Shifting Culture

Ep. 466 Kayla Craig Returns - Prayer Is as Close as Your Next Breath: Learning to Pray in Anxious Times

In this episode, Kayla Craig joins me again to talk about her new devotional, Our Daily Breath, a year of breath prayers, Scripture, and short reflections for anxious people living in anxious times. We talk about breath as a recurring thread through Scripture, from Eden to the valley of dry bones, and what the science says about how breathing shapes a body under stress. Kayla describes prayer as noticing more than performing. Together we explore spiritual direction, anger, and waiting rooms, and how the inner life turns outward into love of neighbor. Kayla Craig is a former journalist who brings deep curiosity and care to her writing. Now an author and spiritual director, Kayla helps others slow down and reconnect with God through her writing and speaking. She’s the author of the brand new Our Daily Breath: 365 Prayers and Practices that Whisper Peace in a Shouting World, along with the bestelling books Every Season Sacred and To Light Their Way. Her relatable reflections appear in books, devotionals, and commentaries. Her work has been featured by Christianity Today and Hallmark’s DaySpring. Her weekly newsletter reaches readers in all 50 states and more than 100 countries. With a poetic, prophetic voice, she created the popular Liturgies for Parents Instagram account. With a background in journalism, Kayla brings curiosity and depth to everything she creates. Studying contemplative spiritual direction and formation at Columbia Theological Seminary, she’s learning to companion others on their faith journeys with deep listening and care. Kayla lives in Iowa with her husband, Jonny, and their four children in an 115-year-old former convent, where she’s discovering that a meaningful life with God doesn’t require perfect silence—just a willingness to pay attention. Kayla's Book: Our Daily Breath 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 Listen to The Good, The True, and The Cinema anywhere you get podcasts. Support the show

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Ep. 465 Kutter Callaway - Learning to Fear Rightly

In this episode, Kutter Callaway joins me to talk about his new book, Be Afraid, and why horror might be one of the most spiritual genres in film. We explore the difference between managing fear and fearing rightly, what happens when fear goes unresolved, and how Scripture, from Eden forward, can be read as the long work of redirecting our fears. We talk about what Frank Peretti got wrong, why the best horror doesn't let its heroes off the hook, and how the horror stories in our own Scriptures might meet a culture looking for somewhere to put its fear. Kutter Callaway (PhD, Fuller) is the William K. Brehm Chair of Worship, Theology, and the Arts, associate professor of theology and culture, and associate professor of psychology at Fuller Theological Seminary. He writes and speaks on the interaction between theology and culture—particularly film, television, and online media—in both academic and popular forums. Callaway holds two PhDs, one in theology and the second in psychological science. He is the host of the Be Afraid podcast, and is author of Deep Focus, The Aesthetics of Atheism, Watching TV Religiously, and Scoring Transcendence. Kutter's Book: Be Afraid Kutter's Recommendation: Undertone The Odyssey 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 Listen to The Good, The True, and The Cinema anywhere you get podcasts. Support the show

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Ep. 464 Jen Pollock Michel Returns - What a Sixth-Century Monk Knows About Modern Anxiety

In this episode, Jen Pollock Michel and I talk about A Rule for the Rest of Us and what Saint Benedict might offer people who will never live in a monastery. We start with the anxiety of optimization and the strange burden of unlimited freedom, then ask what happens when we're left to manufacture our own meaning. Jen explains what a rule of life actually is, why small daily habits can do what ambitious goals can't, and how we learn to hear God's voice through Scripture and community. We also talk about keeping a rule from becoming self-help, and about discipleship that fits the life we actually have. A dual citizen of the United States and Canada, Jen Pollock Michel is an award-winning author, speaker, and podcast host living in Cincinnati. Her sixth book, A Rule for the Rest of Us, releases on September 8th. Jen holds a B.A. in French from Wheaton College, an M.A. in Literature from Northwestern University, and an M.F.A from Seattle Pacific University. Her writing has appeared widely in print and online publications, and her popular weekly Substack posts publish most Mondays. Jen also serves as the first-year writing mentor in the Whitworth University low-residency MFA program in Creative Writing. You can find out more about Jen at jenpollockmichel.com. Jen's Book: A Rule for The Rest of Us 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 Listen to The Good, The True, and The Cinema anywhere you get podcasts. Support the show

