Michelle Lelwica is an associate professor of religion at Concordia College in Moorhead, Minn. She is the author of Starving for Salvation: The Spiritual Dimensions of Eating Problems Among American Girls and Women and The Religion of Thinness: Satisfying the Spiritual Hungers Behind Women’s Obsession With Food and Weight. She wrote a commentary for Newsweek and The Washington Post linking the quests for thinness and […]

Steve Reynolds is pastor of Capital Baptist Church in Annandale, Va., and author of Bod for God: The Four Keys to Weight Loss (2009). He urged his congregation to join him in a Christian-themed weight loss program. Reynolds eventually lost 100 pounds.

Debra Orenstein is a rabbi and leader of Makom Ohr Shalom congregation in Los Angeles. She wrote a Torah portion commentary about teshuvah, the return to God, and weight loss.

Myriam Klotz is a Reconstructionist rabbi and the director of yoga and embodied practices at the Institute for Jewish Spirituality.

Melani McAlister is an associate professor of American studies and international affairs at George Washington University in Washington, D.C. She participated in a February 2008 roundtable discussion about American evangelicals and the 2008 primaries at Princeton University’s Center for the Study of Religion. She is also at work on a book about American evangelicals and global vision.

La Vita Weaver is the founder of Fit for God Ministries and the author of Fit for God: The 8-Week Plan That Kicks the Devil OUT and Invites Health and Healing IN. She says her belief in God helped her reduce from 200 pounds. She is based in Capital Heights, Md.

David M. O’Leary is a Jesuit priest and a senior lecturer in comparative religions and medical ethics at Tufts University in Medford, Mass. He contributed articles on heaven and hell to The Encyclopedia of Religious and Spiritual Development.

John Byl is co-author of Christian Paths to Health and Wellness (2007). He is a professor of physical education at Redeemer University College in Ancaster, Ontario, Canada. He can discuss the biblical foundation behind the Christian fitness movement.

The Rev. Maria Erling is a Lutheran pastor and an associate professor of the history of Christianity and global missions at the Lutheran Theological Seminary at Gettysburg in Gettysburg, Pa. She contributed a chapter on mainline Protestants in New England to Religion and Public Life in New England: Steady Habits Changing Slowly.