Every Somewhere Sacred: Rescuing a Theology of Place in the American Imagination (Ben Norquist & Brian Miller) - Review
EVERY SOMEWHERE SACRED: Rescuing a Theology of Place in the American Imagination. By Ben Norquist and Brian Miller. Downers Grove, IL: IVP Academic, 2026. 246 pages.
What does place have to do with
faith? In a mobile society, where people are always on the move, we might
wonder whether place or land has theological meaning. As we ponder the question of place and faith, we
might consider what is happening in Israel/Palestine. The conflict pitting Israelis
and Palestinians against each other is centered on the question of who
possesses the land and how far back one must go to prove ownership. Then there
is North America, and more specifically, the United States. How might we
understand the question of land and place theologically? In many ways, there
are parallels between the Israel/Palestine and North American situations. Then,
as we ponder these questions, we might ask where God fits into the question of
land ownership. In recent years, at least in my circles, there has been
increasing conversation about land and its sacred worth, centered on the
implications of the "Doctrine of Discovery." This doctrine goes back
to papal decisions of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries that gave Portugal
and Spain (primarily) the right to conquer and subdue lands inhabited by
nonbelievers. While Africa and Asia would come under this dictate, it was especially
applied to the European discoveries of the Americas, lands previously unknown
to most Europeans. This doctrine, which took different forms, essentially
empowered Europeans to take land that belonged to the indigenous peoples who
had inhabited the land for millennia, all in the name of God.
Numerous studies, including books,
have been published in recent years reflecting on the impact of European
presence, conquest, enslavement, and attempted conversion of the people living
in the Americas. These actions displaced people who had lived on these lands
for millennia, often in the name of another related "doctrine," which
is Manifest Destiny. Among the books by Christians that address this reality is
Every Somewhere Sacred: Rescuing a Theology of Place in the American
Imagination by Ben Norquist and Brian Miller. The two authors have a
background in sociology. Miller is professor of sociology at Wheaton College,
while Norquist has served as director of grants and academics for Churches for
Middle East Peace and Director of Evangelicals for the Middle East. Thus,
Norquist has firsthand background with the Israel/Palestine situation.
In Every Somewhere Sacred, Miller
and Norquist seek to reclaim a theology of place that recognizes its sacredness,
while addressing how views of land and place have been distorted. These
distortions have developed in part because our experience of place is one of
rootlessness. We are disconnected from the places where we live, which leads to
distorted lives. Their goal here is to help the reader, as followers of Jesus,
transform the way we live in land and place. While this is rooted in theology,
they wish to see this discussion applied to daily life. That is, they want us
to reflect on our own "somewhere." This includes the natural world,
but it also includes homes, workplaces, roads, our places of worship, and other
places we inhabit. This is a reminder that we are embodied persons living in a
physical world. The Introduction, titled "Why American Christians Need a
New Way to Live in Place," provides the reader with definitions and
guidelines for the journey ahead.
The authors divide the book into
three sections, which start in Part One with the title question: "Where Do
We Think We Are?" In asking the question of where we think we are, they
provide us with the tools we need to answer this question. With this question
in mind, they title the first chapter "Spatial Texts: Tools for Reading
Places." Spatial reading involves thinking about place. Some of the
metaphors they offer for us to use in analyzing place include networks, time
traveling, overwriting (a reminder that spatial developments often overwrite
previous configurations), copy-paste (replicated forms), etc. They also offer
diagnostic questions followed by a discussion of how to apply the tools. With
this foundation laid, in Chapter 2, Norquist and Miller offer "American
Land Stories." Here they speak of the metanarratives we use to tell our
story of place. They offer four American stories about land, starting with
exceptionalism before moving to frontiers, private property, and generating
wealth. After introducing us to these four metanarratives, they speak of
religious land stories, including the creation of the doctrine of discovery and
the concept of dominion, both as it is used in the United States and in
Israel/Palestine. They note that our stories are often held in tension, such as
the claims made on the land by Israelis and Palestinians.
After introducing us to the
question of where we think we are at, in Part Two, titled "How Did We Get
Here?" the authors speak to how understandings of space and land developed
in the United States. They explore this question through three vantage points
or axes. First, in Chapter 3, titled "Settler Places on Indigenous
Land," they address the way European settlers took indigenous land and
made it their own, displacing the people who had inhabited the land for
millennia. Here again we see the Doctrine of Discovery at play, as well as
European ideas of land ownership and use, which differed greatly from those of
the indigenous people. They define "settler colonialism" as "the
domination of a territory and its people for the purpose of transfer—that is
for the purpose of displacing current inhabitants to make room for a new,
settler population" (p. 101). This effort at transfer is related to the
second axis, "Race and Class" (Chapter 4). Consider the practice of
redlining or restrictive covenants that were used to limit access to
communities to people of certain races and economic classes (mainly white). In
this chapter, the authors define race, ethnicity, and social class, and then show
how these categories have functioned in American life. The third axis is
"Types of Space" (Chapter 5). Here they discuss four kinds of space—Wild,
Rural, Suburban, and Urban. They take us on a tour of how these four kinds of
space have been understood historically, especially as we moved from wild to
suburban. As they introduce us to these spaces, we gain a better understanding
of our place in this space.
Part Three is titled "Is There
a Better Story?" This is an important question because the discussion to
this point has been rather disheartening. So, is there a better way? The first
chapter in this section is titled "Four Themes for Rereading Bible Stories
About Land" (Chapter 6). They remind us that land and place are important
themes throughout the Bible, beginning with the creation stories in Genesis 1-2
a nd concluding with the eschatological vision of a new heaven and new earth in
Revelation. Here they speak of land as gift, sacrament, kin, and home. In
expanding on these themes, they offer new pictures of God, including as the
ultimate homemaker, as well as the role that sin plays in displacement. Chapter
7, titled "Swords into Plowshares: Revising Christian Land Stories,"
here the authors help us learn to tell better stories that will bless creation
and all people. Here it is important to note that we cannot set aside land
stories. Rather, we must learn to tell/inhabit new ones. Chapters 8 and 9 focus
on "Living Out the Better Stories," first as individuals (Chapter 8)
and then "Together" (Chapter 9). When it comes to individuals, they
remind us that the Western world tends to sever us from "places, land and
ultimately God." However, we're not just brains on sticks. As Christians,
we need to remember that we live in specific spaces as God created us for.
Western Christians tend to embrace individualism, a reality discussed in
chapter 8, but the expectation is that we live out these stories together, as
community. So, here they explore our response collectively to place. Land and
place do matter to Christian life, so we're invited to study, act, and be in
response.
In writing Every Somewhere Sacred: Rescuing a Theology of Place in the American Imagination, Norquist
and Miller approach their subject, which has strong theological components, not
as academic theologians but as social scientists. While this is true, they do
good theology in this book, addressing important questions with implications
for how North Americans see themselves in relationship to the original
inhabitants who are still with us, as well as our foreign policy regarding
Israel/Palestine (among other places such as South Africa). In doing so, they
help us tell better stories of land and place so that we might embody land and
place individually and collectively as Christians, recognizing where we've gone
wrong and how we might move forward from those wrong turns to a better future.
In other words, this is a book that has important implications for the way
Christians live in an increasingly diverse and complex world.
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