Reimagine. Rediscover. Recreate.

I recently listened to an interview where the speaker provocatively said, “I don’t think we can understand MAGA until we understand the opioid crisis in the United States.” 

As the speaker continued, he spoke about the pain people are in, but being God-fearing people, they don’t want to cause suffering or hate, so we let other people do it for us.  

I never considered this.  What I do know is that people are, indeed, in much pain.  The amount of substance abuse and medicine we take to numb ourselves is not inconsequential.  

I’ve been reflecting about all of this in the context of the men PEP serves in prison. One of the most transformative lessons there is that, to heal, you must face your pain—face what you’ve done and the harm it caused. And, in that process, they gain a kind of advantage: they become deeply attuned to their own pain. 

This past Thursday, Christians around the world celebrated Maundy Thursday.  Maundy – the “mandate” to wash the feet of others – to serve others.  At my parish community that night, I saw this powerfully demonstrated.  Instead of a scripted ceremony, everyone washed one another’s feet.  Not just people they know, but people who were strangers. There was a raw, intimate service, an acknowledgment of shared humanity that went beyond familiarity. I was moved to near tears, and it took me a few minutes to figure out why.  

Because people were being present to each other in a manner that was not comfortable, and yet it was.  Service is what makes presence comfortable.  Service, not medicine, is what ails our pain.  

I think this what I see from the men I meet in prison.  Through the program, which is also made up of many rituals, they learn to serve.  And in the service, they are able to face their pain.  And in facing their pain, they accept who they are, and who others are around them. 

At a recent staff meeting, we reflected on Scripture and the idea of fun, which is also one of PEP’s 10 Driving Values. Ironically, the conversation was led by a colleague who openly admits he doesn’t regularly attend church. This alone feels meaningful.  

When the team asked me, “Chris, how do you have fun?” I realized my answer might surprise them. I’m not naturally lighthearted or considered “fun-loving”. I’m intense, driven, and focused. I replied that for me, fun is often found being present to what I am doing. When I’m focused and intentional, life becomes deeply enjoyable. 

This past week, I was in prison for a discussion on authentic manhood. I believe men, in particular, are wired for focus. I am always remind of the importance of intentionality in prison.  There are no phones to distract us.  Many people are recovering from addictions, which also distract us from intentionality.  Prison for me, is place of intense focus, though I am not sure how many people see it that way.  In prison, conversations deepen, laughter feels richer, and engagement is genuine. There’s a kind of joy that’s hard to find outside those walls—because outside those walls, we are perpetually distracted.

Many of our frustrations stem from distraction. We are constantly pulled away from what matters. Our phones buzz. Our attention fractures. We grow anxious and annoyed, not because life lacks meaning, but because we rarely give it our full attention – and it leads to a lack of enjoyment.  

We’ve trained ourselves to escape boredom instantly. The moment something feels dull, we reach for our phones. But that habit doesn’t solve the problem; it intensifies it. The answer isn’t more stimulation. It’s deeper focus.

When we become fully present—when we resist distraction and give ourselves entirely to what we’re doing—life becomes more enjoyable. Presence is not just productivity. It is joy. It is purpose. And, for me, it is fun.

I have been in prison four days this week.  It is more than usual, but it is because we have had our graduation events at a new unit, and because I have spent some extra time with our servant leaders on the inside about how we can improve the program.  There is a lot to take in, but I was so impressed their sense of service.  It has actually been a theme in many of my conversations with alumni and participants throughout much of January.  

Formation is very different than education.  Education is something you know – it is intentional and often very measurable.  Formation is much more subtle.  You can’t really measure it, but usually there is a day when you realize you have been formed.  Education is something you can do individually, but formation requires community. 

I say this because many of the men with whom we work told me that the feel like our program really begins after graduation.  They said that is when they really began to understand that success is really about service and how much they realized now that their previous notions of success were rather selfish.  When I heard this, I realized that the formation occurred after the education did – which is usually how this all works.  Once the mind is focused, the heart work can really begin.  

