What four films best capture the story of America?

In this Fourth of July edition of Sacred Frames, Jeff Cook, Sean Palmer, and Mike Yager each build their own cinematic "Mount Rushmore," selecting four films they believe reveal the promises, contradictions, triumphs, and tragedies that have shaped the American experiment. From Far and Away, Do the Right Thing, Wall Street, and The Right Stuff to Lincoln, Killers of the Flower Moon, Saving Private Ryan, Malcolm X, and beyond, the conversation explores immigration, race, capitalism, war, religion, identity, and the enduring tension between America's highest ideals and its deepest failures.

Rather than asking which films are the greatest, this episode asks a different question: Which stories help us understand who America has been—and who it might still become?

Steven Spielberg's Disclosure Day has become one of the most divisive films of the year—and it split the Sacred Frames hosts as well.

Mike Yeager sees Disclosure Day as a late-career masterpiece: a hopeful meditation on empathy, trauma, faith, and humanity's place in the cosmos. Jeff Cook had the opposite reaction, arguing that the film never earns its emotional weight, depends too heavily on Spielberg's past work, and ultimately fails to deliver on its philosophical ambitions. Sean Palmer lands somewhere in the middle, praising the filmmaking while wrestling with the story's themes and ending.

In this conversation, we explore:

*Does the movie have anything meaningful to say about faith, theology, and human nature?

*Does the ending work?

*What role do empathy, trauma, and redemption play in Spielberg's vision?

Along the way we discuss Close Encounters, E.T., A.I., The Fabelmans, Schindler's List, and the larger themes that have shaped Spielberg's career for decades. Whether you loved Disclosure Day, hated it, or are still trying to figure out what Spielberg was attempting, join us for a thoughtful—and spirited—conversation.

Science fiction may be our culture's most spiritual genre. In celebration of Disclosure Day, Jeff Cook, Mike Yager, and Sean Palmer hold a science fiction movie draft built around eight themes that sit at the intersection of faith, philosophy, and the future.

Cosmic Christ — The messianic figure who saves, sacrifices, redeems, resurrects, or carries unmistakable Christological themes.

To Infinity and Beyond — Humanity pushes beyond its limits and encounters the grandeur, mystery, wonder, or terror of creation itself.

Holy Communion — A transformative encounter with the Other. First contact that leads to understanding, revelation, friendship, or reconciliation.

Unholy Communion — First contact gone wrong. Possession, corruption, invasion, conquest, or destruction.

Imago Dei — Stories about creators and creation. Artificial intelligence, robotics, genetic engineering, and the question of what it means to make something in our image.

Apocalypse — Not merely destruction, but revelation. Worlds ending, systems collapsing, and hidden truths coming to light.

Kingdom Come — Visions of utopia and the future. Societies that promise salvation, perfection, or human flourishing—and the cracks that inevitably appear.

Wild Card — The category for everything too strange, beautiful, profound, or unique to fit anywhere else.

Along the way, the conversation touches on films such as Arrival, The Martian, Rogue One, Interstellar, Close Encounters of the Third Kind, 2001: A Space Odyssey, Ex Machina, Gattaca, Minority Report, Alien, WALL-E, and many more. What do our favorite science fiction stories reveal about sacrifice, hope, free will, creation, transcendence, and what it means to be human? Join us as we draft 24 films and explore the spiritual questions hidden inside some of cinema's greatest journeys into the unknown.