Meet Carl Godlove: The Swedenborg Foundation’s New CEO
The Swedenborg Foundation has experienced unprecedented growth over the last decade, thanks in no small part to the hard work of the creative teams behind our translations and video content. In order to ensure that we can continue that growth and capitalize on it, while not having it overwhelm the creative teams that spurred it, the board of directors has hired Carl Godlove to serve as their CEO, effective July 1, 2022. Carl is a seasoned chief executive officer who brings both his experience and his passion for Swedenborg’s message to the Foundation.
With more than twenty years of CEO experience, and more than thirty years of continuous service on nonprofit boards in leadership roles, Carl found Swedenborg in 2015 through the Foundation’s Off The Left Eye videos, and he was hooked. Carl sought out Curtis Childs (host of the Off The Left Eye YouTube channel) on the Bryn Athyn College campus in 2016 and offered to do anything he could to serve the cause. Curtis took him up on that offer. This led to Carl joining the board of directors in 2019 and subsequently advising Curtis on long-term strategic planning. In July 2021, Carl was hired to fill a leadership gap, taking on the role of interim CEO, which precipitated his resignation from the board so that he could fill the position. The board search committee went through a rigorous, professional process, reviewing more than seventy applicants. In the end, Carl was selected and hired by the board to be the permanent CEO.
Carl has a proven professional track record of helping teams succeed at the highest levels. His tagline on LinkedIn gives some insight into what attracted Carl so powerfully to Swedenborg: “ignite the human spirit with love-powered purpose.” The love in Carl’s heart, in all its manifested forms, underpins his broad interests and pursuits. He has worked as an engineer, a business owner, a software developer, an entrepreneur, an executive coach, an innovator, and a writer.
Carl’s personal journey began when he became inspired by his father’s willingness to seek out spiritual ideas. Carl pursued a similar quest in many directions. In the first Off The Left Eye video that he saw in 2015, he was most struck by the notion that there is a loving God. He went on to watch many more videos from the Swedenborg Foundation before coming directly to Curtis to offer his professional skills. It is worth noting, too, that Carl is one of the few people to be elected to the board who had no previous affiliation with a Swedenborgian church.
By rearranging the staff leadership team and communicating continuously with the board of directors’ officers, Carl has demonstrated his extraordinary ability to inspire and lead. The board of directors of the Swedenborg Foundation is grateful to have Carl Godlove continue to apply his remarkable talents to our organization in this new role, and to inspire our staff to carry out our mission: “to foster an affirmative, informed, and increasingly broad engagement with the theological message disclosed by Emanuel Swedenborg.” Carl can be contacted at carl.godlove@swedenborg.com.
Soni Werner
Chair, Board of Directors