But you also need a reason to undergo formation.  For many of the men in prison, their families are that reason.  I recently had a conversation with a man who has been in out of prison since he was a teenager.  He recalled that he grew up without much – his mom didn’t make a lot of money, but when he was set to graduate high school, his mom splurged to buy him a congratulatory banner and a key so he could celebrate his accomplishments with his friends.  He didn’t know this until much later because he went out the night before and did some things that got him arrested.  His mother never saw him graduate.  But our team reached out to his mother, as we do all family members of the guys who are about the graduate, and she agreed to attend.  This man was awestruck that his mother would finally see him graduate after waiting nearly 30 years to do so.  

Today, than man wants people to know his story because he wants others to know the cost of the decisions we make.  He wants to be of service, and for him that is all the success he needs.  

The turning of a new year always brings a flurry of ideas and emotions.  We set resolutions about the people we want to become, but I think we often fail because those ideas are not rooted in deep reflection about who we currently are.

We lament the bareness of a January without the decorations of Christmas (and perhaps Thanksgiving and Halloween before it), and the monotone colors of winter before the glory of spring flowers begin to emerge.

Yet in life of the liturgical church, this is a deeply rich season filled with revelation about who God is.  God, in all God’s power and glory, reveals himself in a child cradled far outside the seat of power in the region.  The Magi arrive to honor power with presence and awareness.  They arrive with more curiosity than expectation.  What they discover changes their path.

In the life of the church, the following Sunday fast forwards the story by some 30 years when Jesus is baptized by John, proclaiming him as the Son of God, and revealing to us once again not only a relational God, but also how we are to be in relationship with God.  

These stages of revelation are meant to shatter our expectations, our control, our assurances.  Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks wrote, “Unity creates diversity.  So don’t think of one God, one Truth, one way.  Think of one God creating this extraordinary number of ways, the 6800 languages that are actually spoken.  Don’t think that there is only one language with which to speak to God.  The Bible is saying to us the whole time:  Don’t think that God is not as simple as you are.  Don’t think you can predict me.  I am a God who is going to surprise you.  Don’t think that we can confine God into our categories.  God is bigger than religion.”

These events we celebrate, the nativity, epiphany, and baptism are invitations into the mystery of God – not as something we cannot know, but as something that is infinitely knowable. 

So as we think about a new year, and all the work we have ahead of us, my question if we are willing to approach the year with goals and a willingness to be surprised?  What is God doing that leaves us uncomfortable, and are we willing to be present to all of that rather than reject or ignore it?

I have no doubt that God is revealing Godself to each of us, and history should remind us that it is often the opposite ways that we would expect:  the growth in the losses; the path to success through the series of failures; the joy through the sorrow; the discovery of community through experience of isolation.  

As we approach this new year, may we have the courage to wander and wonder, so that we may be surprised by God’s revelation to us and through us.   

Merry Christmas!  

The season has certainly evolved for me over the years, though as I reflect on this season, my message has been the same.  Everyone belongs.  Everything has a reason.  Everything is gift.  

I was recently sharing a story with my staff about a time I had to preach at the Children’s Mass on Christmas eve.  This is the one which occurs usually around 4 pm or so.  Church is often the last event before dinner and/or presents.   Needless to say, the kids are even more anxious than usual, and the church is packed with them!  It is also the Mass (one of only two times in the year) when the Church prescribes the reading of Jesus’ genealogy from Matthew – the long list of names that make up Jesus’ family tree.  Important to be sure, but not the most compelling if you are 8 years old.  

One year, I invited all the children to the front of the church to hold a long piece of pre-lit garland.  As I read the Gospel, I pointed to each light with the idea that that light represented the name in Jesus’ lineage.  If you are familiar with it, you know there are some people who have made some mistakes in that reading.  When I got to those names, those particular lights did not burn as brightly or were burned out completely.  

After I was done reading and pointing, I went back to the lights that were not working so well, pulled out that light.  Of course, the whole strand goes out.  I told the kids, this is the lesson:  even if we think that this light is broken, it still has to be there in order for the strand to function.  The same is true with each of us.  We all work because we are here, not necessarily because we shine brightly.  

May we all remember this in the coming year.  

I have spent much of my life working in social service organizations of one form or another, so I am profoundly aware of the difficulty this time of year can present for so many people.  When you are supposed to feel joyful and grateful, some people simply don’t – for any number of reasons.  Life is not always kind or fair.  Sometimes life is hard, even if the calendar disagrees.  

