"Proclaim Peace" Season 2, Episode 20 // Peacemaking in Wards: Conflict, Curiosity, and Belonging, With Carri Hulet and Christopher Palmer
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Carri Hulet and Christopher Palmer join Jen and Patrick to explore how peace is formed in the realities of ward life, where people are covenanted together, differences are unavoidable, and conflict can either fracture trust or deepen belonging. In this episode, they unpack the tension between avoiding contention and engaging honestly, especially in doctrinal, relational, and leadership settings. They also share practical ways leaders and members can create spaces where people feel heard, respected, and able to disagree without losing belonging.
Chapters
(02:36) Why wards are naturally conflict-prone
(04:00) The ward as a laboratory for peacemaking
(06:41) Why church assignment and unchosen community surprise outsiders
(09:08) Why high stakes can lead to conflict avoidance
(12:36) Deference, stewardship, and why problems roll upward
(16:41) What is lost when a ward never shares dissenting views
(20:23) How church structure, truth claims, and judgment shape conflict
(24:47) Many true or good ways to do things in the ward
(28:29) Curiosity, respect, and naming doctrine clearly
(33:28) Different beliefs are not sins
(36:26) Direct belonging language and the power of humor
(40:37) Better preparation for ward councils and meetings
(43:37) Modeling respectful disagreement at home and in church
Transcript
Patrick Mason (00:00)
Hi everyone and welcome to the "Proclaim Peace" podcast. I'm Patrick Mason. I am grateful to be here as always with Jen Thomas to talk about peacemaking in the scriptures. Jen, how are you doing?
Jennifer Thomas (00:09)
I'm doing well today. Tell me about how you're doing in this lovely fall season.
Patrick Mason (00:13)
It is actually really lovely right now here in here in Logan. and I was in New York earlier this week where it was totally lovely, like the the
Jennifer Thomas (00:20)
Glorious.
Patrick Mason (00:21)
leaves were just starting to change and and I was with my daughter and we came back and she's like, Utah is really dry. Like I'd never really like noticed that, but like after spending a week in the northeast, you're it's different kinds of beauty. but I definitely appreciate this season.
Jennifer Thomas (00:36)
Well, so do I.
Patrick Mason (00:37)
Yep. Well, we're gonna do something a little bit different and and and I think really enjoyable today. So we've been, of course, spending this year talking about the Old Testament and and principles and practices of of peacemaking that we can find there. And today we'll be speaking a little bit more generally about the you know, less tied to a particular scripture, but but one of the things that that comes up a lot in Old Testament scriptures in the Psalms and in Isaiah and others.
Other places is this sense that that God is and can be a refuge from the storm, and can provide shelter from that. And and I think we each find that in our individual relationships with God, but it also it's it's one of the things that our our congregations, our wards as Latter-day Saints promise to provide.
Right. That that that we gather together on Sundays and throughout the week, that that we will find some level of shelter and refuge from the storms of life when we gather together. And I've certainly experienced that a lot. but also anybody who's spent any time in a ward or congregation, it knows that there's also a place where the storm it can be a place where the storms actually happen. It is both a refuge from the storm and a storm generating mechanism just because you have lots of different people there. So we want to talk about that today.
Jennifer Thomas (01:49)
And and I think we want to name the fact that when you give yourself over to a covenant community and you love them deeply and you count on them to be kind of a connecting point for you with God and the kingdom of God, it feeling conflict there hits differently, right? It it has it it sometimes has a greater power to wound. And I think figuring out how to do conflict in those settings also has a a much more transformative effect.
And one of the things that struck me to your point as you were talking about the Old Testament is over the course of reading this year, it's really clear to me that there are two patterns for peace for the Israelites or the, you know, the children of God in this story is that they they basically, when they are unified, it doesn't matter what the world brings to them, they are able to find peace in a community. When their community is fractured.
It doesn't matter how well they're doing, how much they're prospering, those things fall apart. So that's a one pattern is that that there is actually there's value in us investing in making sure that our faith community and our wards and our stakes are places of great peace and resilience. And then I think the second thing is that that church and our wards are the place that we go to learn about what it's like to have eternal peace and find it. And if our wards are acting or behaving in ways that is contrary to that, it gets harder for us to access the peace that Christ offers us. So I think there are two reasons that we as saints should care about this. First is because it it sort of helps us s sort of, I guess, push back against the world in really good ways. But I also think that it is where we go to access Christ's peace. And if our behaviors inwards are limiting that for others people, it's probably something we really need to address.
Patrick Mason (03:36)
Yeah, I I think that's so true that, we're probably not always surprised when we encounter conflict, say, in the workplace, right? We just know that that's a feature of it. We're we're not surprised, of course, when we encounter on social media or in politics or something with, you know, there and then there's a set of tools that we can develop in terms of how we engage that. But I think sometimes we are surprised when we encounter conflict, especially deep conflict and relational conflict in our worth precisely because these are places where we come to find peace. And so I I I'm looking forward to the conversation today to just think about how our wards can be better engines of and schools for the kind of peacemakers that we want to be.
