Valerie Hoffman is the head professor in the department of religion at the University of Illinois in Champaign, and the former director of its Center for South Asian and Middle Eastern Studies. She is an expert on Islam and in 2012 organized and participated in a conference on the Rohingya at the center.

Joseph Bast is president and CEO of the Chicago-based Heartland Institute, which is skeptical of man-made climate change. Bast’s research focuses on public policy, environmentalism, climate change, health care and economic issues. He has been critical of Pope Francis’ climate change campaign.

Bret Lortie serves as senior minister for the Unitarian Church of Evanston, Ill. He has called for placing a Black Lives Matter banner at the church where he preaches.

Ramon Rodriguez is the president of Dignity-Chicago, an organization of LGBT Catholics that works for inclusion in the church.

Emily McGinley is a pastor at Urban Village Church, a multisite United Methodist Church in the Chicago area with an outreach ministry to transgender people.

Marya Hornbacher is a writer and nonbeliever who has written widely of her own struggles with mental illness. She is the author of Waiting: A Nonbeliever’s Higher Power, which explores what spirituality can mean to nonbelievers recovering from a mental illness.

Amy Reynolds is an assistant professor of sociology at Wheaton College in Wheaton, Ill. She is an expert on globalization, women in leadership in the Christian world and gender studies, and she is researching women in leadership within evangelical organizations. Reynolds is the author of Free Trade and Faithful Globalization: Saving the Market.

Buddhist Council of the Midwest, based in Evanston, Ill., is an organization for all Buddhist groups in Chicago and the Midwest area. The council is inclusive of all three Buddhist traditions. Its purpose is to foster the learning and practice of Buddhism, to represent the Midwest Buddhist community in matters affecting its membership and to […]

Mary Keldermans was ordained as a Catholic priest by Roman Catholic Womenpriests in April 2014, an act for which she was excommunicated by her local bishop. She leads services at Holy Family Inclusive Catholic Community in Jacksonville, Ill., at the Congregational United Church of Christ.