Ep. 203 (Part 2 of 2) | In this rich, delightful, and profound conversation, Integral Theory informed Father David McCallum, SJ, currently serving the Catholic Church as executive director of the Program for Discerning Leadership, leads us into a world filled with mission, purpose, and service, foundational to which is the practice of discernment. David describes discernment as the capacity to exercise good judgment, hold complexity, and wait for clarity. This is not only a practice for individuals, he explains, but also a communal one, providing a way for communities to discern and design together the future they want to create—through listening, dialoguing, participating. Discernment is a way of knowing and making sense of reality, David continues, and especially important now in this era of changes and choices to be made.

David enlightens us as to the beautiful and far-sighted reforms proposed by the late Pope Francis, who was all for changing the balance of authority and participation in the Church; for people to have direct experience of Presence and the capacity to practice discernment; who also advocated for taking swift action on behalf of our planet, even calling out the part in the Bible that says man has dominion over the Earth. From David’s description of “the journey worth making”—surrendering, opening, accepting divine grace and love—to using Otto Scharmer’s U Process to help find the courage to change and simplify our lives for the benefit of all, to the Church’s relationship with A.I., David provides us with an extraordinarily mind-broadening, motivating, and spiritually fulfilling perspective. Recorded July 10, 2025.

“Disasters and oppression today are by-products of a spiritual crisis… We don’t see the unity of all.”

• Turning inward for guidance: making discernment practices & skills available to all (01:07)
• The hunger to get back to direct experience (04:04)
• Practicing with the Ignatius exercises including contemplation: the path of silence (06:40)
• Pope Francis’ call out for action on behalf of the Earth (09:39)
• Using Otto Scharmer’s U Process to gain the courage to simplify our lives and make the commitment to change (12:11)
• Pope Francis’ challenging the idea that men should have dominion over the earth (13:30)
• Disasters and oppression today are by-products of a spiritual crisis; we don’t see the unity of all (15:13)
• Liberation theology: awakening the poor to their plight, giving them tools to remediate systemic injustice (16:52)
• Why Jesuits were killed in El Salvador (19:28)
• In the current situation in the U.S., what shape will/should religiously motivated resistance take? (20:23)
• The church, A.I., and the danger of losing our human competencies to machines (27:32)

• Father David McCallum, SJ, The Program for Discerning Leadership
• The Spiritual Exercises of St Ignatius of Loyola
• Jesuit Roshi Bob Kennedy;