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Ep. 463 Wes Crawford - America Never Established a Religion, So It Became One

In this episode, Wes Crawford joins me to talk about his new book, One Nation Over God, and why faith and patriotism have become so tangled in American life. We explore Robert Bellah's idea of American civil religion, how a nation without an established faith came to treat its flags, anthems, and founders as sacred, and why that stirs so much anger in our churches and families. We trace the roots of the religious right, question the myth of a Christian nation, and consider what it looks like to love our country while keeping our allegiance to Jesus first. When those loyalties collide, which one wins? Wes Crawford is the Vice Provost at Abilene Christian University. He also is an Associate Professor of Church History. His research interests center on American religion generally and the intersection of race and religion specifically. His books, Shattering the Illusion: How African American Churches of Christ Moved from Segregation to Independence (2013) and Courage in the Sheer Silence: Challenging Racism in 20th Century Churches of Christ (2025), examine the relationship between white and black members of Churches of Christ throughout the twentieth century. His forthcoming book, One Nation Over God, explores the implications of American civil religion. In addition to his academic pursuits, Wes also served twenty years as a Preaching Minister within Churches of Christ and maintains a passion for local congregational ministry. Through his work with the Siburt Institute, he spends most weekends preaching for various congregations across the country. Wes has been married for twenty-nine years to his wife, Kim, and they have four children. Wes' Book: One Nation Over God Wes' Recommendations: From Bible Belt to Sun Belt Theo of Golden 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 Listen to The Good, The True, and The Cinema anywhere you get podcasts. Support the show

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Ep. 462 Kenneth Tanner - The Vulnerable God Who Shows Us How to Be Human

In this episode, Kenneth Tanner and I contemplate the human face of God. We talk about why we split Jesus into a divine half and a human half, and what we lose when we do. We get into the story we've been told about strength, survival, and success, and how a God who takes the lowest seat overturns it. We talk about serving as a way into the permanence of God, the cross as the foundation of creation, the dignity of the body, and a resurrection already at work in the world. What would change if we believed God is like Jesus? Kenneth Tanner is pastor of Church of the Holy Redeemer in Rochester Hills, Michigan, where he has served since 2005. He is the author of Vulnerable God: How Jesus Upends Our Assumptions About God—and Shows Us How to Be Human (Brazos Press, 2026). His writing has appeared in many outlets, including Huffington Post, Sojourners, Mockingbird, National Review, Christianity Today, Clarion Journal, and more. He and his wife, Debbie, have seven children and four grandchildren. Kenneth's book: Vulnerable God Kenneth's recommendation: The Wound of Unknowing 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 Listen to The Good, The True, and The Cinema anywhere you get podcasts. Support the show

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Ep. 461 Dave Nienhuis - What Happens to Faith in the Deep

In this episode, Dave Nienhuis joins me to talk about his memoir, And the Sea Was No More. We explore the deep, the chaos waters that run through Scripture from Genesis to Revelation, and what happens to faith when anxiety and trauma take away your ability to control your own mind. Dave shares how Scripture gave him language for drowning, why Jesus enters death rather than destroying it, and how the body, community, and liturgy carried him through. We also talk about shame, a generation leaving the church, and why we don't have to explain suffering before we cry out. Dave Nienhuis is a teacher, writer, speaker, and Professor of New Testament Studies at Seattle Pacific University. Dave's Book: And the Sea Was No More 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 Listen to The Good, The True, and The Cinema anywhere you get podcasts. Support the show

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Introducing: The Good, The True, and The Cinema

This is The Good, The True, and The Cinema, a film podcast in pursuit of the good, the true, and the beautiful. Join Joshua Johnson, cultural critic and host of Shifting Culture, Craig Detweiler, filmmaker, author, and president of Wedgwood Circle, and John Dougherty, writer, educator, and film critic for America Magazine. Together, they review new releases, revisit the classics, and have a lot of fun along the way. Follow The Good, The True, and The Cinema anywhere you get podcasts. 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 Listen to The Good, The True, and The Cinema anywhere you get podcasts. Support the show

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Ep. 460 Annie F. Downs - When Something is Stolen, Killed, or Destroyed, How Do We Keep Going?