Jennifer Thomas (04:16)
And we have two really special guests for you today. And the reason that we selected them, they're both personal friends of mine, but most importantly, I've lived in one sort of location for a really long time, most of my adult life, which means that I've been in close community with pretty much some consistently with some people and seen patterns of wards and seen patterns of the stake. And both of these people I have seen at points of conflict truly be repairers of the breach. Both of them have in really quite pivotal moments ensured that deep conflict at church that could have been extraordinarily damaging and have had profounding lasting effects. They were either able to mitigate those effects or they were also able to make transformational change where there was a lot of repair. And so I have lived alongside them and I know that they not only can talk the talk, but they can walk the walk. And I have seen the ways that they have had really positive influences on both the wards that I've lived in and the stakes. So really excited to bring them to you today. So the first guest is Christopher Palmer. He is an associate professor of management and of finance at the MIT Sloan School.
As a researcher, he studies how economic shocks, housing instability, and credit access impact families. And I think most what's most relevant to our discussion today is his time serving in a bishop in my Massachusetts ward, where I saw him help families manage economic shocks, housing instability, and really sometimes quite traumatic things that impacted their family. And he did that with extraordinary grace and love. And our second guest is Carri Hulet.
She is, she does this by trade. She's a collaboration expert, a mediator, and a facilitator who specializes in helping diverse stakeholders build consensus around really complex policy issues. She currently leads a women in consensus building initiative at Harvard and facilitates diverse groups working in public issues, including climate change, water quality, energy, transportation, and smart growth. Though very experienced in conflict negotiation and dialogue professionally. We really want to hear from her today about her experience with this in her ward where she served as a relief society president. again, I saw her in that experience navigate some extraordinarily difficult situations, and she did it with great grace and in a way that has allowed a ward to grow and become stronger after those experiences. So we want to welcome them both to join us today on the podcast.
Jennifer Thomas (06:44)
Carri and Christopher, welcome to the Proclaim Peace Podcast. We are so thrilled to have you both with us today.
Carri Hulet (06:49)
Thanks. Nice to be here.
Christopher Palmer (06:50)
Yeah.
Jennifer Thomas (06:51)
We are gonna start with the question that we start with all of our guests. And Carri, why don't we start with you? And would you share with us a little bit about how you define peace?
Carri Hulet (06:59)
Sure. It feels to me, peace feels to me like possibility or a lack of constraint. And the opposite feels like like quite a bit of constraint or impossibility, like you're in a box that you cannot get out of. And I feel like when I have when I'm in the role of mediating, I see that people when they're in deep conflict, they feel like they're stuck and they cannot get out of it. And when they then make their way out of that feeling of being stuck. That is the feeling that I associate with peace when you get out of that being stuck feeling.
Jennifer Thomas (07:34)
This hits me right where I live. I think a lot of what we're trying to do is help people get out of boxes, right? That's a lot of the work that we do with this podcast. So I really appreciate that. Christopher, share with us what you think.
Christopher Palmer (07:44)
I loved Carrie's definition. For me, that constraint and feeling of stuck is is constrained by worry or stress. And so peace is the absence of that. It's this like calming of my worries, this feeling of reassurance that has some hope for the future and some feeling of safety for me and those I love.
Patrick Mason (08:04)
That's terrific. I love both those definitions. And so what we want to talk about today and why we've brought you on is to to think about one of the sites where peacemaking can become most prominent, partly because it's most needed. and that you know, Jesus said, where two or three are gathered in my name, they're all be in the midst of them. But it also, whenever two or three people are gathered, it means that there's going to be conflict as well.
And so when we when we gather even in Jesus' name and as you know as as professed followers of his, there's still always gonna be conflict in our religious congregations, in in our wards, just because you're bringing together people with so many different like backgrounds and personalities and political views and and family situations, all those kinds of things. So so Christopher, maybe we'll we'll start with you. When when you hear the word peacemaking, and apply it to a ward context, where does your mind immediately go?
Christopher Palmer (08:58)
Okay, so here's where my mind goes. I think this tees up the tension. Third Nephi eleven, Christ says, He that hath the spirit of contention is not of me, but is of the devil who is the father of contention. He stireth up the hearts of men to contend with anger one with another. And so I think with that kind of a backdrop, it makes us very conflict averse And sometimes we think that, therefore, in the spirit of being nice and not contending with anger, we need to not disagree, right? But I contrast that with Doctrine and Covenants one twelve, where Thomas Marsh is told, Contend thou therefore morning by morning, day after day, let thy warning voice go forth when the night cometh, let not the inhabitants of the earth slumber because of thy speech. So actually the end is kind of cute. He's saying, like, Don't be boring, you can be energetic, you can be lively. Here's this command to contend morning by morning.
And you contrast that with the third Nephi eleven saying the spirit of contention is not of me, is of the devil. I think that tension helps us understand why we have a problem with this. That we gotta balance those two forces. And sometimes we're too far on the just like, let's be nice and and never disagree.
Patrick Mason (10:10)
Yeah, Carri what do you think? What when you when you think about peacemaking in our wards, what does that make you think of?
