Proclaim Peace Episode 32 // From the CIA to the Classroom: How Experience Shapes Perspectives on Peace with Jeannie Johnson

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In this episode of the Proclaim Peace Podcast, hosts Jennifer Thomas and Patrick Mason explore a broader understanding of peace and peacemaking. They emphasize the importance of expanding the conversation to include diverse perspectives and forms of peace. Joining them is Dr. Jeannie Johnson, a professor of political science at Utah State University and director of the Groundbreaking Center for Anticipatory Intelligence. Dr. Johnson shares her insights and expertise, highlighting the significance of preparing students to contribute positively to the world. This episode encourages listeners to rethink their definitions of peace and engage in meaningful discussions about how to foster it in various contexts.

Timestamps

[00:03:29] Defining peace within oneself.

[00:04:52] Peace in complex environments.

[00:11:58] Wicked problems in national security.

[00:15:23] Importance of building institutions.

[00:18:08] Resilience in institutions and individuals.

[00:22:18] Models of peacemaking in Ammon.

[00:27:32] Power in choosing peace.

[00:31:06] The power of conscious choice.

[00:35:57] Peace through strength exploration.

[00:39:44] Peacemaking in national security.

[00:46:26] Finding peace through scripture.

[00:48:12] Making peace in your life.

Transcript

(00:03-00:05) Jennifer Thomas: Welcome to the Proclaim Peace Podcast. I'm Jennifer Thomas.(00:06-03:16) Patrick Mason: And I'm Patrick Mason. And this is the podcast where we apply principles of the gospel and read the Book of Mormon to become better peacemakers. Hi, everyone. We're excited about this episode that we think is going to go in a little bit of a different direction than we oftentimes have, partly because we're going to be expanding the conversation of what peace is and how we think about it and who's included in the discussion and maybe even some of the different forms that it takes. And so it might challenge and stretch the way that we think about peace and peacemaking. But as we approach this, we've thought that's a good thing. We shouldn't get overly comfortable and just kind of settle into our typical definitions, but we should really want to have as many conversations as partners as we possibly can in terms of people who are really committed to doing good and bringing peace into the world. Along those lines, I'm really excited to introduce one of my favorite colleagues and really good friends on the faculty at Utah State University, Dr. Jeannie Johnson. Jeannie is one of the most popular professors, I can say that, here at USU. Students just absolutely flock to her because of her energy, her passion, her expertise, and her absolute commitment to preparing them to do good in the world. So by way of formal introduction, Jeanne Johnson is a professor of political science at Utah State University, and she serves as the director of USU's Groundbreaking Center for Anticipatory Intelligence. And I think we'll get into what that means, anticipatory intelligence. But in short, it's an interdisciplinary program that lives at the intersection of national security and geopolitics. It deals a lot with cyber threats and data analytics and emergent technology. It does a lot of teaching in terms of training students, both at the undergraduate and graduate level, but works with government and industry and just does a lot of really interesting work. Prior to her academic career, Jeanne worked within the Central Intelligence Agency, the CIA, within its Directorate of Intelligence as a member of the Balkan Task Force, and then also served within the U.S. State Department in embassies in Paris and Zagreb. So she earned her doctorate in strategic studies from the University of Reading in 2013. She's published books on counterinsurgency strategy, nuclear weapons, strategic organizational culture. So again, Jeannie's background is a little different than some of the people that we've brought on. but I know that she absolutely has a heart for peace. I think we're gonna hear a lot of that in our conversation today. But again, for us to think about expanding the definition and expanding our boundaries of who are our conversation partners when we talk about going out and trying to make peace in the world. So we're thrilled to have my good friend and colleague Jeannie Johnson on the program. Well, Jeannie, we are thrilled to have you. So welcome to the Proclaimed Peace Podcast.

(03:16-03:17) Jeannie Johnson: Thank you.

(03:18-03:27) Patrick Mason: All right, well, as you know, we always start with the same question because it always generates fantastic answers. How do you personally define peace?