In this episode Annie F. Downs joins me to take John 10:10 apart. Steal, kill, destroy — we tend to read them as one sentence, but Annie treats them as three different losses asking three different things of us. Something stolen still exists somewhere. Something dead doesn't come back. Something destroyed has to be cleared before anything gets built there. We talk about courage borrowed from artists, grief that never fully resolves, why resurrection never looks like restoration, and why none of this can be worked out alone. Don't let that hold you back. Annie F. Downs is a New York Times bestselling author, sought-after speaker, and successful podcast host based in Nashville, Tennessee. Known for her engaging and honest style, Annie makes readers and listeners feel like long-time friends. She is the co-founder of the That Sounds Fun Network, home to her flagship podcast, That Sounds Fun and host of the television talk show I Gotta Ask. Annie's Book: Don't Let That Hold You Back Annie's Recommendation: Calamity Club 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 Listen to The Good, The True, and The Cinema anywhere you get podcasts. Support the show

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Ep. 459 Sarah Stankorb - Millions of Women Have Left the Church in the Past Decade. What's Happening?

In this episode Sarah Stankorb joins me to talk about Damned If She Does and the sixteen million American women who have walked away from the church in the last decade. Sarah is a journalist who covers religion, and someone who left herself, and she argues that women leaving isn't a side story but a signal we have about where American faith is going. We follow the threads back decades, sort through what the numbers do and don't show, and talk about what women are finding after they go. Some have left faith entirely. Some are still following Jesus without the institution. Sarah Stankorb is a journalist, essayist, and author. Hundreds of her pieces have been featured in publications including: VICE, ELLE, The Washington Post, The Atlantic, The New York Times, The Guardian, The New Republic, Cosmopolitan, Marie Claire, and others. The award-winning writer tends to break taboos, offering women a platform to discuss the quiet hurts and joys that define their lives. Stankorb's beat spans religion, politics, gender, and power, but is informed by questions of basic morality. Sarah was born in Youngstown, Ohio, and often found escape in books. She studied world religions and philosophy at Westminster College, and a chance to study abroad in Northern Ireland and then Israel further opened her eyes to how faith (and conflict) can shape people’s everyday existence. She earned her master’s degree from the University of Chicago’s Divinity School, where she studied ethics and South Asian religion and history. She’s more fun than all this sounds. Sarah lives in Ohio with her husband and two children, and she writes regularly about the quirks of American faith for her Substack, In Polite Company. Sarah's Book: Damned if She Does Sarah's Recommendation: The Conspiracists The Magicians 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 Listen to The Good, The True, and The Cinema anywhere you get podcasts. Support the show

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Ep. 458 Kristin Kobes Du Mez Returns - Positive Thinking, Holiness Theology, and the Power Women Were Promised

In this episode Kristin Kobes Du Mez traces how holiness theology and New Thought merged into a faith that promised women power right where they stood, and taught them that naming what was wrong was itself the sin. We follow the thread from Hannah Whitall Smith to corporate campaigns against the New Deal, from a YMCA small group in 1910s China to postwar evangelical totalism, through MLMs and Christian bookstores to the blogosphere and Beth Moore. If confession can heal and confession can control, how do you know which one you're inside? Kristin Kobes Du Mez is a New York Times bestselling author and Professor of History at Calvin University. She is a Senior Democracy Fellow with the Public Religion Research Institute. Her research focuses on the intersection of gender, religion, and politics. She has written for The New York Times, The Washington Post, NBC News, Religion News Service, and Christianity Today, and has been interviewed on NPR, CBS, and the BBC, among other outlets. Her most recent books include Jesus and John Wayne: How White Evangelicals Corrupted a Faith and Fractured a Nation (2020) and Live Laugh Love: The Secret History of White Christian Women and the World They Made (September 2026). Kristin's Book: Live Laugh Love 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 Listen to The Good, The True, and The Cinema anywhere you get podcasts. Support the show

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Ep. 457 Jeff Woodke - After Six and a Half Years as an Al-Qaida Hostage, What Remained?

