple. It's so much easier to say "I'm right and everyone else is wrong", it's that simple. Our monkey brain goes to that place, you know what I mean? That reptilian brain, whatever you want to call it, that animal instinct that we have, to just make it simple and easy and be done with it and wash our hands and move on.

The harder work is the work that says: how do we stay in community with one another amidst our differences? We need more communities like that, and I call those inclusive communities. We need more inclusive communities. That will hopefully bring us out of some of this negative tribalism we've seen.

Again, tribalism can be really good. If you're in junior high and you're sitting at the lunch table all by yourself, that's a hard place to be, and that's lonely. I would want that junior high kid, that 12-year-old, that 13-year-old, to find their tribe. It might be with the band, it might be with the basketball team, it might be any number of groups that they might find a connection with.

We need to have a connection with people who are similar to us or have similar interests. So again, tribalism is not always bad. It's bad when it becomes exclusionary, when it becomes "We're better than you!" That is really when it becomes negative. And we have an opportunity, I think, at this particular point in human history, to look at the data, even of just every day.

We don't have to go far back in human history. We can look at today's data for how we're talking to one another and say: "Wow, we've really missed the mark on how to do this whole thing together." And then take that and say: "Okay, so the only way this is going to happen is if it starts with me. I have to show a different path to the people in my life." And if enough of us take that and begin to do that, and love in a self-sacrificial way, it could make a difference, you know?

Especially because we're so global now. It's not just nations doing their own thing. Whatever China does is going to affect America. Whatever America does is going to affect China, and every other country in between. We have to be working together when we think about our climate crisis. Because if one country tries to change... we're connected now as a world in a way we've never been before, and the problems that used to be just a nation's to solve are now problems that we even need to approach as the world. All of us have to come together. Humanity has to come together and think about how we're going to approach some of these.

And we have to do that with a level of humility, to hear from other people who are going to have vastly different worldviews and experiences than us. Again, how do we remain connected and open to hearing from one another amidst that? That's something that I think the centered set provides a model for.

Wow, that's a good question. I think, first and foremost, my impact starts with my family. I hope my wife and kids know and have felt my love for them. I have three kids. Assuming I'm alive long enough to see this, and my children are interested in having their own children, I would love to even have a legacy with my grandchildren, if I was so blessed. So I think it starts there. I would hope that I handed them a foundation of love in the way that they related to me, but also in the way that they were inspired to relate to others. So that would probably be the first thing on my deathbed.

And secondly, that my legacy would be that I was not always right. I got it wrong a lot of the time. But ultimately, I loved people, and I was always working to champion love in my own life and in the communities that I was a part of, and that people felt loved when they were in my presence. That's my desire.

There are a lot of accomplishments that I would love to have. I have goals, don't get me wrong. I would like to write a book at some point. I would like to do certain things. But I don't know if I'm going to be on my deathbed thinking about the book I wrote.

I think I'll be thinking about the relationships I had with people, and the moments that I journeyed with people who were going through the loss of a loved one, or the moments that I celebrated with a family when they just had their first kid, or the moments where I married a couple. You know what I mean?

Those are going to be the moments where I think I'll have journeyed with people through their life in the way of love, and inspired them to love and to grow in their life. And hopefully that'll have an impact on our world and on those particular individuals, and that legacy will go on.

Thank you! It was great.