PHOTO PROVIDED Rev. Dr. Doug Dortch

Acoustics have never been my area of expertise, at least not in the technical sense. When it comes to music, both sacred and secular, I know what I like but am at a loss to explain why. But recently I heard someone refer to an “echo chamber,” a recording term, which in this current moment has come to take on more and more sense to me.

In its purest sense, an echo chamber is a hollow enclosure used to produce reverberated sounds for recording sessions. The term of course comes from that phenomenon of standing at the top of a high peak and hearing your own voice reverberating back to you from the valley below, as if there are others down in the valley who are repeating your words. Popular culture has picked up on the analogy so that to be in an echo chamber refers to a narrow-minded communications space where you think that everyone agrees entirely with your perspective. If you’ve spent any time on social media lately, you understand the analogy and have seen it practiced. It’s not so much that there’s anything wrong or unhealthy about having other people agree with you; the danger only comes when we feel the need to stifle other voices and turn a deaf ear to anyone who dares to think differently.

Diversity of opinion is always a challenge. I never find it enjoyable to cross paths with someone who has a different take on things than I do. I much prefer to think that I’m always in the right. But in my more honest moments I must acknowledge that I have grown much from wrestling with other viewpoints, even when I haven’t ended up accepting them.

All of this has come home to me in the last several days as I’ve been confronted with other opinions and interpretations from both the left and right of where I am, which has resulted in some fascinating conversations. My hope is that not so much that I’ll convince anyone to agree with me as it is that they will at least respect my position. I like big circles that include as many people as possible. But I also recognize that some people don’t, and it’s best for me simply to respect where they are and move on. After all, maturity demands we define ourselves without expecting everyone else to line up precisely with us. It’s a much larger (and more freeing and fulfilling) world once we open the door and step out of our echo chambers.

When I read the Bible, it seems to me that as a Christian, I am called as a person of faith to do my best to draw big circles in all my relationships, especially considering how Jesus seemed to have taken exactly such an approach in his ministry. That approach may be something you might want to consider also, especially in these present times, because in the end, whenever and wherever we speak up and hear the voice of Jesus echoing back, we will know we are in a very good place.

“Speaking the truth in love, we will grow to become in every respect the mature body of him who is the head, that is, Christ” (Eph. 4:15).

The Rev. Dr. Doug Dortch is the pastor at the Captiva Chapel by the Sea.