Jeanette Rodriguez, a professor of theology and religious studies at Seattle University, wrote Our Lady of Guadalupe: Faith and Empowerment Among Mexican-American Women (University of Texas Press, 1994).

Theresa Torres is assistant professor of Women’s and Gender Studies, religious studies and anthropology at the University of Missouri, Kansas City.  She studies U.S. Hispanic Catholics, Hispanic women’s religious and civic activism, and immigration/refugee issues.

The Pew Hispanic Center is part of the Pew Research Center. It researches the growing Hispanic population in the United States and works to understand its impact.

Read a Jan. 19, 2000, story from Beliefnet.com exploring whether there’s a divide in American Buddhism between “Asian Buddhists” and “New Buddhists” – converts from other ethnic and cultural backgrounds.

Read a story from the June 26, 2001, Village Voice about the involvement of black women in Buddhism.

Richard H. Seager is an associate professor of religious studies at Hamilton College in Clinton, N.Y. He is studying the globalization and Americanization of Buddhism and is the author of Buddhism in America and Encountering the Dharma: Daisaku Ikeda, Soka Gakkai and the Globalization of Buddhism Humanism.

Janice Willis is a retired professor emerita of religion and social sciences at Wesleyan University in Middletown, Conn. She is the author of Dreaming Me: An African American Woman’s Spiritual Journey. Read an excerpt on Beliefnet.com. Willis has talked about her journey from the segregated, revival-preacher South to a Buddhist monastery in Nepal where she began to find peace.

Esperanza USA is a network of Hispanic Christians, churches, and ministries. It is based in Philadelphia. Jodi Reynhout is media contact.

Jonathan Kim is associate professor of Christian education at Talbot School of Theology in La Mirada, Calif., and author of “The role of Christian education in the Korean church” in the Jan. 1, 2003, special edition of Christian Today newspaper.