In this collection of essays, an invited a group of leaders considers and suggests, if a coefficient of happiness were to be added to the customary monetary coefficient, how this would radically alter their way of practicing their profession. Pivotal to this reformation would be the prime motive of global and personal collaboration. Just as the Black Plague was followed by the Renaissance culture of meritocracy, the COVID pandemic has to be responded to with collaboration. For the challenge today is compounded by millions of refugees and world hunger. The growing global population can only be the breeding ground of new viruses. Hopefully, conflict between nations will diminish to enable the fight against this common enemy.

James M. Houston is professor emeritus of spiritual theology and founding principal of Regent College, Vancouver, British Columbia. He is the author of many books and has been described as a geographer of the self, a mystic, and an evangelical pioneer in the field of spiritual theology. He was trained in the history of ideas and taught at the University of Oxford for two decades as a geographer.