Carri Hulet (10:15)
Yeah, it's interesting because a ward is the perfect laboratory for for practicing peacemaking because you have a group of people who are forced together essentially. It's not really a voluntary, you can choose to go to church, but you don't really choose where to go to church or with whom. And so you're kind of forced into this relationship with people that you may or may not otherwise always choose to be with. And so you have all these different people with all these different perspectives and like you said, Patrick, from all these different places. And then you have long term relationships. Because a short-term relationship often can avoid conflict simply because you don't have enough time. But if you have a long-term relationship, over time you will have ups and downs for sure. And so you have these long-term relationships, all these different people. There are a variety of ways that we interact. You have power dynamics, and those power dynamics are constantly shifting. Sometimes I serve you, sometimes you serve me, sometimes I lead you, sometimes you lead me. And so it's just this incredible place to learn compassion, to learn empathy, to learn to set boundaries, to learn where you're really bad at setting boundaries. it's really it's as if there were some intelligent design on making this structure in order to create the opportunity for us to practice what might be one of the most important Christian values that we hold. yeah, wards are I mean it's it's like if you can make peace in a ward, then i you should be able to make peace anywhere, right?
Patrick Mason (11:41)
I love what you just said and I fully believe that it's true that actually the ward and the family are the two great laboratories where we work on this precisely because of the unchosenness of of it right we choose in some element right to get married or to you know to you know to end to to to go to church right there is some element of choice but then after that, we we have these relationships, these long term relationships that we've got to figure out how we want how we need to manage.
Carri Hulet (12:09)
Yep. Yep.
Jennifer Thomas (12:10)
So we were at dinner last week with some colleagues of my husband's. And y when you live outside of the kind of Inner Mountain West, you are regularly faced with people who come to any conversation with you with questions about your faith or questions about your systems of faith, right? And one of the interesting thing to me, things to me at that dinner was they said, okay, so we've heard a funny thing about your church and we're wondering if you could kind of help me help us understand this.
So my brain automatically goes to the series of the 10 things that I have to cue up. And you know what it was? She said, is it really true that you don't get to go where choose where you go to church? Do you really like I had heard that you just go where you're told. How does that work? How do you make that work? She's like, we spend a lot of time shopping for a church so that we could find one that worked for us. And I just can't even conceive of how that would work.
And so it was interesting to me that of all the things she could have asked me, right? This was the one that just stunned her. And that she didn't, couldn't figure out how or why it could work. So I think let's talk a little bit about in the rest of this podcast about how we can make that work, right? How we can go from having this thing that seems impossible and unlikely and is for some people could be read like what you spoke about at the beginning as a box that people were trapped in.
And shift our mindset about our wards into something that is, no, this is an expansive place where we can find peace and we can find hope. And I'm hoping that that is something that we can talk about today. I think one of please. Yeah.
Christopher Palmer (13:36)
I can I riff on something Patrick said before you asked the question? What you just said made and combining it with Patrick setting up the parallel between family and church just made me think of this interesting connection where one of the reasons we think eternal marriage is so valuable and this doctrine of eternal families is that it gives us this extremely long perspective on the people we're with. It's not just transactional like I didn't really like the way you talked to me last night. I'm packing my bags. Instead, it's like, well, I'm gonna be with you forever, so I've got to figure this out, right? And there's something that's like, covenant relationship about the people in our ward, because of the covenants we make at baptism, to live with them and to mourn with them and to serve them and to love them and lift them up. And then the way that we constantly are sustaining each other, that makes it maybe not the same level of covenant as as your family, but it's a covenant relationship as well. And then maybe it's that long-term perspective that helps us invest even when times are hard.
Jennifer Thomas (14:27)
So I love this. It actually links to what I was about to ask because I I think that just as in when we talk about choosing where we go to church or not, there are different ways we can look at things. And I think what you've just described can either feel like it can have a positive framing where you feel like I've got a long run way to figure this out, or it can feel like a f people can frame it as I have to be perfect here. If it doesn't work, it's a disaster. Right. and so I I want to dig in strong from the very beginning, I think that this there is at the root of this sometimes a fear that leads to conflict avoidance in our wards, right? We this feels high stakes, it feels really important. And so when we are faced with conflict, we tend to avoid. And I think both of you probably have something to say about this. What happens when keeping the peace in a space becomes more important to people than addressing the problems that are actually happening. And why do you think we do that? Like what are the roots of that behavior? And maybe Carri, if you'd start out with that.
Carri Hulet (15:30)
Sure. I this is a hard question for me to answer because I I also avoid conflict. And I think there's I think I you have to exercise some discernment. And I think discernment is also a capability and a and a skill that we try to learn and and you know a capacity we try to develop. And sometimes it's just not worth it. So I do want to just, I just wanna say a little bit for the conflict avoiders and say sometimes it's not that bad. Okay. It's it's sometimes avoiding the conflict is the right choice. and and I do think, particularly in an ward sometimes you really do have to be able to say, is this something that is worth the engagement, or is it important for me actually, is it more important for me to avoid it? That being said, I do think that we avoid conflict way too much. And I think it's the path of least resistance, obviously. But I think the question of what what is it that creates the resistance? Why why does it feel hard to engage in conflict? And I think the resistance is a few things. One is lack of skill, you know, and just knowing how to do it. And another is I I do think actually that the church structure incentivizes avoiding conflict because of our hierarchy. And and I also think that
We have a lot of teachings that support avoidance, just like, you know, like Christopher said earlier, the contention is of the devil. And I I think on the skill side, we really it we don't think of peace as work, but it is work. And all work require work requires skill. And you do actually need to be taught how to manage skill. It it takes, you know, like naming and knowing your own needs, your own interests, active listening, being able to problem solve and brainstorm without feeling too committed to a possible outcome. these are all things that that you can learn, but you have to learn them and you have to practice them. And so I think there's a skill gap there generally. I do think there are some skills to conflict of management that we're actually very good at, like apologizing and forgiving, serving. Those are all really important, but I also think on the incentive side, the hierarchy of the church creates this sense for all of us that we have a sphere of influence. And within that sphere of influence, which we call our stewardship, we have a role to play in deciding what's what and who does what and whether you engage or not. But if something feels outside of your stewardship or outside of your sphere of influence, then you defer. And you defer to the person that's in that person's stewardship, which means that all the problems roll up to the bishop, which I'm sure, Christopher, you loved having all the problems brought to you as the bishop. It's just like it's not a good system, right? And and I do think there's a gender piece here because it it you can always go up the chain, the next level, and every once in a while the next person in the chain above is a woman, but there's always a man somewhere up there, you know.
