Greg Tobin is senior adviser for communications at Seton Hall University in New Jersey and author of Holy Father: Pope Benedict XVI: Pontiff for a New Era.

The Rev. Thomas G. Guarino is a professor of systematic theology at Seton Hall University in New Jersey. He has written on the theological vision of Joseph Ratzinger.

The National Catholic Reporter has a June 22, 2009, podcast and summary of a story, “Jesuit sees convergence of U.S., Vatican policies,” featuring an interview with the Rev. Thomas Reese about relations between the Vatican and the Obama administration.

Read a June 22, 2009, National Catholic Reporter story, “Progressive Catholics at home in Obama administration.”

Read a June 22, 2009, analysis of the encyclical’s themes, “Economic encyclical expands on church’s ‘best kept secret’,” by National Catholic Reporter columnist John L. Allen Jr.

Read a June 24, 2009, blog post at the Web site of the Jesuit magazine America, “Obama going to the Vatican,” by Michael Sean Winters.

Courtney Bender is a professor of religious studies at Columbia University and sociologist. She studies new religious movements, religious pluralism and is currently writing about the religion of the future.

Read a May 1991 Time magazine cover story about Scientology. The church took great exception to the article, which went on to receive the Gerald Loeb Award for distinguished business and financial journalism, the Worth Bingham Prize and the Conscience in Media Award from the American Society of Journalists and Authors. Article requires log-in and payment to access.

Read an ABC transcript of a 1992 interview between Ted Koppel and David Miscavige. The interview was said to be the first ever granted by the Scientology leader.