Living On Common Ground
Does it feel like every part of your life is divided? Every scenario? Every environment? Your church, your school, your work, your friends. Left, right. Conservative, liberal. Religious, secular. From parenting styles to school choice, denominational choice to governing preference, it seems you're always being asked to take a side. This is a conversation between a progressive Christian and a conservative atheist who happen to be great friends. Welcome to Living on Common Ground.
Episodes
What would you want your body to become after you die: ashes, a grave, or something that keeps feeding the living? We dig into a surprising end-of-life planning option that’s gaining ground in the US: human composting, also known as natural organic reduction. From there, we chase one weirdly heartfelt idea all the way down a rabbit hole of wills, funeral choices, and what it would mean to turn your remains int...
A stranger yelling in traffic shouldn’t matter, yet it can light up something primal in us. We start there and follow the thread all the way into the bigger problem: a divided culture where anger feels not only normal, but expected. As a progressive Christian and a conservative atheist who are still close friends, we talk through what it takes to stay grounded when everything around you pushes you to pick a te...
Everything feels like it comes with a team jersey now, even your faith, your politics, and your friendships. We start there because we’re tired of a world that demands you pick a side and stay there, and we’re trying to practice something harder: a real conversation between a progressive Christian and a conservative atheist who actually respect each other.
That friendship sets up a big question fr...
College football is starting to feel less like a tradition and more like a marketplace, and we’re not sure what to do with that. We’re two friends from different worldviews a progressive Christian and a conservative atheist trying to stay close in a culture that keeps begging us to pick sides. So we grab something familiar (sports) and follow the thread all the way into the hard stuff: money, incentives,...
The world keeps daring us to pick a side, then punishes us for talking to anyone across the line. We push back with a simple question: what if the people we’re told to avoid are the ones who can actually hold us up? As a progressive Christian and a conservative atheist who somehow ended up close friends, we try to tell the truth about division without turning each other into a project or a stereotype.
A teen lifeguard fights through heavy surf and pulls a kid to safety, and the clip goes viral for a reason: it hits that raw place in all of us that wants to move toward danger when someone is drowning. But then the headlines shift to warnings, expert quotes, and the familiar refrain that untrained people should not go in. That’s where our conversation really starts, because the advice can be true and still ex...
The fastest way to lose your mind right now is to assume everyone else is living in the same reality you are. We feel that pressure every day: pick a side, wear the label, stay in your lane, and treat the other lane like a threat.
We start with a problem we did not expect to care about so much: AI detectors. When a tool can confidently label human writing as “100% AI,” what happens to trust, autho...
The most dangerous water at the beach is not the wave you can see coming, it is the calm channel that quietly pulls you away from shore. We kick off a new series of short reflections by reading “The Rip Current,” then we take it apart like a real-life warning label: what does it mean when the hazard is subtle, the sign is easy to ignore, and your confidence shows up right when you should be paying attent...
The most dangerous current in your life might not feel like danger at all. Jeff opens a new series, “Reflections from the Beach,” with the story behind the stories: a community tornado that revealed what people can become for each other, a pandemic that turned everyday choices into tribal tests, and a church season where United Methodist disaffiliation fights and LGBTQ inclusion debates left real emotion...
Every part of life can start to feel like a walled-off camp: your work, your church, your friend group, even your news feed. We sit down as a progressive Christian and a conservative atheist who still choose friendship, and we ask a hard question out loud: if we met today, would we still be friends?
A Kentucky congressional primary turns into a bigger conversation about political polarization, libertarianism,...
Every part of life can start to feel sorted into boxes: conservative or liberal, religious or secular, my people or your people. We push back on that instinct with a simple reality check: we are a progressive Christian and a conservative atheist who are also close friends, and we are not interested in letting the world tell us we cannot sit at the same table.
We start with the stories we tell about plac...
We step into a topic that might irritate people if it’s handled carelessly, so we try to handle it with precision. We explore an idea drawn from historian Tom Holland’s work on Greek culture: even in societies that appear politically male-dominated, women often served as the recognized link between humans and the gods through temples, priestesses, and oracles. That opens a broader conversation about the ...
Life can feel like it’s been chopped into competing categories: church or secular, left or right, friends or enemies, work or rest. We start from that tension and then zoom in on a quieter divide most of us live with every day: the gap between how busy we claim to be and how distracted we actually are. We talk honestly about American hustle culture, why “I’m slammed” can become a badge of wor...
Life can feel like it’s been split into rival camps: your job vs your faith, your friends vs your politics, your values vs your tribe. We’re not interested in pretending those differences don’t exist. We’re interested in proving they don’t have to end real friendship. We’re a progressive Christian and a conservative atheist who actually like each other, and we start with the uncom...
Every corner of life now feels like a forced choice: left or right, religious or secular, “our side” or “their side.” We don’t buy that those are the only options, and we’re testing that belief the only way we know how: two friends with clashing labels, a progressive Christian and a conservative atheist, trying to talk like actual humans.
A simple question kicks it off: why...
In August last year we had the opportunity to sit down and have a converation with Peter Enns. Peter's insights regarding certainty have inspired much of Jeff's work. We decided to share that conversation with you again. Enjoy.
Every day feels like a forced-choice quiz: left or right, religious or secular, believer or skeptic, my people or your people. We want a different way to live, so we invited Bible scholar, aut...
Life can feel like it’s been chopped into rival zones: work, church, school, online, each one demanding you declare a side. We’re two friends who don’t fit the usual pairing a progressive Christian and a conservative atheist and we keep testing a simple question: can you stay close without surrendering your convictions?
We start by revisiting Stoicism, and why the modern “neo-Stoic&rdq...
Every part of life can feel like it comes with a forced choice: left or right, religious or secular, your people or their people. We sit down as a progressive Christian and a conservative atheist who are also close friends, and we ask a risky question right up front: if we met today, would we still choose each other in a culture built to split us apart?
From Holy Week and Palm Sunday to a viral clip cla...
“Steinbeck was a communist.” It’s a throwaway line until you realize how much heat a single label can carry and how fast it can rewrite what we think the other person meant. We’re two friends who disagree for a living, a progressive Christian and a conservative atheist, and we use a John Steinbeck debate to test whether curiosity can beat reflex, and whether listening can beat the urge to sco...
It’s hard to stay close to people when every space in your life demands a label and a side. Church, work, family, politics, online life, even your friend group can start to feel like separate worlds with separate rules. We sit down with Steve Ghikadis, a secular humanist and atheist married to a Christian, to talk about what it really takes to build common ground without watering down what you believe.
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