The Rev. Thomas Worcester is a history professor at College of the Holy Cross in Worcester, Mass., where he teaches a course on the papacy. He is co-editor of The Papacy Since 1500: From Italian Prince to Universal Pastor (2010).

Paul Lakeland holds the Aloysius P. Kelley, S.J., Chair in Catholic Studies at Fairfield University in Fairfield, Conn. His areas of expertise include the role of the laity in the church and recentralization of authority under recent popes.

Nancy Dallavalle is an associate professor of religious studies at Fairfield University in Fairfield, Conn., where she teaches a course on the papacy. She is an expert on popes and the papacy, the pope as a world leader and media treatment of the pope.

Gregory A. Smith is the associate director of research at the Pew Research Center. He’s an expert on religion in America. Arrange interviews through Anna Schiller.

Joseph Chinnici is a Franciscan friar and professor of history at the Franciscan School of Theology, which is affiliated with the University of San Diego. He is the author of When Values Collide: The Catholic Church, Sexual Abuse and the Challenges of Leadership.

See a June 4, 2010, roundup by Christianity Today of Christian activist groups’ reactions to the crisis. That roundup includes: Ken Blackwell of the Family Research Council blamed the Obama administration for weak leadership in the Middle East; Jim Rice, editor of Sojourners, said the crisis would not end until Israel’s blockade of Gaza and its “illegal occupation” of Palestinian territory ended

American Piety in the 21st Century, an extensive survey of beliefs and practices released in 2006, was conducted by the Baylor Institute for Studies of Religion. This study counted one-third of Americans as evangelicals, compared with the Pew study’s one-fourth. It numbered the unaffiliated at 10.8 percent, much lower than the new Pew study and the […]

Tom Smith is a senior fellow and director of the General Social Survey at the National Opinion Research Center at the University of Chicago. He is at work on a study of religious change, including how people think about God. He served as a consultant to the Religious Landscape study and is an expert on Catholics and Protestants.

Lawrence Cunningham is a theology professor at the University of Notre Dame. He wrote the entry on angels in the Harper Collins Dictionary of Religion. He can also discuss the Catholic data in the study.