Michael Pasquier is an associate professor of philosophy and religion at Louisiana State University in Baton Rouge, where he specializes in the history of religion and culture in the U.S. He teaches courses on religion and cinema, religion in Louisiana and religion in Southern culture, as well as a course on American Catholicism.

Mucahit Bilici is an assistant professor at the John Jay College of Criminal Justice. He is the author of Finding Mecca in America and a columnist for Taraf, a daily publication in Turkish.

Maureen Mullarkey is a painter and writer who focuses on art and culture. She has been published in The Nation, Crisis, Commonweal, Hudson Review, Arts, The New Criterion, First Things, The Weekly Standard, and The Magazine Antiques, and she has served as a columnist for The New York Sun. She was quoted in a New York Times article about Pope Francis’ climate change […]

Rabbi Menachem Creditor is the spiritual leader of Congregation Netivot Shalom in Berkeley, Calif. He is also an author, musician, teacher, and activist, and he has worked in Ghana and in the White House. He writes for the Huffington Post and the Times of Israel and blogs at menachemcreditor.org.

Valerie Bridgeman is a poet, dancer, and performer, and she serves as a visiting associate professor of Homiletics and Hebrew Bible at the Methodist Theological School in Ohio. She also founded the WomanPreach! ministry. She contributed a “preaching reflection” about the death of Michael Brown to Odyssey Networks.  

Nyle Fort is a minister, writer and community organizer based in Newark, N.J. His areas of study include critical race theory, African-American studies, the American prison system and hip-hop culture. He has been published in the Harvard Journal of African American Public Policy, The Guardian, Black Girl Dangerous and The Feminist Wire. He has linked the Black Lives Matter […]

Yavilah McCoy is a teacher, writer, diversity consultant and performer. She has linked the Jewish holiday of Purim to the fight for justice for the African-American community and the Black Lives Matter movement. She founded Dimensions Educational Consulting in Newton, Mass.

Philip Freeman is a professor of Classics at Luther College in Decorah, Iowa. His research focuses on Classical Mythology, Ancient Roman Culture, Greece and Rome in film, as well as Latin.

The Rev. Nageeb Michael is a Dominican priest and a scholar at the Digital Center for Eastern Manuscripts. He digitizes historic Assyrian Christian manuscripts, according to a New York Times article, and he fled the city in which he previously worked, Qaraqosh, when the Islamic State gained control of the area. He is a source on art and religion.