However, the community of PEP has once again offered me another perspective on this time of year.  Sometimes the joy and gratitude are not only present, but they are amplified.  Such was the case, this past Thanksgiving during the PEP celebration with staff, volunteers and participants.  Let me tell you – we had a spread!  I carved five turkeys and our office was filled with food.  By the end of the day – it was gone. 

As I watched our guys PILE food on their plates, I had not considered how meaningful a home-cooked Thanksgiving meal for the first time in years could mean to someone.  Our guys have worked hard, and it was clear to me that this was a moment to celebrate!

This is what PEP makes possible.  People make mistakes – some learn from them; others do not.  Some not only learn, but they work hard to overcome the ripple effects of those mistakes.  

This season is not always easy, and there are always reasons why people can find it difficult to celebrate today; but there are also reasons why we should – and those are the ones that I celebrate all the more.   

Most organizational websites are relatively similar:  About Us, Programs, Partners, Events, Get Involved and the like.  There is an expected pattern that help us intuitively navigate what we need to know about an organization even if we know nothing about it.  

Recently, I visited a website that presented information I didn’t expect, and I was intrigued.  Under the usual About Ussection, was listed some of the usual topics such as Our Work, Our Story, Our Leadership, but what I didn’t expect was a very detailed narrative about Our Struggles.  Even more so, every page listed out books and articles as recommended reading to give greater understanding about the topics discussed on the page.  

Intrigued, I read the Struggles page in detail, and loved it.  I wondered what it would look like if PEP did something similar?  I wondered what I would write on the page under such a heading? 

I will admit that these days I feel like I am always learning.  I am learning new things, and I am relearning things I forgot.  There are things I think I used to be good at that I need to practice again if I am going to depend on certain skills as “strengths”.

I find “authentic leadership” is better described as “learning leadership”.  When I am honest about my abilities, there is an accompanying vulnerability and recognition of the things I wish I did better.  The burden of leadership is not simply the (at times) overwhelming responsibility, but the desire to be better for the people you are leading.  

These days, the hard work and goodness I see in just about everyone around me makes me more aware of my foibles – probably because even when I think I could do better, they provide encouragement, deference and kindness.  

I recently re-read a line from Community:  The Structure of Belonging that read, “leaders bring the kitchen table and the street corner into being.”  More than offering direction or ideas, they create new contexts and use their power to convene.  There is an inherent vulnerability in this as it means power is distributed rather than held.  Yet, in doing so, so are the struggles.  Struggles are easier to name and manage when they are shared, because then it is not the struggles we must own, but the learnings and possibilities that come from them.   

I recently read Abundance by Ezra Klein and Derek Thompson.  From Wikipedia, Klein and Thompson argue that the regulatory environment in many liberal cities, while well intentioned, stymies development. They write that American liberals have been more concerned with blocking bad economic development than promoting good development since the 1970s. They say that Democrats have focused on the process rather than results and favored stasis over growth by backing zoning regulations, developing strict environmental laws, and tying expensive requirements to public infrastructure spending.

But what struck me was their point that in past decades, the model of innovation was relatively straightforward: a small number of breakthroughs, often in government-funded labs, would lead to a cascade of applications. Innovation was followed by deployment, often quite rapidly.  We were comfortable with long horizons, big leaps and uncertain outcomes.  I think of this every time I go to NASA and see the Saturn V rocket, in some cases held together by zip-ties and wires running everywhere rather than in conduit.

Often invention was quite separate from deployment or application.  There was a high tolerance for risk and longer time-frames with fewer requirements.  This is not so true today – certainly not in areas requiring governmental involvement.  

This is not to say we don’t innovation or deployment.  The rapid development of AI is a clear contradiction to this; rather, that there is not a public will for risk and experimentation.  If it is publicly funded, it has to work, or else the funding is gone.   Everything has projected outcomes, which means public innovation moves much more slowly.  We take small steps which we know are achievable because everyone is watching.  Rather than accelerate to scale, we regulate it.  The science of making science has lost its love with Eureka! moments in favor of systematic process improvements.  

Of course improvements will be necessary, but we must begin so that we may learn.  We start with what we know and we worry about the exceptions later.  They are not to be ignored, but if we begin by trying to include everyone, social innovation will be paralyzed.

So let us begin – or begin again with the science of making science.  

