Terrence Hines is a professor of psychology at Pace University in Pleasantville, N.Y., and the author of Pseudoscience and the Paranormal (Prometheus Books, 2003). He says uncritical presentation of the supernatural and paranormal in the media leads to high belief ratings. But he also thinks the human brain may be constructed to believe in “cognitive illusions,” such […]

Laura Donaldson is an associate professor of English at Cornell University in Ithaca, N.Y. She has written about women’s beliefs in the New Age movement, which includes belief in many supernatural and paranormal phenomena.

The National Spiritualist Association of Churches maintains a state-by-state list of Spiritualist churches across the United States.

Barry Karr is executive director of the Committee for Skeptical Inquiry, which aims to promote scientific inquiry, critical investigation, and the use of reason in examining controversial and extraordinary claims.

Ask Rabbi Mayer Waxman at the Orthodox Union in New York about travel trends, about trips and whether families around the country are planning bar mitzvahs and bat mitzvahs in Israel.

Regina Sandler-Phillips is a rabbi, chaplain and educator. She is the founder of the Hevra Kadisha (sacred Jewish burial fellowship) at Park Slope Jewish Center in Brooklyn, N.Y. She has kept the vigil over Jewish dead in hospitals, private homes and funeral parlors, and is an acknowledged authority on Jewish funeral issues.

Charlton McIlwain is Associate Professor of Media, Culture and Communication at New York University. He is the author of Death in Black and White: Death, Ritual and Family Ecology (Hampton Press, 2003), which examines African-American funeral practices.

Elizabeth Westrate wrote, produced and directed A Family Undertaking, a documentary about the home funeral movement.