In this episode, Jeff Woodke tells me what six and a half years as a hostage in the Malian desert stripped away. We talk about the day he was taken, the years of false promises that killed hope first, the months in a box, and the depression he couldn't outrun once he was the only one in the room. We talk about forgiving his captors daily in their own language, about praying until he couldn't, about losing his religion and finding his faith, and about why he says God got him through but people got him out. Love is the bedrock. Everything else burns. Jeff Woodke is a speaker, writer, poet, and hostage advocate. He and his family worked with Youth With A Mission (YWAM) in Niger, West Africa, for decades and served their community by digging wells, establishing primary schools, assisting with land regeneration and famine relief, and advocating for climate change adaptation. He won a Sasakawa Award in 2009 from the United Nations for disaster risk reduction work in Niger. In 2016, he was taken hostage by terrorists linked to al-Qaida and held for six and a half years in northern Mali. Released in 2023, he returned to his wife, children, and grandchildren in California with PTSD and stories that needed telling. His book debut, All the Way Home, is available nationwide this September. Jeff's Book: All the Way Home Jeff's Recommendation: The Crucifixion of the Warrior God 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 Listen to The Good, The True, and The Cinema anywhere you get podcasts. Support the show

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Introducing: Jesus and... Everything

Jesus and... Everything is a space for those of us who want a faith that is deeply spiritually alive, but also rooted in the big framing issues of the world. Every week, Pete Portal sits down with a guest, and has an honest conversation exploring how faith in Jesus can help us navigate big issues and topics, but also how real life in the real world can challenge our own perspectives that we may have held without much thought. There'll be no easy answers here; just some honest wrestling. So, if you're looking for a podcast that doesn't ask you to leave your mind or your faith at the door, then pull up a chair Follow Jesus and... Everything anywhere you get your podcasts. Jesus and... Everything is a part of the Shifting Culture Podcast Network 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 Listen to The Good, The True, and The Cinema anywhere you get podcasts. Support the show

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Ep. 456 W. David O. Taylor Returns - How Artists Bear Witness to the Fullness of God's Creation

In this episode, W. David O. Taylor joins me to talk about To Set the World Aflame and the artist's calling to bear witness to the fullness of God's creation. Artists work with the sensory, the imaginative, the emotional, the metaphorical, the material stuff of the world, and in doing so they help the rest of us see what's actually there. We talk about what an artist really is, why belovedness comes before output, and how the calling has shifted across centuries without losing its center. We linger on abundance: seven thousand kinds of apples, more wine than anyone could drink, a God who delights in more than enough. W. David O. Taylor is Associate Professor of Theology & Culture at Fuller Theological Seminary and the author of ten books, including For the Beauty of the Church: Casting a Vision for the Arts and To Set the World Aflame: How Artists Bear Witness to the Fullness of God’s Creation. An Anglican priest, he has written for The Washington Post, The Gospel Coalition, Religion News Service, and Christianity Today, among others, and has contributed scholarly essays to the T&T Clark Companion to Theology and the Arts, Theology, Modernity and the Visual Arts, and Contemporary Art and the Church. He served on the board of Christians in the Visual Arts and is part of a three-year scholarly project, "Theology and the Visual Arts," hosted by King's College London. He lives on twenty-one acres of land east of Austin with his artist wife (Phaedra) and children. He posts about art and faith on Substack (@wdavidotaylor) and Instagram (@davidtaylor_theologian). David's Book: To Set the World Aflame 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 Listen to The Good, The True, and The Cinema anywhere you get podcasts. Support the show

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Ep. 455 Derwin Gray Returns - We've Made our Wounds our Identity: It's Time to Heal