And and so women in particular are really trained to defer. At at you even if you feel full autonomy over the specific sphere of your specific calling at some point, you say, Fine, whatever you up there think, I I will go along with it. So, you know, that's a it's hard to even even when you're very skilled, it's hard to work against that.
Jennifer Thomas (18:44)
And deference can read avoidance, right? Or it gets experienced like avoidance, yeah.
Carri Hulet (18:46)
Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, and and you feel like you're doing the right thing. That's what I'm supposed to do. Right. Yeah.
Christopher Palmer (18:55)
Yeah, I think it comes from this promise that we make that of not evil speaking against the Lord's anointed. I think like that and the all of the associated doctrines around contention just kind of lead us to this. I I love that you started off by being like, let me just say something for the conflict avoiders. And and I think if we are gonna spend a few minutes kind of railing against conflict avoidance, it doesn't mean that we're saying that we should always be confrontational. And I was actually my ears perked up when I heard Elder Gilbert's story during general conference. And I've always thought of him as someone who was like, I'm here for the debate, I'm stubborn and I've got strong opinions and I'm gonna give them to you. And he talked about this situation where something that he had really put his kind of reputation on the line in establishing was the value of like faith based institutions in higher learning. And that that viewpoint was just being railed on and he was in this environment and he was like, I I like I have the capabilities to debate this and to win this debate and I feel very fiery about it, but he chose to I'm gonna leave that question out there and I'm not gonna engage. And then that later gave him flexibility to engage with some of the people that were in that meeting in a different way. And then, later he was also called as an apostle. So imagine if he'd been shouting and sweating and like spitting in like an angry response just right before that calling. It would have been incongruent. So it's not that we think you should always jump in, right? But sometimes this spirit of like, let's let's here's here's the other myth that I think comes into play besides just this desire to not speak evil of the Lord's anointed, is there's this myth that if someone with a stewardship is inspired, then they don't need me and anything that I say that's different from what their gut is is not gonna be inspired because they're the person that's got the inspiration.
And it's never been that way, but sometimes we think that, right? That we can't provide that input. And then on your on Carri's point about we we feel comfortable in our sphere of influence, but not like steadying the arc outside of it. I think this is what is tricky about a ward counsel that it's really hard to get right, is like the point of a ward counsel is not that, all right, please turn on when we talk about the young women and turn off when we talk about so and so's job loss.
And please turn on when we talk about the young men or or when we talk about Sunday school, but please turn off when we talk about something that's not in your lane. The whole point is like, look, this is a diverse group of people. We need to get you together and we need to figure out how this is gonna go and we especially need your differences of opinion.
Jennifer Thomas (21:23)
So before we move on from this, I would love to hear from both about you about what maybe you think it costs us when we avoid. I think you've both done a really good job of articulating some of the benefits and some of the reasons that it might make sense at times to avoid. But I think there are also maybe costs that we incur when we're conflict avoidant. Do any of you either of you have any thoughts on that?
Christopher Palmer (21:44)
I've got an analogy that I use in the classroom sometimes. If you have watched Who Wants to Be a Millionaire, one of the lifelines you can use is to poll the audience. And you poll the audience about something weird, like the average length of an elephant's trunk in centimeters, right? And then you see the distribution of the answers from the audience, and then you like feel confident in like picking your answer. Imagine that every single person in that audience was Christopher Palmer. There would be nothing useful about polling the audience, there would be no wisdom of the crowd.
You would get 200, views that the answer is 111 centimeters or whatever. And the whole value of that exercise of querying the audience comes from the fact that we have diverse opinions and we aggregate them to like kind of figure out what the the right one is and what the best one is. And so I kind of apply that in this situation. What do we lose if we don't have this kind of sharing and if we're all kind of conflict avoidance and if we just defer to whoever's up the hierarchy, we miss out on all the good ideas and all the bad ideas that would be shut down if we don't get that consensus. And so much of what we have as a church was not like someone went up Mount Sinai and they got tablets that said this is how primary works. It was Louisa Levit Haight in Farmington, Utah, like coming up with an idea. Like seminary was a grassroots idea. And and the location of our Boston Temple was a gr grassroots idea. And Sunday school was a grassroots idea. There's a lot of really important wisdom that comes from the congregation, not just from like the one figurehead that is the anointed judge in Israel.