(03:29-04:51) Jeannie Johnson: Well, it's been so much fun to think about that question this week. And my answer, like many of the guests that you've had on your program, ends up being one that resides inside oneself. rather than being dependent on external circumstances. I think we have all had the opportunity to have that tested in recent weeks and months and determine the extent to which we are able to achieve peace and personal peace, even when lots of disruptions are happening around us. And so for me, the way I would define it I feel at peace when I am confident in the path that I'm on. You know, those days when you know you spent the day the right way, and it doesn't matter if the day was stressful. It doesn't matter if the day was intense or there wasn't enough sleep. When you feel strongly confident in concert with the spirit that you have spent the day the right way, that is peace to me. And again, as many of your guests have pointed out, that has to be led by the spirit, right? There's really not a way around that foundational concept.

(04:52-05:51) Jennifer Thomas: Oh, I love that answer. And I've been thinking a lot, as you have just said, in the last few weeks about how much in a society that has become so comfortable and well-fed and well taken care of, we have externalized our sources of peace, and we're being asked to do something a little bit differently now. And it's a learning curve, I think, for a lot of us, including myself. But I really appreciate you talking about peace residing in, to some degree, work, right? Residing in us putting efforts behind things that matter to us. And this leads me directly to your bio because it's robust and fascinating. And I would love to hear you talk a little bit about your time in the CIA or at the State Department and get your sense of how work in some environments, sometimes people might not associate with peace, is in fact a source of peace for you and brought meaningful peace and direction to your life.

(05:52-06:20) Jeannie Johnson: Well, I first want to complicate that bio just so that your listeners are even more shocked that you have someone like me on the Proclaim Peace podcast. In addition to CIA and State Department, I was on Secretary of Defense Mattis' Close Combat Lethality Task Force. So, you know, just to ratchet up the complete confusion.

(06:20-06:27) Patrick Mason: Jesus said a lot about close combat lethality. That sounds like one of his favorite topics.

(06:28-06:29) Jennifer Thomas: It's right there in Luke.

(06:31-09:13) Jeannie Johnson: So, I think first off, it's appropriate to say that as you have pointed out in prior podcasts and as Patrick points out in his book, Proclaimed Peace, there is a fair amount of compartmentalization that goes on with Latter-day Saints. We often really divide ourselves between our work life and our religious life. And so I think the only honest way to answer your question is to say, that for a long time, I didn't think much about how or where those needed to be blended or treated in unison. And it's only as I have grown older and my convictions about the things and the values that are really important to me have deepened, that I have started to actively and intentionally seek ways to blend those. So early on in my career, the extent of it, the extent of what you might call justifying, and again, using that word, Patrick, in the way that you do in your book, Proclaim Peace, and the way we understand it as different from sanctification, justifying the work as an intelligence officer, and to clarify, I was not on the active spy side of the CIA. I was on the intelligence analysis side. But even still, you're engaged in a larger corporation that is in the business of espionage. And so you would make light jokes about Moses using spies and joke around about how many different intelligence officers named their kids Caleb and Joshua. And these are jokes, but they're also data points. There's not a small number of Caleb's and Joshua's running around in the world of the intelligence community. And so it took a while, I think, for me to be more thoughtful about the role of the nation state instead of accept as both a literal and a figurative article of faith that it was part of my duty as a Latter-day Saint to reinforce the welfare and good fortunes and, frankly, position of national power of the United States of America. So it took a while to be thoughtful about that.

(09:14-09:50) Patrick Mason: I really appreciate that and that kind of honesty in the sense that you've grown into that. And as you've gotten experience and wisdom on the professional side, but also the way that that's been matched with, and that this, I mean, I just know you to be somebody who's profoundly thoughtful and deeply committed to your faith. And that, so that kind of spiritual maturity that, Maybe, you know, we don't always have these things figured out in our 20s or even in our 30s or 40s, right? That these are deep and knotty questions. I mean, K-N-O-T-T-Y.

(09:50-09:50) Jennifer Thomas: Yes, yes.