In this episode, Derwin Gray and I talk about what it actually takes to heal. He noticed years ago that people were making their wounds into their identity, and It's Time to Heal is his answer - be honest, expect it to be hard, accept what happened without letting it define you, live from love instead of for it. We get into salvation as healing rather than a one-time event, why the fleshly desires still call after we become believers, and what forgiveness cost him in his own story. We also talk about why healing that stays personal has stopped short of the gospel. Dr. Derwin L. Gray is the co-founding and Lead Pastor of Transformation Church, just outside of Charlotte, NC. Dr. Derwin L. Gray was named the recipient of the John M. Perkins Justice Award. The award is given to a visionary leader whose life and work exemplify the principles of biblical justice. He is also an award-winning author who has published several books, including “How to Heal Our Racial Divide: What the Bible Says, and What the First Century Christians Knew about Racial Reconciliation" and NEW RELEASE "Lit Up With Love: Becoming Good-News People To A Gospel-Starved World". You can follow him at @derwinlgray on Instagram, Twitter, and Facebook, as well as www.derwinlgray.com. Derwin's Book: It's Time to Heal 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 Listen to The Good, The True, and The Cinema anywhere you get podcasts. Support the show

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Ep. 454 Sandra Glahn - A Woman's Place Is in the Story

In this episode Sandra Glahn helps us read Scripture the way we already know how to read a story. We talk about the women we've skipped as bunny trails, handed only to women, flattened into ideals, or made into sinners the text never called sinners — Tamar, the woman at the well, Abigail, Job's daughters, Rhoda at the door. We get into reading bigger sections instead of verse-sized fragments, what place and naming and silence are doing on purpose, translations that narrow the room, and why the hard texts still need preaching. There is more here than most of us have been trained to see. Dr Sandra Glahn is a professor at Dallas Theological Seminary and the cofounder of the Visual Museum of Women in Christianity. She is the author or coauthor of more than 25 books, including the forthcoming "A Woman's Place Is in the Story: Seeing Women in the Biblical Text." Sandra's Book: A Woman's Place Is in the Story Sandra's Recommendation: Theo of Golden 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 Listen to The Good, The True, and The Cinema anywhere you get podcasts. Support the show

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Ep. 453 Eric Geiger - Rooted Leaders Bear Fruit That Lasts

In this episode, Eric Geiger and I dig into what's growing underneath a leader's life. We've all watched leaders fall over the past few years, and the wreckage takes a long time to clear. Eric's conviction is that we keep working on the things we can see, when the real question is the root system beneath it. We read Nehemiah as a leadership journal, talk about vision as burden and belief intermingled, how credibility gets built when trust in leaders is at an all-time low, what's actually worth fighting, and why being overwhelmed might be something that grows you rather than takes you out. Eric Geiger serves as the senior pastor of Mariners Church in Southern California, where he lives with his wife, Kaye, and their two daughters, Eden and Evie. Eric received his doctorate in leadership and church ministry from Southern Seminary. Eric has led in both marketplace and ministry settings, as senior vice president and chief business officer of a publishing company, a consultant on vision and strategy, and a local church pastor. Eric's Book: The Rooted Leader 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 Listen to The Good, The True, and The Cinema anywhere you get podcasts. Support the show

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Ep. 452 Pricelis Perreaux-Dominguez - We Have Mistaken Sameness for Unity

In this episode, Pricelis Perreaux-Dominguez argues that much of what the American church calls peace is really just quiet — and that what we call unity is often sameness, congregations gathered around shared opinion rather than around Christ, where difference gets managed, silenced, or shown the door. We talk about how sameness took root in the church, why our opinions became idols we defend like God, what it means to hold truth with an open hand, and why discomfort is a practice rather than a personality trait. It's a conversation that confronts, but toward something better than the false peace we've settled for. Pricelis Perreaux-Dominguez (MSW, MSEd) is a Black Latina and daughter of immigrants who’s committed to truth telling and helping the body of Christ be pro-neighbor. She is the founder and CEO of Full Collective and creator of the annual Sowers Summit in New York City. She is the author of Being a Sanctuary and the new book False Peace releasing on August 25th. She just graduated a master’s in biblical and theological studies from Denver Seminary. She is on staff at the NYC chapter of Safe Families for Children and is an associate pastor at Renovation City Church in the Bronx, New York, where she lives with her husband and son. Pricelis' Book: False Peace Pricelis' Recommendation: From Genesis to Junia 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 Listen to The Good, The True, and The Cinema anywhere you get podcasts. Support the show

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Ep. 451 Scott Cairns - Why Mystery Makes Better Meaning Than Certainty