Carri Hulet (23:14)
I love that answer so much, Christopher. It's so good. And it's so true. There are so many things that get so much better when people actually engage and bring out all of their ideas and then you have so much more to work with. And I I I can't help but answer this question with like a really serious answer, which is that when I was really society president, I saw too much abuse, like
Way more than I ever imagined was in our in our community. And a lot of the outcomes could have been avoided if someone was more willing to just say what they saw and to say what they saw to the right people. like we are not a community that doesn't that is ignorant of what's going on around us for the most part. For the most part, we know. And to raise something like that is to actively say to someone what you are doing is wrong. And that is an aggressive move toward contention or toward conflict, or it feels that way. And we are not good at that. And there can be some really legitimately devastating consequences if we were better at calling each other out sometimes when necessary, then we could really protect some of our most vulnerable members of our community. It's it was really, really hard to see. Like that was one of the hardest things to be a part of when I was the Relief Society president.
Patrick Mason (24:38)
Let me follow up follow up on that. I'm I'm so glad you raised this. because this isn't just what we encounter in our congregations isn't just like arguments over whether we're gonna have tablecloths or not, right? I mean so so so sometimes it is like really serious stuff. let let me throw out I think three ways that I'm thinking about that sometimes conflict works differently.
In our wards than might work, say in our neighborhoods or in our workplaces or so forth, because of the distinctive religious commitments and obligations and teachings that we have, and see what you think about this. So, and and some of this you've already mentioned. Some sometimes we we run into ideas about keys and hierarchy, right? That there are certain people who have been called to have the final answer on certain things, at least within their sphere of authority.
We also are a community that believes that there is such a thing as truth, right? And that not everything is up for debate. Not everything is up for d discussion, right? that actually there is a correct answer to the to the average length of an elephant trunk, right? in in spiritual terms, and and that actually not everybody's opinion, well, they may have a right to it, you know. we we actually have some teachings that that that we that we see are are really important.
And then we also have a sense of of don't judge, right? And a lot of teachings. And some sometimes these things that I'm talking about sort of go in opposite ways. So maybe I'm putting too much on the table all at once. But we do also have these sense of like don't judge and and be compassionate towards other people, let give people their space and right that that we are not the final judge. And we could probably think of others. I mean, so when when each of you thinks about like these particular things that make the conflicts in our wards especially difficult or at least have a different character than they might have. how how do you respond to any of those? And maybe you don't have to respond to all of them, but but but does that spark anything for either of you?
Christopher Palmer (26:27)
I had a leader in our ward who was she had had many, many senior leadership positions and was a retired attorney, just like kind of dripping with capability. And out of respect to me, she would never disagree with me in public. So she would like listen as I said some like dumb idea, and then she would pull me aside afterwards and she'd be like, So here's why that won't work and I respected her respect for me, and that did f I just felt like she always had my back. But it did feel like a missed opportunity that we didn't get the engagement to roll forward because of her deference for for me. That like sometimes if she had had her strong opinion in public, and by public I mean like in a ward council setting, for example, I feel like maybe we would have been able to amplify that. It would have given other people good ideas. It would have helped shut down other bad ideas and it we would have been able to get to a better place that way. So that was one thing that I could see in your three examples of of why this is hard.
Jennifer Thomas (27:27)
And I love that also in that, Christopher, that it sometimes we operate under the assumption that our leaders don't want this. I think a lot of the premise of this conversation has been that leaders are going to be resistant if we kind of share our concerns with them. But I love the way that you've just modeled that there are a lot of leaders that are like, no, I I want to hear the concerns and I'd like to hear them in a way that signals to other people. That didn't allow you to signal.
to anyone else that you were happy to hear those criticisms. They came privately, you could communicate to her, and I'm sure you did. Thank you. That's welcome. I'm happy to hear it. But that didn't that knowledge and that learning and that openness on your part didn't skip get spread past that one relationship. So I really like the way you've shared that.
Christopher Palmer (28:12)
Yeah, thanks.
Carri Hulet (28:12)
Yeah, me too. I think I agree with you. I think just to model it more would be really good, I think it's so funny that we have this lay clergy church, and then as soon as someone gets a calling, we're like, they know everything. It's so unfair. It's so unfair
Patrick Mason (28:26)
Yeah.
Carri Hulet (28:28)
to everyone who gets called because from one day to the next you really don't know more than you did the day before, even if you do have a different kind of calling and mantle. I think, I was thinking about the question of truth. And I hope this isn't too like if I hope I don't go down d down a rabbit hole too much here, but I think i the the idea that there is truth sometimes makes us think that there is one answer to everything and that can drive us toward avoiding any engagement with a topic because we just assume there's like one right answer here.
And certainly the person with the calling is the person who's gonna find it, right? Like the words are gonna come down from heaven and tell them this is the one right answer. And instead, of course, there are many ways we can do things in the ward that are true. There are many different ways that could be good and therefore true, or good enough, right? And therefore true. And I think our sometimes inability to be satisfied with a range is i makes it hard for us to feel satisfied with something that is clearly good enough and therefore true. But we're like, was it the one thing? Was it the exact right thing? And I think that can be hard and therefore again like drive us to not engage and and not like Christopher said multiple times, not be a part of that brainstorming and solution making and problem solving together.
It's like we just don't trust ourselves to be able to arrive at truth, which is kinda funny. It's the whole point of what we are taught. Yeah. Yeah.
Jennifer Thomas (29:54)
Premise of the gospel.
