Mark Roehling is an assistant professor of labor and industrial relations at Michigan State University in Lansing. In 1999 he published a study that found that overweight and obese people were discriminated against – often openly – in the workplace.

Tami Coyne and Karen Weissman are known as “The Spiritual Chicks” and are authors of The Spiritual Chicks Question Everything: Learn to Risk, Release and Soar (Red Wheel, 2003). In the book, they discuss whether God loves fat people and conclude that God does. Both Chicks live in New York City.

Carol Showalter is the author of 3D: Diet, Discipline and Discipleship (Paraclete Press, 2002) and is a member of the Community of Jesus. She is the founder of the 3D Plan, a Christian lifestyle group.

Lael Atkinson is pastor of Payson Park United Church of Christ in Belmont, Mass. In 2003, she delivered a sermon about America as a culture that consumes too much of everything, including food.

Miriam Berg is president of the Council on Size and Weight Discrimination, a national nonprofit group based in Mount Marion, N.Y., that works to eliminate weight discrimination and “sizism.”

Ravindra S. Khare is a professor of anthropology at the University of Virginia in Charlottesville. He has written about Hindu gastrosemantics.

Francine Prose is the author of 10 books, including Gluttony, part of the “Seven Deadly Sins” series (Oxford University Press, 2003). She is a distinguished writer in residence at Bard College in New York. She lives in New York City.

Jualynne Dodson is a visiting professor at the Center for Latin American and Caribbean Studies at Michigan State University in East Lansing. She has written extensively about African-American Christians and food.

The Rev. O.S. Hawkins is president of Dallas-based GuideStone Financial Resources. He has said that taking care of the body as the temple of the Holy Spirit is one of the duties of a Baptist. The top two medical claims paid by the denomination’s health insurance program in 2002 were for obesity-related ailments, including back […]