In this episode, Ben Norquist and Brian Miller make the case that American Christians have become a placeless, rootless people and that we are shaped by inherited land stories. That our land is exceptional. That property is something to wall off. That the ground exists to be taken and turned into wealth. We dig into where these stories came from, how they affect our faith, and why it matters that Scripture opens with God calling place good. We talk about how to read the place you actually live, whose stories get monuments and whose get erased, and what better land stories, ones shaped more like Jesus, might look like.

Dr. Ben Norquist is a writer, researcher, and communications strategist whose work explores how Christian understandings of land shape mora/l imagination and public life. He serves with the Bethlehem Institute for Peace & Justice, engaging American Christians on questions of theology, justice, and the realities in Palestine. He is co-author of Every Somewhere Sacred: Rescuing a Theology of Place in the American Imagination (InterVarsity Press, 2026).

Brian Miller (PhD, University of Notre Dame) is professor of sociology at Wheaton College and regularly teaches about and publishes on Christian residential and cultural patterns. His books include Sanctifying Suburbia: How the Suburbs Becamethe Promised Land for American Evangelicals and Building Faith: A Sociology of Religious Structures, coauthored with Robert Brenneman.

Ben & Brian's Book:

Every Somewhere Sacred

Connect with Joshua: jjohnson@shiftingculturepodcast.com

Go to www.shiftingculturepodcast.com to interact and donate. Every donation helps to produce more podcasts for you to enjoy.

Follow on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, Threads, Bluesky or YouTube

Support the podcast and the ministry that my wife and I do around the world. Just click on the support the show link below

Bring meaningful conversations about home, belonging and loving your neighbor to your friends, family or small group. Download World Relief’s free conversation cards at worldrelief.org/shiftingculture

Go to eerdmans.com and use promo code CULTURE40 for 40% all books

Support the show