June Cotner is the editor of Dog Blessings: Poems, Prose and Prayers Celebrating Our Relationship with Dogs (2008). She lives in Poulsbo, Wash.

The WomanSpirit Center of Bellevue, Wash., is an interfaith community of women that offers retreats, workshops and activities, many of which include unusual forms of prayer, such as hiking, beachcombing, journaling, centering prayer and meditation.

Debbie Levenstein is development officer for Women’s Philanthropy of the Jewish Federation of Greater Metro­West, N.J. and worked for a time as the advocacy director of the Domestic Abuse Women’s Network in Tukwila, Wash. Among her specialties is dealing with Jewish women and domestic violence.

Toby Crittenden is the executive director for the Washington Bus, which engages young people in Washington on their own terms, and empowers them through education, civic and cultural engagement, and hands-on democracy.

Eugene Cho is the founding and lead pastor at Quest Church, a Seattle church with a largely under-35 crowd. He’s also the founder of One Day’s Wages, a non-profit organization focused on global poverty.

Lesley Hazleton is a former psychologist and journalist and is the author of Mary: A Flesh-and-Blood Biography of the Virgin Mother. Hazleton lives in Seattle and describes herself as having “deep roots in both Judaism and Catholicism.”

Philip Watkins teaches psychology at Eastern Washington University in Cheney. He specializes in gratitude and has researched its relationship to spirituality.

Craig Rennebohm founded the Mental Health Chaplaincy in Seattle in 1987. The chaplaincy provides services for the mentally ill, including homeless people, and training for congregations to support families experiencing mental illness. Rennebohm now trains others for mental health chaplaincy.

Mark Lloyd Taylor is an associate professor in the School of Theology and Ministry at Seattle University. He teaches Christian theology and wrote God Is Love: A Study in the Theology of Karl Rahner.