(09:50-10:41) Patrick Mason: Maybe the other kind of knotty sometimes too. But I really appreciate that. I want to ask, but before we dive into some Book of Mormon stuff, I want to ask about another part of your bio, too. So we talked about the Center for Anticipatory Intelligence. And I have to say, I mean, I've just witnessed the amount of energy and the passion that so many of your students have. I mean, Jeannie's just known as one of the best professors here at Utah State. Students just absolutely gravitate to her and her program. Can you talk a little bit about that? Because we've had some interesting conversations about even the way that that training that you're doing relates to some of the training that I and Chad Ford and other people are doing on the more explicit peace building side.

(10:41-11:52) Jeannie Johnson: I would love to, and I think it provides a useful follow-on to your question. Jennifer, because it shows sort of that progression of thinking and intentionality where being a faithful Latter-day Saint and being someone who is also a professional in the national security space become co-joined. So the foundational sort of motivation for our center, and I know it's a mouthful, right, Center for Anticipatory Intelligence, is to anticipate therefore built in to the center's name, the complex, intertwined, shared problem sets that we have, not just as a nation, but sometimes as municipal communities and also at the global level, and that require concerted effort, a team effort, in order to even begin to address them. We don't possess the hubris that we would solve these problems. The legitimate technical term for these problems is wicked problems, right?

(11:53-11:55) Jennifer Thomas: The idea- The Bostonian in me really appreciates that.

(11:56-11:58) null: Oh, good.

(11:58-13:56) Jeannie Johnson: The idea there is that they are problems of such size and complexity that you manage them, you mitigate them, you prepare for them, you build resilience in order to weather them in only the most rare circumstances would you hope to solve them? Right. And so what a problem focused approach does for you is first off, it encourages community, which has been a wildly fun part of running the center. We are truly deeply multidisciplinary. A lot of centers give lip service to that concept and we really live it. My background, of course, is in national security, as you've heard, and political science. My associate director's background is aerospace engineering. One of our newest hires comes from the College of Agriculture because she does food security. Another new hire is a landscape architect who is going to do socio-ecological resilience. In other words, the resilience that is the product of really understanding a community and understanding the place in which that community lives and making sure that you account for both as you are building resilience. So we have just this wonderful varied faculty and students thrive within the program because it's genuinely collaborative. And one of the great strengths of Gen Z is that they want to solve problems together. They want those community ties. They're very hungry for it. And so that problem orientation, The fact that these are shared problems, so really only some of them reside at the national security level. Most of them are human security types of problems. Then, of course, this leads me to your doorstep, Patrick, and to Chad Ford's, and to others who are doing amazing work in that same problem set domain.

(13:57-15:22) Jennifer Thomas: So I'm really intrigued by the notion that Zion is a wicked problem and that anticipatory intelligence is exactly the kind of mindset or the kind of framework that we need to be willing to collaborate in or under if we want to build something complex and robust that is resilient to kind of onslaught and harm and And so to me, I'm seeing just these beautiful connections between the work that you've done and the way that we all maybe need to change how we think in terms of not seeing spiritual issues before us or issues facing our society as problems to be solved. but problems to be engaged with, to build community around, to create institutions that can manage, instead of saying, oh, we will only be together once this X problem has been done away with, but instead saying, no, we can be together in spite of X problem if we can build systems and institutions that can support us in that togetherness. So I'm wondering if you'd be willing to share a little bit with us about what you think about institutions and their importance, because you've spent your life in the service of them. And now it sounds like you're spending this next phase of your life in the service of kind of creating and building institutions that can be more robust in the face of difficulty.

