Luke Smetters is a candle carver who has led workshops at the Lutheran School of Theology in Chicago, Ill., where he is also a student. Contact him at Bethany Lutheran Church in Ishpeming, Mich., where he is the vicar.

Paul Z. “PZ” Myers is an associate professor of biology at the University of Minnesota, Morris. He is known for his provocative challenges of religion, including a 2008 incident in which he drove a rusty nail through a consecrated Eucharistic host. He describes himself as a “a godless liberal” on his blog, Pharyngula.

Martin Marklin is a liturgical artist in Contoocook, N.H., who makes paschal candles.

Bryan F. Le Beau is a history professor and vice president of academic affairs at the University of St. Mary in Leavenworth, Kan. He is the author of The Atheist: Madalyn Murray O’Hair.

The Myer & Rosaline Feinstein Center for American Jewish History, based at Temple University in Philadelphia, Pa., promotes the study of the Jewish experience in America.

Michael Lackey is an associate professor of English at the University of Minnesota, Morris. His research interests include God and religion in literature, and atheism, and he is the author of African American Atheists and Political Liberation: A Study of the Sociocultural Dynamics of Faith (2007).

The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops answers questions about the role of the paschal candle in Easter rites.

Read about the symbolism and history of the paschal candle in the Catholic Encyclopedia.

Annie Laurie Gaylor is co-founder and co-president of the Freedom From Religion Foundation, a Madison, Wis.-based national association of atheists and agnostics working to keep state and church separate. She previously served as editor of Freethought Today, the nation’s only freethought newspaper. She is the author of Woe to the Women: The Bible Tells Me So and editor of Women […]