America is 250 years old, and somehow still has the energy of a teenager with a credit card, a rocket programme, and a very firm opinion about everything. In this episode, we celebrate the United States of America at 250, looking back at the Declaration of Independence, the Founding Fathers, the Constitution, American freedom, national identity, faith, democracy, innovation, and the extraordinary story of a country that began as thirteen colonies and became the most powerful nation on earth.

But this is not just nostalgia with fireworks attached. We ask what the next 250 years of America might look like, and we predict good things. Not because everything is tidy. It is not. Anyone claiming America is calm and settled has presumably never opened the internet. But beneath the noise there is still enormous strength: world-leading technology, unmatched creativity, deep religious roots, a culture of enterprise, vast natural resources, military power, scientific leadership, and a stubborn belief that tomorrow can be better than today.

From the American Revolution to the moon landing, from Silicon Valley to small-town churches, from constitutional liberty to cultural chaos, America has always been a contradiction with a flag. Grand, maddening, brilliant, excessive, generous, divided, hopeful. Very American, in other words.

We explore whether America can renew itself spiritually, politically and culturally, and whether the next chapter could see not decline but revival. A renewed America could lead in artificial intelligence, energy, medicine, space exploration, education, religious freedom, and democratic confidence. That is the optimistic case, and we are making it with both eyes open, which is generally safer than doing it with bunting over your face.

America at 250 is not the end of the story. It may be the beginning of a new one.