Patrick Mason (29:56)
How how how would you manage that around say a doctrinal thing? So so not a kind of programmatic or like different ways to like sort of manage things, right, within the word that that I think a lot of people would recognize. Okay, there's more than one way to do this, right? But around a doctrinal thing, you say say you're sitting in Relief society, you're sitting in Sunday school, right? And and and they're I mean, the what what you mentioned earlier, Christopher, from third Nephi 11, right? They're having a doctrinal dispute about baptism, right?
and then he says, like, there's one way to baptize, right? so there there are some things. let's just use an ex an extreme example. Say somebody in Sunday school says, like, I actually don't think Jesus Christ was resurrected, right? Or or or something like that. where at least from church doctrine, we we do have like a correct answer, right? And we recognize not everybody in the world believes that, but at least the within the church, within the covenanted community of the church. That is a core article of faith for us that the Jesus rose from the grave. So so how how do you think about peacemaking around doctrinal disputes within church?
Christopher Palmer (30:56)
We we had Carri come once and do a second hour lesson in our ward. And just this person threw her a complete wasn't even in our ward, but had walked in at the end, gave you this complete curveball at the end of the lesson. And I remember looking at one of my counselors and being like, We are so glad it's Carri up there and not us. And I think you just modeled exactly how to do that. Like you just handled it with such grace and tact. And so that's part of it is like you weren't like What? Did you hear anything I just said? you just kinda rolled with it and you figured out what you could latch on to, which was kinda tricky of like what that person had said, even though it like seemed like they they are just kind of missing the mark and and like part it was just like love and good nature and like you you weren't taking it personally.
Carri Hulet (31:38)
That's that's so great to hear. I have no recollection of that moment, but I'm so glad it went well. So glad really
Christopher Palmer (31:42)
You were in the zone.
Jennifer Thomas (31:43)
I do. I do.
Christopher Palmer (31:46)
Ha ha.
Carri Hulet (31:46)
I'm so glad it went well. I think there are a couple of things I would I I would say on this. One is I do think that curiosity is when I'm teaching people about mediation negotiation, I say if there's one one like quality that you can develop, it's curiosity. Because judgment is the thing that we are all much better at. So someone says something, you disagree, you instantly start to think of all the reasons why, and then you start to think about how to defend it and all that, right? So the first reaction can be curiosity, a little that is so interesting. I I'm so fascinated. Why do you think that? Tell me more. You know? If you have time, which is tough to get, especially these days, then I think you can engage it a little bit. I also think it's okay to say, that is so interesting, Patrick. I
Frankly, I have never heard anyone express that perspective. And I would love to hear more about why you think that. I wish we had more time. It is very different from the official doctrine of the church, which is that Jesus did resurrect. Like I think as a teacher you have a responsibility to name the doctrine if it's that clear. So you just said something so clear. I think usually people express concerns that are in this world of gray where you it's really not your job.
To say the way in which they are wrong, but I do, I always appreciate when a teacher clearly names that something is different than what than than the official, you know. That's helpful, I think. But I think the key there is respect. So you just said something I totally disagree with, but I don't feel differently about you as a human being. I still honor.
And love you and care for you as my brother or sister. And even if I'm having trouble with curiosity, I don't think less of you for thinking differently than I or thinking differently than the church teaches. You are still a child of God. And my behavior toward you and my feelings toward you, I it's incumbent upon me to treat you in that way. And so I think that's the way that you have to try to deal with these things. And I think if someone becomes very aggressive, then you say, This doesn't feel like the right conversation for this space. At some point you shut it down,
Jennifer Thomas (33:57)
So I have this seared in my memory about 15 years ago, and it was long before I started a journey trying to understand conflict and peacemaking, sitting in my parents' home ward I was back visiting, and a perfectly lovely relief society class was happening. And I don't even remember the topic, but someone made a statement and someone else in the class raised their hand and said, You're wrong, and let me tell you why, and then proceeded to basically humiliate that person.
Christopher Palmer (34:25)
Oof.
Jennifer Thomas (34:25)
Right. And
Carri Hulet (34:26)
Mm.
Jennifer Thomas (34:26)
and I think that person, the the woman doing that, I know and I know well, and truly thought that I don't think ever thought she was being unkind. I think she thought she was defending the faith. Right. But I remember sitting there in the moment and thinking, This feels awful. It feels gross. And I don't even know that I completely agree with your defense. Do you know what I mean? Because sometimes these things aren't so clear cut.
And then it was a few years later that I was sitting in another relief society meeting and I saw someone say something that was, I thought, truly outrageous. And some the teacher literally said, That is interesting. Could you help me understand why you feel that way? And she didn't even say think that way. She just said feel that way. And it was such a transformative experience for me because I do not to this day remember the topics that either of those things were talking about, but I remember.
How the room felt the first time. I remembered the face of the person who had been corrected the first time. I remember the room the second time and the face of the person who had been invited into dialogue. And that teacher really did. She she listened and then she said, That is so like helpful for me to understand. If you'd like, I'd be happy to talk with you about this later. And then she just went on with her lesson. But there was no harm done, if that makes any sense. And so I really love the example you've given, Carri, here about just leading with curiosity and leading with love of the other person. Because I think we all know that while doctrines are deeply important and they need to be upheld and sustained, what is important in a church setting is that people don't feel damaged by that process and that they feel loved, even if we assert truth. So I just really appreciate you framing that that way because I think that set us on the right path for knowing how we can respond in situations like that.