In this episode, Scott Cairns talks about certainty and mystery and getting glimpses of the unknowable God. Scott has spent forty years wrestling with, investigating, navigating words to help make meaning in our lives. In this conversation, we talk about words as things rather than labels, about reading a text the way the rabbis did - layer on layer, meaning that never closes - about prayer as communion rather than petition, and about what a culture loses as it stops reading. Underneath it all is a God who is endless, which means the knowing is never fully attained, but it's a beautiful pursuit. Librettist, essayist, translator, and author of multiple poetry collections, Scott Cairns is Curators’ Distinguished Professor of English Emeritus at University of Missouri. His poems and essays have appeared in Poetry, Image, Paris Review, The Atlantic Monthly, The New Republic, and many other venues, and both have been anthologized in multiple editions of Best American Spiritual Writing. He has blogged for the Religion Section of The Huffington Post. His recent poetry books include the recently released Against Certainty (2026), Correspondence with My Greeks (2024), Lacunae (2023), Anaphora (2019), Slow Pilgrim: The Collected Poems (2015), and Idiot Psalms (2014). His spiritual memoir, Short Trip to the Edge, first appeared from HarperSanFrancisco in 2006, and has been translated into Greek and Romania. His Endless Life (translations and adaptations of Christian mystics, appeared in 2014, and his book-length essay, The End of Suffering: Finding Purpose in Pain, was first published in 2009, and has also been translated into Greek. He wrote the libretti for two oratoria, The Martyrdom of Saint Polycarp and A Melancholy Beauty. He received a Guggenheim Fellowship in 2006, and the Denise Levertov Award in 2014. His current projects include Descent to the Heart, verse adaptations of selections from the homilies of Saint Isaak the Syrian, and a new poetry collection, Ways of Not Knowing. Scott's Book: Against Certainty Scott's Recommendations: Lauras A History of the Island 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 Listen to The Good, The True, and The Cinema anywhere you get podcasts. Support the show

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Ep. 450 Ian Morgan Cron Returns - Beauty Is a Doorway Home: What St. Francis Knew 800 Years Ago

In this episode, Ian Morgan Cron and I talk about Chasing Francis, the novel he wrote twenty years ago (before anyone called it deconstruction) about a megachurch pastor who loses his faith mid-sermon and goes looking for St. Francis in Italy. We get into a 13th-century church that looks a lot like ours, beauty as a doorway back to God, why Francis walked across a battlefield to meet a sultan, the difference between spotlight attention and lantern attention, and why the sermon on the mount should be read as instructions. Ian Morgan Cron is a bestselling author, Episcopal priest, trained psychotherapist, Enneagram teacher, Dove Award-winning songwriter, and one of the most sought-after voices in American spirituality today. His Enneagram primer The Road Back to You has sold over one million copies and launched a global conversation about self-knowledge and spiritual formation. But Chasing Francis is where it all started — and where it still leads. Ian’s work spans psychology, theology, the arts, and pastoral care. He speaks from lived experience: he has sat with the burned out, the doubting, the spiritually shipwrecked — and he has been all three himself. He is the host of the widely popular podcast Typology and has appeared on media across the country. Ian's Book: Chasing Francis Ian's Recommendations The Master and His Emissary The Myth of Normal 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 Listen to The Good, The True, and The Cinema anywhere you get podcasts. Support the show

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Ep. 449 Natalia Terfa - God Got There Before You Did

In this episode with Natalia Terfa we talk about her book It All Counts, why questions deepen faith instead of eroding it, how to tell human authority from God's, what love looks like when a protest turns ugly, and why the prosperity gospel falls apart at a child's funeral. We get into loneliness and the risk community asks of us, the incarnation as an argument for the goodness of bodies, and how breath and creation return us to who we are. Natalia is a Lutheran pastor, podcaster, and author who lives in Minneapolis with her her loves, Sam and Layla, and kitty babies. When she’s not working or writing, you’ll find her reading in her couch nest, ideally with a cat on her lap, watching Turkish television, taking walks in the neighborhood, looking at trees, or making good food for the people she loves. Natalia's Book: It All Counts 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 Listen to The Good, The True, and The Cinema anywhere you get podcasts. Support the show