(15:23-19:40) Jeannie Johnson: I do want to talk about that. And I want to talk about how my perspective on that has flipped while I have been the director of this Center for Anticipatory Intelligence for the last six years. So when we began the center, we began it with what Patrick would call kind of a fortress mindset, right? Or a defensive mindset, not in a negative sense, but in a protector sense. We are here to protect critical systems that underpin the American way of life, to protect institutions and their functionality, protect individuals and humans. And what I have come to realize as we have continued to hone the trade craft that underpins both forecasting and foresight. So two different ways of seeing what's coming. Forecasting tends to be short term and you can get pretty granular predictions and we're actually quite good at that. Foresight answers the question, What are conditions ripe for? What kind of disruption or major event are conditions ripe for? We don't know exactly when it will occur. We just know it's highly plausible because the conditions are present. As we have done this work over the last six years, what we have come to realize is that no matter how good you are at this intelligence function that we are training into our students, you will still be surprised and sometimes severely. And so your best course of action, which coincides with our gospel message, is building resilience and building resilience all the way down. Resilience certainly in our national systems, maybe in our global communities like alliances or even effective economic communities that are elevating prosperity for a lot of different people, but then resilience all the way down through people's business lives into their community lives and then very importantly within themselves individually. So the best opportunity, gift, learning that I can offer to students is learning in this area of resilience because I will tell you, Jennifer, my expectation for the next couple of years is that we will see severe disruptions to institutions. And we will need to individually and as communities be collections of people who are willing to work together without a lot of structure. It is interesting to me to see that happening even within the institution of the church. Every new program that is rolled out seems to be rolled out with a stronger emphasis on personal initiative and a decreased emphasis on policy and structure. And I don't know whether that is a preparatory step for us to become more and more accustomed to being in charge of our own spiritual lives and being accustomed to direct those lives without a lot of structure, or whether there's some other objective at work. Clearly, I run a center, and we take great joy in what we call playing as a team, and we are wildly effective because we play as a team. So I have a deep love for the institution that we have created, I have a deep love for the institutions that I worked for and for the bonds that those facilitated and the increased capacity you have when you are working as an organized unit. So I have a lot of love for all of those things. I also recognize, and especially so in this moment, that we need to be prepared to do a great amount of good without them.

(19:43-22:17) Patrick Mason: That's so rich. There's so much to engage there. And one of the things that I hear there is, I think, really one of the fundamental orientations or characteristics of peacemakers and people who want to improve the world is a kind of both and mentality, right? A recognition that it's not institutions or individuals, that it's both. And there needs to be a focus on both. And actually, if we're disproportionate or if we neglect one, then it really comes at a cost. The other thing that came to mind as you were talking was actually Jen's message in the closing session of this year's MWAG conference. where, you know, Jen, you'll say this better than I will, but when you and Emma got up and said, you know, we've been accustomed, because we've lived through many decades of relative peace and security and stability, especially in the United States, obviously it's been different in other places around the world, but we've been accustomed that when problems arose, that the cavalry was going to come and save us. And what happens when you wake up and realize that the cavalry isn't coming and maybe you're the cavalry, right? And so, I mean, for me, it's been, it's one of the reasons I admire MWEG so much and all the kind of people who are working in these kinds of spaces to build resilience, to build capacity, to build resilience at the individual level, the community level, all the way up to the national and international level to respond to these things. Can we transition to talk about the Book of Mormon? So, you know, so throughout this podcast, when we've talked about peacemakers in the Book of Mormon, a lot of times we've gone to some of the usual suspects, right? We've talked about the anti-Nephi-Lehies, we've talked about the Zion community and fourth Nephi, we've talked about this guy named Jesus who shows up on the scene, right? And has some things to say. But one of the things that I appreciate in talking with you, Jeannie, in preparation for this is you talking about ways that maybe we can find some models in the Book of Mormon, and maybe this is one of the, again, one of the great uses of the Book of Mormon, is it gives us some other models of peacemakers and peacemaking that maybe aren't so obvious or clear cut. And so do you want to talk about that a little bit? Where can we look for some other types of models other than the plainly obvious ones?

(22:18-22:47) Jeannie Johnson: I would love to, and I should probably tell the listeners that one of the great trials of Patrick's life is that I am on the third floor of Old Main on USU's campus right by him. So if there's anything that strikes me as interesting or I love or I disagree with in one of his books, he cannot make it three steps down the hall without being accosted by me and then trapped in conversation for a solid 30 minutes when he's supposed to be somewhere else.

