Andy Weenig and Mark Houser

Andy Weenig (AW) asks Mark Houser (MH) why he wanted to have an One Small Step conversation. MH asks AW the same.

MH asks AW about his family and 5 children.

MH & AW talk about their shared experience of both having worked as river guides.

AW asks MH about coaching Jackson Hole High School's Speech and Debate Club.

AW asks MH about his personal experience with suicide and his work in counseling people who have lost someone to suicide. AW talks about how suicide has touched his family. MH asks about the perception of suicide in the Church of Jesus Christ of Later Day Saints (LDS).

AW asks MH about how religion (Lutheran) has shaped his world view. MH talks about Carl ________ a Lutheran Minister who MH met in college who was openly gay and inspired MH's work in LGBTQ rights advocacy.

AW reflects on being a parent of teenagers and fears how his bias may be pushing them away as they develop their individuality.

MH talks about the Lutheran Ministry and once considering becoming a minister when he was in college.

MH talks about his daughter who came out to him when she was in the 8th grade in 1996. AW asks about the social climate in Jackson Hole at that time.

AW shares how he tries to balance his LDS faith with his perception of morality and politics and mentions that his opinions on abortion shifted when the State of WY attempted to pass legislation to prohibit home births. He and his wife decided bodily autonomy is a basic right for all.

AW talks about the structure and practice within the LDS Church in Jackson Hole.

MH talks about being adopted as a baby and meeting his birth mother and brother as a 50 year old man, which has colored his perception of abortion.

AW asks MH what he would say to a pregnant teen, which leads to a discussion about how society may or may not be impacted by an individual's choice.

AW mentions a concept of "omitted positivity" and if one can prioritize one's own autonomy over society.

Both talk about how to address political divides within society coming from a conservative, religious community.

AW talks about his role as a father and the influence of his own father in politics and how to communicate.

AW asks MH about his siblings and their simularities (both those he was raised with and the biological brother he didn't meet until later in life). He mentions how that has influenced him in thinking about nature vs. nurture.

MH asks AW about how he interacts on the day to day as a political minority, how he connects, what he shares with people. AW finds common ground around nature.

AW asks MH about acting on desire, whether homosexual or heterosexual.