Leo Davis Jr. is artistic director at Gia Publications, Inc. in Chicago, Ill. Davis has a scholarly background in black church worship and can discuss contemporary influences and trends in church music.

Colleen Grogan is co-chair of the Center for Health Administration Studies at the University of Chicago. She is an expert on health policy and health politics.

C. Ben Mitchell is director of the Center for Bioethics and Human Dignity, in Bannockburn, Ill., and associate professor of bioethics and contemporary culture at Trinity International University in Deerfield, Ill. He is editor of the journal Ethics & Medicine: An International Journal of Bioethics.

Aldon D. Morris is a professor of sociology and African-American studies at Northwestern University in Evanston, Ill. His classic book The Origins of the Civil Rights Movement: Black Communities Organizing for Change (Free Press, 1986) examines black church organization and influence on the civil rights movement.

The Rev. Jesse Jackson is founder and president of the Rainbow/PUSH Coalition, the Chicago organization that works on issues involving economic development and economic justice, health care, voter registration, jobs and peace.

Otis Moss III is pastor of Trinity United Church of Christ in Chicago. He espouses Black theology and advocates efforts to reach Black youth in the city. A poet, he wrote Redemption in a Red Light District: Messages of Hope, Healing, and Empowerment.

Louis Farrakhan leads the Nation of Islam, based in Chicago. In September 2006 he handed over daily leadership of the Nation of Islam to its executive committee. Under his leadership, the Nation of Islam, founded in 1930 to address the spiritual, economic and social needs of African-Americans and criticized as separatist and anti-Christian, has become more mainstream. […]

Amherst College’s ambitious project, “African-American Religion: A Documentary History Project,” was begun in 1987. It compiled a comprehensive history of African-American religion in a three-volume work published by the University of Chicago Press.

Shiraz A. Malik is executive director of the Islamic Medical Association of North America in Lombard, Ill.