(22:47-22:51) Patrick Mason: One of the great joys of my life here at USU.

(22:51-29:38) Jeannie Johnson: So I have just loved, loved and treasured those moments. So one that I want to sort of pluck out and examine from maybe a different lens is the story of Ammon. And I'll preview that with saying that part of what I study, an area of specialty for me is something called strategic culture. And it looks at the way your national and your organizational cultures, those internal cultures, combine to impact your foreign and security policy. And one of the strident aspects of American strategic culture is our penchant for dichotomies. We love dichotomies. We love dividing things into two camps and giving them labels and having them be opposites. And so a temptation in peacemaking conversations is to divide people and figures or stories in the Book of Mormon into camps of, there are the peacemakers, and then there are those who have an appetite for violence. And these are two different types of people, and they're on two different tracks. And so I want to complicate this, and I warn Patrick, this is not, let's be careful here, this is not something I have a burning testimony of. This is something I have some personal conviction about and some experience with, but I'm bringing it to the two of you for the purposes of inquiry and an interesting discussion and to gather your thoughts about it. And so a thought that I have, is that if we look at the story of Ammon, it is tempting to see Ammon as effective because he was so humble, which is true, because he was willing to do menial tasks, which is true. He is a prince who has made himself a servant. All of this is true. I would like to submit that his raw physical power also played a role. And that rather than making dichotomous this idea of, oh, the strange moments when Ammon committed violence, and then the moments we're more comfortable with, where he is bearing testimony of the gospel, to be willing to entertain a notion that the two did, in fact, in a very powerful way, go hand in hand, and to accept at face value Ammon's overjoyed testimony that this moment of violence, this act of slingshotting and cutting off arms had been handed to him as a missionary opportunity. I just want to explore that for a minute. And I think the best way to do it would be to run a counterfactual and say, would King Lamoni have sat stunned in his chair and wondered about Ammon and been open and receptive to Ammon's message if Ammon had only been serving in those menial and humble tasks. If he had said, where's Ammon? And they said, he's feeding your horses. What made that moment poignant and so powerful, you know, that the king couldn't speak for a while. It was because he had seen what Ammon was capable of in raw physical power. Now, we know he was assisted and aided by the Lord in sparing his life, right, in that exchange. But he demonstrated that he had other options, that he was perfectly capable of expert violence and of extraordinary raw physical power. And he was choosing to be a humble servant of the king and to do these acts in service of the king. And I think it's worth meditating on that concept for a while. And the way I would like to reference this in personal peace is that in my own life, it's not as though I've had, you know, extreme combat training. I don't want any of your listeners to be misled. In fact, The reason I was on Madison's close combat lethality task force is for my cultural expertise and doing pre-deployment training. I was not teaching anyone martial arts. However, I do have experience with physical contact with other human beings in a not peace building situation. So that, whether you train, doing it as a sport like taekwondo, like I did in college or in some other way, knowing you have a different option for how to confront a situation. And I'm going to say, especially as a woman, knowing that when you are presented with a situation and you choose restraint and you choose peace and you choose to say a kinder thing, and you have another option, I think there's real power in that. And I think there's a type of confidence and a type of choice that is communicated to the person that you are engaging with, whether it's in your bearing, whether it's in your word choice, whether it's just in your eyes, they know you have another option for how to behave. There is no question about whether you are a victim in this moment or you're choosing peace because you're scared or you're choosing peace because you feel like other options would be too scary. They are clear on the fact that that is not the case. And I think that's a way to be a more powerful peacemaker. And so the conversation I wanted to have was just around, you know, as we widen the tent of of institutions and individuals who could be powerful peacemakers, I would like to keep open the option that there is utility in this raw physical power, and even in former practice with violence, that that can be an instrument for a highly effective peacemaker.