Carri Hulet (36:18)
Mm-hmm. Thanks, Jennifer. I think that we f forget sometimes that having a different belief is not a sin. People are allowed to not have arrived at a testimony yet. You know, it's okay for people. I think we just feel so uncomfortable with it sometimes. It's like that person hasn't arrived at their testimony of this doctrine. That's not a sin.
Jennifer Thomas (36:38)
And I think we also forget how vulnerable people are when they respond in church. we get used to it, but but when people are sharing something, they're being vulnerable and it's helpful to respect.
Patrick Mason (36:47)
So along these lines then what what can ward leaders, all of us, but but but war ward leaders do to create wards, not necessarily where everybody agrees on everything, but everyone feels like that they have a place here, that that they belong and and that they can worship here. How how do we create that kind of environment? Christopher, do you wanna go first?
Christopher Palmer (37:06)
Yeah. I I have a friend who grew up in the Inner Mountain West and realized when he was a like young teenager that he was gay and we were talking about his experience. He was in one of our wards out here. We were talking about his experience and he said to me something that I thought was really profound. He said, I just wish that someone along the way in my childhood would have entered into their mind the possibility that maybe I'm speaking to a mixed audience. And we s we tend to always think that we are talking to people that think exactly the same way that we do. And he was saying, like, you're we're just w actually, we're always in mixed company. And like statistically, out of the like 50 youth in my like Cash Valley ward, there would have been like one of us that was gay. And it turned out to be me, is what he was saying. And so I think leaders can always assume that they're speaking to a mixed audience.
And I define mixed very broadly, right? And if this is this is really hits home if you've ever sat on the stand like to give a talk or you were you were in a bishopric or something like that. You like look out at the audience and you just realize the spectrum of people and how different everyone's reactions are. And when someone's being like really fiery and rigid and dogmatic, you can see the people that that resonates with and they love it and they're like, yeah, like I'd like to throw a grenade right now.
And then other people that are like it's just they feel sick about it, right? And vice versa. You just see that there's always this spectrum. And I think it changes how we should speak as leaders if we're always thinking that this room is not like everyone has the same view of how long the elephant trunk is, but like this room is like there's people that are all over the map. And I want to give them the benefit of the doubt and also the humility that, like, maybe my own views are not a hundred percent right. And when we do that, it mellows us out, I think, and and helps us leave room for everyone to be who they are.
Carri Hulet (38:58)
Yeah, that's so nice. I'll just add, I totally agree with that. And I think not letting problems linger, meaning someone, something happens, right? There's some situation. And it's very clear that someone or everyone involved does not want to see each other again anytime soon. And anyone does not have to be a person in authority or leadership. Anyone can go to any of those people and be like,
I'm so sorry, that seemed really hard, but I am so glad that you're part of us. And I just hope that this heals quickly and that you feel like that doesn't make you I hope you don't feel like you can't we can't all be together or you're not welcome or that you don't belong. Like those words are very powerful to just say remember you do belong here. We all belong here.
Jennifer Thomas (39:45)
Yes.
Carri Hulet (39:46)
There is no like we are here because Christ has said that we are here. And so we're just here. And I I just think the effort to say to people, you do belong here. I want you here. Other people want you here is really, is really, really important. And I also think a little humor helps now and again. Like I there are a couple of men in my ward now who totally disagree with each other on a million things and they always joke about it. And it's so great.
Because it just it makes it it names the differences and it also names their love and care for each other. And that that people who can rise to that level are impressive and and they help the rest of us out, right? Because it makes it it makes it okay to just not agree with everybody all the time on everything.
Christopher Palmer (40:35)
Here's another little practice that I noticed someone in our ward doing that I was just floored by. So there was a talk that was over the pulpit, and I immediately kind of thought this talk has the potential to be quite offensive to several people in the ward, in part because the speaker was somewhat i misinformed, but he was he was is essentially insinuating that like all of his kids were fully participating in the church because of his like great decisions and prowess as a parent. And and anyway, he was factually wrong about that and didn't know it. But setting that aside,
Jennifer Thomas (41:09)
Yeah.
Christopher Palmer (41:10)
I just thought like, this is gonna be tough for a lot of people. I mean basically every single person, right? But there was there were some people that I there was a couple that I saw approach him afterwards and they latched on to something of his talk that they liked. And I was thinking like they should be so hurt by what his talk was, but they instead said like
Dear brother, I really loved how you said this. And I almost saw him crack a little bit, he all of a sudden replayed his talk th and listened to it through their ears and was like, like, what a but but they were so like I I think that that as a practice of peacemaking is really beautiful to just be like, because I want to reaffirm that you belong even if you're you might have unintentionally offended me, and I belong even if I'm somewhat un offended, I'm gonna like knit us together a little bit more, by finding something that I can honor about how you showed up.
Jennifer Thomas (41:59)
So that is incredibly beautiful. I'm really appreciative of you sharing that story and now I wish I could remember what that talk was. but I you guys, we invited you both on this podcast because you are both masters at triage in a time of crisis, and you're also really masterful healers. I've seen both of you do that so well. so but I would I'd love for you to each spend a couple of minutes talking to us. Now you're primary care physicians, and I want you to operate a seat of preventative preventative care rather than post-traumatic response. So what do you think that we can do from your perspective, both both of you having been leaders in congregations, what can we do to create cultures that is that are better equipped to handle conflict before it happens? That we can prepare people in our communities to learn the skills before the moment of crisis comes.
