Tom Wassink is a psychiatry and genetics researcher at the University of Iowa. He’s also the co-pastor of Sanctuary Community Church in Coralville, Iowa.

Justin L. Barrett is a professor of psychology at Fuller Theological Seminary. He specializes in the cognitive science of religion.

Ying Chen is a research scientist with the Human Flourishing Program at Harvard University. She was the lead author of a 2018 study about the relationship between religious and spiritual practices in childhood and adult health outcomes.

Phillis Sheppard is an associate professor of religion, psychology and culture at Vanderbilt Divinity School in Nashville, Tenn. She is an expert on the role religion plays in self-understanding, womanist theology and psycholanalysis.

Lindsay Wilkinson is an assistant professor of sociology at Baylor University, where she studies medical sociology, aging and social stratification. She has assisted in several Baylor religion studies, including research on religion and mental health.

Paul Froese is a professor of sociology at Baylor University and research fellow for the school’s Institute for Studies of Religion. He is the author of several books, including On Purpose: How We Create the Meaning of Life.

Marya Hornbacher is a writer and nonbeliever who has written widely of her own struggles with mental illness. She is the author of Waiting: A Nonbeliever’s Higher Power, which explores what spirituality can mean to nonbelievers recovering from a mental illness.

T.M. Luhrmann is an anthropology professor at Stanford University and the author of When God Talks Back: Understanding the American Evangelical Relationship With God. In an April 13, 2013, New York Times op-ed essay, she describes herself as a secular observer of evangelical congregations and says “one of the most important features of these churches is that they offer […]

Aaron Kheriaty is the director of the bioethics program at the University of California, Irvine, School of Medicine. He wrote The Catholic Guide to Depression: How the Saints, the Sacraments and Psychiatry Can Help You Break Its Grip and Find Happiness Again.