(29:39-31:04) Jennifer Thomas: So this isn't personal. I've never been in a position where I could exert physical force on someone and scare them to death. But as you were talking, one of the things that came to my mind was the position that the United States was in, particularly in Europe and in Japan at the close of World War II. I think one of the most beautiful monuments and testaments to that is found at the cemetery in Normandy, where basically I'm going to misquote it, but never have people exerted so much force and made so much sacrifice to take basically nothing in return. And I just think about how that peace was settled after the United States had exhibited the most extraordinary lethal weapon that humanity had ever created. And certainly, we're in a position at that point to move across the globe with significant force. They could have probably at that point taken much of Europe or exacted reparations or whatever they wanted to do at that point. And so it's really been interesting to me to think, as you've talked about, force for good that can come when people see you have the opportunity to execute force, but are choosing not to. They understand that you have that capacity and the gift that you're giving them is to not exert that force. But that only happens if they know you're capable of it, right?

(31:06-32:09) Patrick Mason: I mean, just, I mean, like, so we have that from a kind of national security perspective. I mean, even theologically, too. I mean, this is what draws us to the God that we worship, right? That we know that God is capable. of exerting great force and even violence, you know, based on the accounts in the Old Testament and other places, right? And what makes Jesus so remarkable, right, what draws us to Him is a God who empties Himself, right? Who chooses to be the babe in Bethlehem, who chooses that moment in Gethsemane, like, I could call down legions of angels and I choose not to, right? That is so compelling, right? So it's not peace through an absence of other options, right? But it's a concerted and conscious choice to relinquish other options.

(32:11-36:19) Jeannie Johnson: Yeah, exactly. And I confess to you, I don't know exactly what the appropriate place is for that. You know, I don't know what the right management of that resource is for mortals. There are only a few things I do know, so I'll lay those out or think I know, right, until you convince me otherwise, which I'm very open to. But the first one is that to have yourself physically tested in some way and to pass that test, and that could be something like going through cancer, right? But to have yourself, your physical body tested in some way where you feel like you have persevered or strengthened that aspect of body-mind together does convey a type of confidence that can't be earned a different way. It's a type of confidence. And the second thing I know is that in a moment in my life when I had a full room arrayed against me, And I was confessing to Patrick that it's more nerve-wracking for me to be on your podcast talking about these really important things and wanting to get them right than it is for me to face a room full of hostile generals, which I have done and would be cool as a cucumber about. And so, you know, this is just really important to get this right. The second thing I know is that I am grateful for moments when a room was arrayed against you and you had to engage with that kind of hostility and know who you were on the other side of that moment. The third thing I know is that I do think we sometimes exaggerate the negative impacts of violence and here's what I mean by that before you get very alarmed. We probably don't remember very many of the fistfights that we had with siblings growing up. We were a high combat unit in my family growing up. There were six of us in eight years, and my mom believed in independence. So there was just a lot of high contact, not exactly sport, in my siblings growing up. I remember almost none of those. But all of us can remember some really searing words that were said to us in our youth and sometimes very young ages. And we sometimes carry those for a lifetime. And so I do think finding a way that children and young people can come to know themselves and their physical selves in ways that you know, a traditional peacemaking perspective might frown on, whether those are martial arts. I know a coach of women's boxing and he gets teary-eyed every time he talks to me about the increased confidence that women on his boxing teams have across the spectrum of their lives because they have engaged in this really taxing and difficult experience that allows them a greater sense of control and mastery of self in their lives, you know, where where does that reside in building our own inner confidence and making us more effective peacemakers and the only answer I have to that is the final point which is What really matters I think is the quality of our hearts So I'm going to confess something that I should probably not confess on a podcast, but it will make it more exciting So I'll offer it to you. A person who is my very good longtime friend, we met because I punched him and not softly. OK, so we met.

(36:19-36:21) Patrick Mason: We love hot takes like that. Yeah.

