Ann M. Svennungsen is president of the Fund for Theological Education, an Atlanta-based ecumenical organization that gives fellowships and support to young women and men exploring ministry, and Texas Lutheran University in Seguin. She was elected Bishop by the Minneapolis Area Synod Assembly in 2012.

Center for Black Women in Church and Society at the Interdenominational Theological Center seeks to enhance the participation and relationship with African American women in church and society.

The King Center in Atlanta educates people about the life of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., nonviolent conflict-reconciliation and social change.

Maisha Itia Handy is a womanist scholar and assistant professor of Christian education at the Interdenominational Theological Seminary in Atlanta. She is also minister of Christian education at First Iconium Baptist Church in Atlanta.

Betty Glover Palmer chairs the department of urban studies at Beulah Heights Bible College in Atlanta, where she also directs the Institute for Urban and Global Economic Development. She works to provide opportunities for urban and global disenfranchised families and communities. She is ordained through the Evangelical Church Alliance. Her B.G. Palmer Economic Development Training consults […]

Bishop Earl E. McCloud Jr. is ecumenical affairs officer for the African Methodist Episcopal Church. He and leaders of the Interdenominational Theological Center organized a September 2006 meeting of 300 representatives of historic black churches and black Muslim leaders in Atlanta to organize an initiative against “black on black crime” in Atlanta.

James Abbington is associate professor of music and worship at Emory University’s Candler School of Theology in Atlanta. He wrote Let Mt. Zion Rejoice! Music in the African American Church (Judson Press, 2001).

Melva Wilson Costen is an authority on music and worship in the black church. She wrote the widely consulted African American Christian Worship (Abingdon Press, 1993) and In Spirit and In Truth: The Music of African American Worship (Westminster, 2004). She recently retired from the Interdenominational Theological Center in Atlanta, where she was Helmar Emil Nielsen Professor of Music […]

Nicole Ravenell Edwards is president and CEO for the Southern Institute on Children and Families, based in South Carolina but with affiliates throughout the South. The institute is a nonprofit organization that works with business leaders to try to improve children’s quality of life, including access to health care. Ravenell is a public policy expert.