Is it really true that my children will not have the same opportunities or lifestyle that I have had when they are my age?  

This is the question just about every parent I know asks at some time or another.  

Not that long ago, I heard a presentation with Harvard Professor, Dr. Raj Chetty, who addressed a room of leaders on the decline of the “American Dream”.  He stated that the probability of children out-earning their parents has fallen from over 90% in 1949 to 50/50 for those born in the 1980s.

He also said that there are four key predictors to economic mobility:

1. Lower poverty rates – areas where there is a mixed income
2. More stable family structure
3. Better school quality
4. Greater social capital, which he characterized as the exposure to different career and lifestyle pathways.  

This last point got my attention for two reasons.  First, because he highlighted that both sports and religion are powerful forces for this; and second, because he spoke about the power of mentorship, which is a key component of PEP.  

I have seen this for myself so many times – the meaning and encouragement one business executive can give to an inmate when they spend time with them in prison.  The importance of the community of people, who would otherwise not know each other, who learn about the other, and have their realities changed.  This is what PEP does week after week.  

Chetty concluded that investing in opportunity is not just about fairness; it’s essential for economic growth by unlocking “Lost Einsteins.” He estimates the U.S. would have four times as many inventors if talent from all backgrounds was developed equally.

After Chetty spoke, we heard from Dr. Flavio Cuhna who called our attention to the significant increase in economic development in Houston from 1980-2010; and at the same time, the doubling of the poverty rate.  

How and why?  

Specific to Houston, he said that the region has immigrated as many people from other parts of the country and world as it had created jobs.  In other words, all the new jobs have gone to new residents.  In other words, Houston is not upskilling its own people.  

But there is another problem, which is not specific to Houston.  Trends that show:

• 1950-1970:  Employers invested in on-the-job-training, with the idea that an employee would stay with that employer for many years.  
• 1980-2000:  A shift to credentialism and cost-cutting for fear that a well-trained employee would be hired by an employer’s competitor.  Instead of developing skills, employers started buying skills, and the role of human capital formation was transferred to families and schools. 
• 2010-Present:  There is an expectation that employees are “job-ready”

The challenges of this information are significant:

• What mindset change is needed to invest in people who are forgotten, and how do you do this? 
• What are implications of technology on solutions that require people to be in contact with each other, even more so, those who are radically different than the other?  
• How do we increase commitment in a world with such limited attention spans an ever-increasing mobility?  

The answer provided to us was to find a “north star” metric – a single, unifying measure to anchor collaboration and track progress on economic mobility over time.  It has to be: 

• Valid: measures what it claims to measure;
• Responsive: reacts proportionally and quickly to real changes;
• Reliable:  consistent across time and contexts; and 
• Specific:  captures real change and distinguishes progress from stagnation. 

Could this be belonging?  Recidivism?  Something else?  

Whatever it is, a north star metric must be simple enough for everyone to understand, transparent enough for everyone to trust, and disaggregated enough to make inequality visible rather than invisible.

May we find such a star.  

18 years out of 36 years of his life.  That is how long this man had spent in prison.  I am not sure what offense was committed at so young an age to warrant this amount of time – I rarely know and never feel the need to know this about anyone.  It is simply not the point, because the person standing in front of me is not the person they were then – especially in this case.  

As he is up for parole soon, we spoke about transition out.  I cautioned that there is no way this would be easy for him – he will have to unlearn so much of what he learned inside – stuff he isn’t even aware of yet.  We spoke the importance of learning to tell his story: not to shy away from his experience; rather to lean into it, limiting the details, but speaking about what you learned as a result of those details.  

Many times, people are tempted to speak about where they are going “back” to.  Back to home.  Back to family.  Back to the job they once had.  Back.  I tell people it is a word they need to strike from their vocabulary, because if they are going back, then all this is in vain.

The opportunity is to see this time as a type of formation, helping you to be someone you could not have been without this experience.  I realize it can be a tall order, but if you don’t, then it will be easy to be angry when you get out.  For better and worse, people are formed in prison.  This is intentional.  The question is what do you keep and what do you let go of.  Somethings you learn to survive in the inside, but they have no place on the outside.  My challenge is for guys to start thinking about what those things are.  In doing so, you begin to tell you story, or really, you learn how to edit your story so that people you for who you are today.