Jonathan Montaldo is one of the foremost Thomas Merton scholars and interpreters of  his writings. Montaldo has served as associate director of the Merton Institute for Contemplative Living, director of a retreat center near Merton’s Abbey of Gethsemani and director of the Thomas Merton Center at Bellarmine University. Montaldo is also editor of the 10-volume Bridges to Contemplative […]

Daniel P. Horan is the author of The Franciscan Heart of Thomas Merton and a columnist for America magazine, where he recently wrote an essay about why Merton still matters, especially to millennials. He blogs at Dating God. He is a Franciscan monk based in Boston.

Michael W. Higgins is vice president for mission and Catholic identity at Sacred Heart University in Fairfield, Conn. He is the author of several books on Thomas Merton, including Thomas Merton: Faithful Visionary and Heretic Blood: The Spiritual Geography of Thomas Merton. Higgins is also an expert on the Catholic writer Henri Nouwen and on the path […]

Paul Elie is a senior fellow with the Berkley Center for Religion, Peace and World Affairs at Georgetown University in Washington, D.C., and director of the American Pilgrimage Project. He is an expert on religion in literature, the arts and media. He is the author of The Life You Save May Be Your Own: An American […]

Stephen Lind is a visiting professor of business administration at Washington and Lee University in Lexington, Va. He is the author of a forthcoming book about religion in the work of Charles M. Schulz.

Anita C. Hill is an ELCA minister and regional coordinator for the Midwest for ReconcilingWorks: Lutheran for Full Inclusion. She works with Lutheran congregations and individuals in Minnesota, North Dakota and South Dakota to be fully inclusive of LGBT people. She lives in the St. Paul, Minn., area.