Rosetta E. Ross is an associate professor of religion and chairs the department of philosophy and religious studies at Spelman College in Atlanta. An elder in the United Methodist Church, she writes and lectures widely about African-American religion and is treasurer of the Society for the Study of Black Religion. She is an expert on women […]

David Chappell is associate professor of history at the University of Arkansas and a historian of the American South, the civil rights movement and race relations in the United States. He is the author of A Stone of Hope: Prophetic Religion and the Death of Jim Crow (University of North Carolina, 2004).

In his Jan. 27, 2010 State of the Union address the president pledged to keep fighting for health care reform, though it remained unclear how he and the Democrats would be able to pass a bill.

View a variety of recent polls about health insurance reform at PollingReport.com.

The Pew Forum published an Oct. 2, 2009, analysis looking at the two main coalitions of religious groups on opposing sides of the issue.

Lorraine Blackman, associate professor at the Indiana University School of Social Work, is director of the African American Family Life Education Program, an educational, research and service project that teaches family life skills.

Cheryl R. Cooper is Chief Operating Officer of the YWCA USA. She was formerly executive director of the National Council of Negro Women in Washington, D.C., which seeks to improve the quality of life for African-American women and their families.

The Rev. Calvin O. Butts III is head pastor of the Abyssinian Baptist Church in Harlem, N.Y. Butts chairs the National Black Leadership Commission on AIDS.

Christine D. Chapman wrote (with Stephen C. Rasor) Black Power From the Pew: Laity Connecting Congregations and Communities (Pilgrim, 2007). She is an adjunct professor at Georgia State University and at the Interdenominational Theological Center.