 I think this is Q&A right? Yes. Where is it? Hi. I have a big girl. Hey. What is her name? I don't know. In fact, they heard it up there. They heard it now. They heard Dallas County. That's good. That's good. They got the whole conference listening. Some of you have submitted some questions that we are going to ask the Bishop. Kind of, this is more of a light-hearted friend couple things that Bishop may keep. What we wanted to start with is what does a Bishop do every day? There are a lot of people who ask that question. And every day of my life is different. And every day of everybody's life is different. But in work that I do, there are things I don't do anymore that I really enjoy. Like, I don't preach at the same church every single time. I don't, I don't see the same people every day of my life, most every day of my life. So, what I do is I'm responsible for, I see myself as a responsible steward of the 300-plus churches in New York, and the North Texas Conference. So that involves being sometimes about vision, sometimes involves going to Honduras, that carries the Honduras with me on our mission experience, learning about what's going on in Honduras. And I've had this church. I mean, I've had this church sound in the state of Texas where the Black America is in Honduras. So I'm responsible for that. There are days in which I've consulted different people about their past group, or I've maybe consulted a pastor about his or her vision of the local church, which he tries to out, or most of the days are really bad. Another day. And most of the time I've taken it up to days, they're good to me. Another question, addition, baptized babies. So early in the church, the image that we first have of baptism is really about Jesus being baptized by John the Baptist. And so we think that's the way everybody is baptized. But early on, in that early church, that he began after that experience, and asked to the day that it caused him, that they were baptizing babies. In fact, it's said in a couple of places that whole families were baptizing the same. And so the reason people were baptized, and I appreciate your tradition, was the way to mark that already they were going to be part of this family affair. The Hebrews, Jews had a different way of doing that. They didn't use baptism to get into that, but literally, so we began to baptize people. And we do it as the United Methodists, because we believe what I said earlier, that God's grace would love us surrounding all the days of the life, even if we don't know. The reason why Provenias were strange, I think, is that Provenias really, it comes from the word prevent. And you think, we all think that makes it stop, that keeps something from happening, but prevent means to go before. So the Keith James version of Bible in the Summary, I think the 59th Psalm, is said something about Provenias, my God was before me. And so when you think about my Provenias, God's already already surrounded you. And so in the Baptist's way of knowledge and farming, that God always surrounds you, and I used to say in the Church, is that I'm pastored. After I've baptized the baby, I take the baby down the aisle, and look into his or her eyes. By the way, I had only had one baby brought, hundreds upon hundreds that I've baptized, I only had one baby brought. And I would look in that child's eyes and I would say, today you have baptized and received the Church. And through the sight of baptism, God has made a claim upon your life. And God has a dream. God's dream or vision for you is for you to become faithful followers of Jesus. But in order for you to do that, then we're going to be weaker here than parents. There's this congregation. We're going to tell you the story of Jesus. So the history that He comes. And that's not only an affirmation about what God does, it was also a decision about what we were all going to do with that child. And that's the delt story of Jesus, or history, or history. I've noticed a question about confirmation. Yes, why is confirmation important? So confirmation is important because when I was six months old, when I was baptized, I don't remember. I didn't know I was Catholic. I was where very little was the six months old. You were too. So most of us were baptized as infants. We really didn't know what happened. But there comes that time at which you have to take responsibility for your own faith journey. And the Hebrew tradition, the Jewish tradition, how many of you have friends for Jewish? A lot of me. And so this is the best way to describe it, is how many of your friends have had a bar, or a bar for a botanist? Is that correct? Have you ever been to a bar, or a botanist? Have you ever been to a bar, or a botanist? No, I was going to take a party beforehand. And I always told my daughter, you can go to the party with me. I was going to go to the service before. Because that's what it's about. So the confirmation process in the Christian church Church is you or I, by saying yes to the commitment that our parents did before and we take our own responsibility for our faith. Somebody submitted a question, how do I know if I am told to be a pastor? You know, this happens in a lot of different ways. So I can tell you my false story just quickly. I've held this so many times in my texts. I know some of them have been heard and I don't put it to you now. So I can remember being four or five years old and saying one day as we left the church, to my father, I think I want to be a preacher. Now every Sunday we also went to my father's house or his sister or brother-in-law lived. My cousins lived. We all went rock-five there. We didn't necessarily have lunch together. But my dad walked and said, and this is what I can sometimes call me a little man. I want to be a preacher. And so, you know, everybody else also, everybody has a purpose to be a preacher. I was five or so. I was just trying to figure out what to do. And I wanted to be in that one year. About a year later, I said to my dad, and we sat on the back of a few. My dad said to me, my brother made, but that was more controlled than anything else. Truth or none. And I said afterwards, I said, I don't want to be a preacher. He said, well, I don't want to know what you want to be, but I don't want to know why you don't want to be a preacher. And I said, you know how I've been watching these gathers, and all of them are bald, and I'm going to lose my hair. I don't want to lose my fingers. I know, you won't, but anyway. So what I'm going to say is that I think that was sort of the first thing. And I can remember Junior High thinking I was going to be a United Methodist pastor at that time. And I remember thinking I was going to do that. When I graduated from my school on the University of Texas, so that I could get a government degree and go to law school, and you know, then I got attached to church. And her preaching was just unbelievable. It's still the best preaching ever, Sunday after Sunday after Sunday, at First Methodist Church in downtown Austin. And I just think that this is a continual intersection of the spiritual life that was really drawing me to a different, taller location. And so I don't think you're going to do any voice-as-long voices. What I was submitted is how do I decide where to worship each Sunday? How do I decide? I think a question I've asked for... For them? Yeah. So when I was growing up, we went to church every Sunday. There was, I need to tell you, it's not anything open on Sunday. Even through Junior High Hospital, I know that that's strange. I'll never get the first time I saw a shot. I was going to go to church every Sunday. What I want to say is we just went to church every Sunday. We didn't have a choice. We went to church every Sunday with my parents. The first time I chose where or if I was going to go to church was when I was in college. In the first year, I'm going to be very open and transparent. I didn't go to church every Sunday. I went to church only for a weekend in college. But the second year in college, somehow there was this boy that was taking part in a call, and I thought, I'm going to go to church. It's the last time I've ever... That's the only time I've ever chosen which church I was going to go to. Because I want to think about it, the last time I became a minister of vision decided what church I was going to go to. And then when I became a Bishop, an implicit committee decided where I was going to go. So I don't know how to decide, but I think it's not only where you feel comfortable because I take people coming. They just want to find peace. Well, if you follow Jesus, there are a lot of times you're quiet when you're not there. So I'm going to go, I'm going to go find the next one's challenge, which I felt alone, but ignored. There's a question that's kind of related. Why should you go to church every week? As a seminary professor has said, if the Christian faith in the church talks too much, it should. It's what we should do. We should do this. We should not do this. I don't know that I could use the word should. This is why the use is not online. It's just the rhythm of the week it's set. And I think it's helpful. It reminds me I'm not in a spot alone, trying to make my own way. There are a lot of people who really care about me. Or I can challenge by something that the preacher says, or there's something beautiful in the liturgy that's in spoken words, or there's something beautiful in the liturgy. I know that something's missing. I know that I may be one of the last generations to go to church every Sunday. But I do think it does you really well. And I need to tell you that Christianity and Christian faith is not a solitary duty. You can't just do it by yourself. It was not meant to be done by yourselves, meant to be done by others.