(36:21-38:41) Jeannie Johnson: Yeah. I was in my 30s. I wasn't a teenager. I was in my 30s. I was at a professional conference. So let me just. Make this more uncomfortable for you. I was at a professional conference. It was the evening time. He was coming back from a beach party. He had had a bit to drink, so he wasn't his most appropriate self. He said something inappropriate to me, and I punched him pretty hard. And he doubled over, and he said expletives. And then he popped back up, and I extended my hand, and I said, hello. You know, it's Jeannie. We've met before. Um, I was at a prior conference, you know, dah, dah, dah, dah. So the next morning I come down and he's sitting and I sit right next to him at the conference and he looks at me and said, um, so last night I said something pretty inappropriate and you hit me. So we're good. Right. And I said, right. Yep. Let's start anew. And it has become our favorite story, you know, as friends and we've worked together now for almost 20 years. And so my point is that was an act delivered with the intent of reconciliation and, and in a language, and I know this is going to sound strange, in a language I knew he was going to appreciate and respond favorably to. If I had said something cutting to him or that shamed him, it would have created a very uncomfortable relationship for us both. So I just hit him, right? I punched him instead and it worked out really well. Now, again, I'm just laying this on the altar of the superior wisdom that you two possess, but what is in your heart rather sometimes than the act itself, And the intent behind the act, I think, need to be considered in this wider conversation where we, I think, maybe overdeveloped the dichotomy between peacemaking and physical acts that would, you know, colloquially be turned to violence.

(38:42-39:33) Jennifer Thomas: So I actually am really happy we're having this complex conversation because I think sometimes, as you've suggested, conversations around peace can sort of degrade into just be nice. And I don't actually think that's super helpful. So let's push a little bit further into this and talk a little bit more about peace through strength. What does that look like? In its bad sense, it can just become, and I think we can see potentially a foreign policy emerging around that, that we are just the winners because we can beat the crap out of you, whether it's economically or militarily. So what does a positive peace through strength look like? Anyway, I'll let you answer that instead of giving my opinions.

(39:33-41:25) Jeannie Johnson: So Jennifer, I think we don't know. I think it's underexplored territory. Okay. I think, and I think it's really important to explore it, because it will need our full energy as connected Latter-day Saints to figure this out. We have an unusual number of Latter-day Saints who work in the national security sector, both in the intelligence community and in the defense establishment. And that community has largely been dominated by, even our LDS community, by a nationalistic narrative, a protect the United States narrative. And I would love to see us instead explore exactly the question you just asked and allow it to be a question and allow people to make mistakes in answering it or explore kind of uncomfortable territory in answering it. But to say, what does it look like when, whether you inherited it or you cultivated it, you are in possession of outsized power. How can that power be used as an asset for true Christ-like peacemaking? I think it's a conversation we need to have And I think it would help us to do a better job of exercising those institutions in a way that achieves that. People need to first see that it's possible. They need to know that it's their Christian obligation. And they need to have thought through models of what this looks like, what it can look like, so that we get rid of the hyper-compartmentalization that in truth, is a part of most of our work lives when you are working in those roles.

(41:28-42:27) Patrick Mason: So how, as we kind of move to wrapping up, I want to ask a follow-up on that. I mean, you are training the next generation of people who will work in these kinds of institutions. Now, of course, not all of your students are Latter-day Saints, but at least some of them are, right? And you have professional relationships with lots of other Latter-day Saints who work in those institutions. what advice would you give your Latter-day Saints students? Or if a colleague came to you and said, hey, Jamie, I just read the Sermon on the Mount, right? Bless her to the peacemakers and turn the other cheek and all this kind of stuff. And I'm trying to reconcile that with my professional obligations or even the things I feel called to. right? In terms as a citizen and in terms of service to the nation, where would you start that conversation? Even if you don't know what it looks like at the very end of that conversation, how would you start it?

