Q. Let's start off with the "formative years" of your late-boyhood/early-adolescence in the 80's; are there any current events that stand out in your memory from that period?

A. The event that stands out most is having gone to Cape Canaveral, Florida right at the time when they launched the Space Shuttle Discovery.  My parents took me and my brother there in '84 and it made a big impact on us.

Then in '86, I remember being home sick from school and watching the TV coverage of the Space Shuttle Challenger's take-off and then seeing it blow up.  I was watching live and I just couldn't believe my eyes.

On a lighter note though, I remember being woken up early–early in the morning by my parents to watch Charles and Diana getting married.

Q: How about––again in the 80's–– any TV shows or musical artists that made an impression on you in your teen years? 

A: Musically, it was the time of the heavy 80's synthesizers and the beginnings of Rap.  But I thought I was too cool to listen to what my peers were interested in, because my big sisters had played songs for my brother and me by bands from a slightly earlier era, like Aerosmith, Boston, and the Who.

Then again . . . I'm going to have to say that I did get into the trending 80's pop music, like Cyndi Lauper.  And the first album I ever bought was Madonna.  My sisters teased me incessantly about that, especially because I spent all the money I had on that album; it was hard-earned cash I made from shoveling snow!

As far as TV shows, I remember that my brother and I watched the Beatles––a cartoon show––on Saturday mornings.

Q.Here's a birthday-related question about those responsible for your birth––your mom and dad––and God, of course.  Can you call to mind something about your mom and dad that you're grateful for?

A.First, their never-ending kindness and love.  Mom was always around, always there for us.  And Dad's joy in making people happy kind of rubbed of on me, I think, as a real important thing in life.  And, on a lighter note, my mom's love of cooking.

Q. Where did you grow up? And can you talk about friends or siblings that you enjoyed hanging out with and who probably had an influence on you in some way?

[Video Transcript] A. In Rockford, Illinois, which is north-central Illinois. My younger brother and I played a lot together and I remember daring each other to jump off the shed roof into the sandbox filled with water.  With other friends, I did the typical things of riding bikes around town and getting into mischief.  

I used to go with a friend named Dave Augustine and explore these creeks in town off the Rock River.  It was where a lot of the sewer tunnels came in. We would dare each other to go further and further up into those pipes. Years later, when our parents found out about it, they couldn’t believe it. . . . That was not real smart

Q.Did you grow up going to church?

A.Yes, I grew up in a Methodist church.  I sang in the choir from grade school on up, and participated in the youth groups.  My parents are still part of that community.

Q.Are there any hymns that you liked or that you still like particularly?

[Video Transcript] A. There are a couple that go way back, which is part of what makes them meaningful to me––and to a lot of people––I think.  "Jesus Christ is Risen Today" is one.  I remember singing it with my parents and especially hearing my dad's booming bass voice.  

And I remember being in the youth choir along with the combined choirs at Easter time.  To a little kid, it seemed like hundreds of voices coming from everywhere.  It was probably just a couple of dozen people.

Q. Did you continue in your faith pretty consistently from your childhood or was there a time in your life when your faith became substantially more important to you?

[Video Transcript] A. I think it was  . . .  "moderate-level-consistent" [laughs] for a long time.  There were times with doubts of course.  I can tell you about a couple of times that it became even more important.  One was three or four years ago when my mom called saying that the doctor had found a malignancy, a tumor on her breast, and she was waiting to hear back the results of the test.  I was like "Oh no!"  I didn't know what to do at the time.

I happened to be in D.C. and I remember I was getting off the metro and I just went and sat in an Episcopal Church––an old historical one near where I worked.  I prayed and hoped that everything would come out well . . . and it did, luckily.

The other time [that faith was important] was when I had a health scare this past March-April [2021].  I had really high blood-pressure spikes and horrible headaches.  We went to the emergency room a couple of times.  My blood pressure was off the charts.

They stabilized me and did a battery of tests over two months to figure out what it was.  It turned out it was this luckily benign tumor on the adrenal gland––extremely rare and potentially lethal.  Luckily again, UVa hospital had one of the few specialists in this.

But that whole time really brought faith into focus as far as needing that to lean on.

Q. Are there any books that have influenced your life or your faith?

A. The one book that springs to mind is "Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance".  Through the story about riding a motorcycle it advocated taking the backroads, and byways––the slower roads––instead of being in a hurry to get to the next destination.  I often feel that way, not trying to get places as fast as possible, but enjoying the interim. 

Q. You mentioned the positive influence of your parents and your siblings.  Do you recall others who played a helpful role in shaping your life path?

A. I think I was lucky in that when I got out of college, I worked with someone I looked up to, who recognized certain qualities in me that they wanted to foster.  That was in the mid-1990s, but I'm still in touch with some of the people who mentored me.

The events of 2017 in Charlottesville brought back so much of what I'd learned back  then because we had worked on desegregation in the Illinois public schools. I called up those friends and we related what was going on in Charlottesville to our experiences advocating for racial minorities in Illinois.

Q. In your early adult years or even more recently, is there anything you've found admirable or inspiring in the life of Jesus?

A. Yes––the teaching of grace, and of turning the other cheek. . . . A lot of times it's about giving the benefit of the doubt to the person you're dealing with and trying to understand where they might be coming from.

Q.  Okay Matt, here is what is sometimes called the "Miss America Pageant question":  What is your wish for the world . . . in what way could we see things get better:

A. A way that––it would be hard to operationalize––but if people could all just sit down and have a cup of their favorite beverage, hopefully in person, and talk and get to know one another, hopefully that could help bridge some of the divides.

We all need to have more beers together [laughter] . . . or coffee!

Q. Anything we haven't covered that you feel like adding?

A. I want to add that we really feel fortunate that we've found such a great church and community at Christ Church.