Carri Hulet (42:46)
I have a pretty simple answer to this. I I think a lot of crisis, sorry, not crisis, a lot of conflict, and these are sort of mini conflicts, but they're the kinds of conflicts we see all the time result from people not not taking the time and care to prepare for whatever the thing is that they're about to engage in with their fellow ward members. So if you are in charge of ward council, you can do a lot to avoid conflict by just
Giving the proper amount of time to think through what exactly are we going to talk about here and who needs to be there and giving people an agenda in advance and having a sense of the directionality of the conversation. So you don't throw a bunch of people into a room and then just hope that through everybody's good grace it will go well. You know, like there's a lot of conflict is just the result of poor planning and and not being careful with other people's time.
And we just have such a culture of everybody, when someone says go, everybody jumps and does it, which is beautiful and wonderful. But we can take advantage of that by not giving the proper care and attention to preparation. And I am speaking to myself right now. Anybody who's ever worked with me in the church knows, wow, Carri, you are not always as prepared as we would like you to be. But the point is that when when we are, we just really make it easier for everybody else to do exactly what Christopher said, which is to name their of their opinions and views because they realize it's it's like the container was carefully crafted. And within this container, I am welcome to speak my mind. And so I think we can do a lot about that if we're just a little more careful about the advance preparation.
Christopher Palmer (44:23)
And I think sometimes after the advanced preparation we undermine all of it when we say, Well, let's hear a few opinions and then behind closed doors, two of us are gonna make the final decision. And I think that that just destroys
all of the buy-in and then then the decision is like handed out from handed down from on high and people are like, Well, so why did I why why did I give my opinion? Like I don't know how that was incorporated. And so I think being transparent and like giving credit to the people that participated in that discussion is really valuable on that side. I think my answer was gonna be something we've mostly already covered, is that just modeling how this like what this de disagreement looks like. So we've we've had this discussion at home in our family that if Megan and I always disagree with each other behind closed doors, our kids will never learn like healthy conflict. They'll always just learn the conflict that they fall into naturally when they fight like cats and dogs.
And there's something about us showing up and saying, like, we can disagree and we can do that respectfully and we're into each other for the long haul. And there's this is no referendum on how we feel about each other. We just have a difference of opinion and we're gonna try to figure out what the right or good enough path forward is for us.
Patrick Mason (45:31)
This is great. I have really appreciated this conversation. I think there's so much wisdom here. And I think people are really going to benefit and and think about in in whatever role they they are currently in in their ward. And and I love the point that that you made earlier that that that in wards we change roles all the time. And this is actually one
Jennifer Thomas (45:47)
Mm-hmm.
Patrick Mason (45:48)
of the things that that both can generate conflict, but actually can be one of our greatest tools for thinking about the kinds of relationships we want to build. and so so this is marvelous.
I wanna finish by asking you each to to reflect on on the question of where you personally find peace. Carri, do you wanna start that?
Carri Hulet (46:07)
Sure. It's funny, I I it when I'm inside the box that I described at the beginning, the only way I get out of it is talking. I have to talk to the person or the people that I'm in conflict with. I just have to talk it through. And it's really scary and it's really hard. But that is I cannot pray my way out of that box or I have I've never successfully prayed my way out of the box. I've prayed a lot.
to get out of the bo to find the way, but eventually I have to just I have to talk to them. So that's that's the way. But I will say where I feel the most peaceful is in nature. Like I find my peaceful space in nature. That's where I feel it. But when I'm when I'm stuck, I ha I have to w talk my way out of it.
Patrick Mason (46:46)
Christopher.
Christopher Palmer (46:47)
Think when I'm desperate for peace, the hymn, Where Can I Turn for Peace often comes to mind and that's what I end up looking at or reading or listening to and it reminds me where peace comes from and the ultimate source of peace. I also feel like peace is a subtle emotion, and so that maybe that's why nature works, because we kind of need the quiet to be able to detect it. And like tender mercies are a subtle emotion that if we're quiet enough we can notice them. I remember driving home from the chapel once after a meeting that like kind of shook me because it was just a a a family that I never thought was gonna be going through what they were going through. And I was just feeling so weighed down from that. And in our town they've gone through and painted all of these like rusty old utility boxes on the sidewalk with like kind of murals. And I was about to turn and I was at a stoplight and I looked over and the utility box right there was painted by my sister.
And I just felt such appreciation for it. it was this little wink, tender mercy from Heavenly Father being like, I I see you and like this burden you're carrying, it's it's mine. Like you gotta give that that over to me. And so I feel like when I am kind of desperate for peace, just noticing these kind of like little things helps me recenter and kind of try to to channel this subtle emotion of peace.
Patrick Mason (48:04)
Amazing. Thank you both so much for everything you brought today. I learned a lot and really appreciate all all your wisdom as as peacemakers.
Christopher Palmer (48:11)
really fun. Thanks.
Jennifer Thomas (48:12)
Thanks for coming.
Carri Hulet (48:13)
Yeah, thank you for having us.
Jennifer Thomas (48:21)Thanks for listening to this episode of "Proclaim Peace." To hear more, you can subscribe on a podcast app of your choice or on YouTube. You can always find full show notes or transcriptions at proclaimpeace.org.
Patrick Mason (48:34)
"Proclaim Peace" is a partnership between MWEG and Waymakers. You can learn more about Waymakers at waymakers.us. Thanks again for listening and we'll see you next time.