(42:27-45:52) Jeannie Johnson: Thank you for giving me the soft approach with that. I really appreciate that. So we started it with a center mantra. And our mantra is bridge builders and problem solvers. for the world's wicked problems. And we live the bridge builders in small and large ways. So for instance, when we have invited guests to one of our events, you know, maybe it's a class from BYU, Idaho or somewhere else. If those students walk in, my students know that they have exactly three and a half seconds. And if they haven't walked over and greeted those newcomers and put their arms around them and invited them to sit down with them, their director is going to come over tapping them on the head, you know, and inviting them to step out of their comfort zone. So I think it's really important to begin practicing these principles in class and in small and large ways. So something else that we do is invite into our community, into our program community, people who aren't always comfortable to rub shoulders with. So we have a number of members of the military who have, since their very young days, been entirely socialized within that institution. So the way they approach problem sets, sometimes just verbally, the kinds of different ways they express themselves, can be profoundly uncomfortable to a young, you know, Gen Z student who is sitting right next to them. and they get dignity and respect and community and connection. And so they learn how at the grassroots level to begin building healthy bonds in uncomfortable situations. And then you build on that with the next step and you build on that with the next step. And I have one more item to share and that is At this moment, when a lot of our institutions are being dismantled, completely changed, and some of our connections on the global stage are also being dismantled, I have reflected on how useful it would have been for more of us to emphasize the positives in those connections and those institutions, the historic moment where they stepped out in a way that was surprisingly generous or was successful in peacemaking, even there was some bumbling along the way. But sometimes as academics, we see our role as being purely the critics. And so this younger generation doesn't have a model, doesn't have a firm concept of what appropriately exercised power can look like because we were too worried about being critics all the time and didn't offer them the examples that can exist in history, fallible as they may be. And so to make sure to police ourselves on that front, and it may be too late for some of that, but in going forward to not expect institutions to attain a standard of perfection before we admire the good that they are doing.

(45:54-46:26) Jennifer Thomas: I really appreciate that. And I know we have a hard stop. And so I just want to thank you very much for what you've shared with us today. And I think we'd like to close with the question that we ask all of our guests, which is basically, in this period of disruption, in the face of significant conflict, as you strive to build bridges and teach other people to build bridges across really significant moats, where are you finding peace?

(46:26-47:54) Jeannie Johnson: My primary conduit for peace is in the fundamentals for the most part. So I spend a fair amount of time with the Book of Mormon in the morning, every morning, and I don't skip. I get up really early. I spend time on scripture study. I diligently do my Come Follow Me. I don't have the same relationship with the Doctrine and Covenants as I do with the Book of Mormon, but I spend time there. And I specifically ask to be directed in my day. And sometimes it takes days and days of searching to find that track that we talked about right when we opened the podcast. What is my lane? Where is my line of effort meant to be pointed? But that's what I'm searching for when I spend time in the scriptures. And then the other piece I do is I do try to make sure to refuel myself every day in whatever way works for me. I actually tried Patrick's very favorite TV show, The Bear, this morning. I'm not sure if you wanted me to divulge that to all of your listeners, Patrick. Because I was like, he loves it, maybe I will love it too. But, you know, finding things that give you simple joys that help just sort of boost the spirit and truly making time for those, no matter how overwhelming your other tasks are, also really important.

(47:55-48:06) Patrick Mason: Jeannie, thank you so much. It's just a pleasure. I mean, I'm blessed to have you as a colleague and a friend, and I think all of us are really fortunate to hear your wisdom today. So thanks for joining us on the podcast.

(48:06-48:09) Jennifer Thomas: Thank you. Yes, thank you so much.

(48:12-48:31) Patrick Mason: Thanks everybody for listening today. We really appreciate it. We just want to invite you to subscribe to the podcast and also to rate and review it. We love hearing feedback from listeners, so please email us at podcast at mweg.org. We also want to invite you to think about ways that you can make peace in your life this week. Thanks for listening and we'll see you next time.

(48:36-48:52) Jennifer Thomas: Thank you for listening to Proclaim Peace, a proud member of the Faith Matters Podcast Network. Faith Matters holds expansive conversations about the restored gospel to accompany individuals on their journey of faith. You can learn more about Faith Matters and check out our other shows at faithmatters.org.