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Megan Goodwin, PhD, is Program Director for Sacred Writes, a Luce-funded project promoting public scholarship on religion hosted by Northeastern University. Her first book, Abusing Religion: Literary Persecutions, Sex Scandals, and American Minority Religions is available through Rutgers. Visit Dr. Megan Goodwin's website here Visit (and listen to) Keeping it 101: https://keepingit101.com/

Dr. Maia Kotrosits is assistant professor of religion at Denison University and is the author of the book “The Lives of Objects.”  Follow Dr. Maia Kotrosits on Twitter: https://twitter.com/maiakotro

Dr. David Newheiser is a research fellow in the Institute for Religion and Critical Inquiry at Australian Catholic University. His first book, Hope in a Secular Age (CUP, 2019), argues that an uncertain hope is required to sustain commitment of any kind: personal, political, or religious. Follow David Newheiser on Twitter: https://twitter.com/dnewheiser Visit his website: https://dnewheiser.net/

Joe Drape is an award-winning sportswriter for the New York Times. He is the author of six books, including the New York Times bestsellers Our Boys: A Perfect Season on the Plains with the Smith Center Redmen and American Pharoah: The Untold Story of the Triple Crown Winner’s Legendary Rise. His book Black Maestro was the inaugural winner of the Dr. Tony Ryan Book Award. A native of Kansas City and graduate of Rockhurst High School, Drape earned a Bachelor of Arts degree in English from Southern Methodist University.  Support Classical Ideas: https://linktr.ee/Classicalideas Visit Joe Drape on Twitter: https://twitter.com/joedrape

Andrea Miller is an editor at Lion’s Roar magazine and is the author of "Awakening My Heart: Essays, Articles and Interviews on the Buddhist Life," out now from Pottersfield Press.  Buy the book: https://www.amazon.com/Awakening-Heart-Articles-Interviews-Buddhist/dp/1988286883/ref=sr_1_1?dchild=1&keywords=Andrea+miller+awakening+my+heart&qid=1607819477&sr=8-1 Classical Ideas Linktree: https://linktr.ee/Classicalideas

Karim Amin is an Educator and Arts Activist from West Baltimore. Karim is currently a graduate degree candidate pursuing a Masters in Public Administration at the University of Baltimore. Karim was a charter member of Black Arts district coalition, the committee responsible for establishing  the Pennsylvania Avenue Black Arts district, the first Black Arts district in Maryland. Karim currently is the executive director Voices of 21217, a youth based nonprofit  focused on  developing arts programming and  funding to bring mixed used development to the Pennsylvania Avenue Black Arts district located in West Baltimore. You can visit Karim’s website at voicesof21217.com to get in touch. Support Classical Ideas: https://linktr.ee/classicalideas

Dr. Harold D. Morales is responsible for developing the center’s vision, recruiting committee members, organizing and overseeing committee work, and speak publicly about the center’s projects and activities. Dr. Morales' research focuses on the intersections between race and religion and between lived and mediated experience. He draws on these critical lenses to engage Latinx religions in general and Latinx Muslim groups in particular. He is currently focusing on developing public scholarship initiatives through his research on mural art and social justice in the city of Baltimore and through the CSRC and its collaborative projects.

Richard W. Newton Jr. is Assistant Professor of Religious Studies at the University of Alabama. His research examines the making of social difference in light of the anthropology of scriptures. He curates his website at: https://www.sowingtheseed.org Classical Ideas LinkTree: https://linktr.ee/Classicalideas  

Dr. Steve Taylor is a senior lecturer in psychology at Leeds Beckett University, and the author of several best-selling books on psychology and spirituality. He is the current chair of the Transpersonal Psychology Section of the British Psychological Society. His books include Waking From Sleep, The Fall, Out of the Darkness, Back to Sanity,  The Calm Center and The Leap. His latest book is Spiritual Science: Why Science Needs Spirituality to Make Sense of the World.  His books have been published in 20 languages, while his articles and essays have been published in over 50 academic journals, magazines and newspapers. He writes blog articles for Scientific American and for Psychology Today.Eckhart Tolle has described his work as ‘an important contribution to the shift in consciousness which is happening on our planet at present.’  Visit Dr. Steven M. Taylor online here: https://www.stevenmtaylor.com/

Yujiro Seki is the documentary filmmaker of the film "Carving the Divine." Carving the Divine offers a rare and intimate look into the life and artistic process of modern-day Busshi – practitioners of a 1400 year lineage of woodcarving at the beating heart of Japanese, Mahayana Buddhism. For more information, visit: https://www.carvingthedivine.com/

Hersch Wilson is a thirty-year veteran volunteer Firefighter-EMT with the Hondo Fire Department in Santa Fe County, New Mexico. He is also a story-teller, committed to explaining how First Responding can change how we see and experience our own lives. In his “real job” he is a writer, speaker, and consultant. He is the author of "Firefighter Zen," out now from New World Library.  Buy "Firefighter Zen": https://www.amazon.com/Firefighter-Zen-Field-Guide-Thriving/dp/1608686884/ref=sr_1_1?crid=24PZQ4UR1SWNK&dchild=1&keywords=firefighter+zen&qid=1603160557&sprefix=firefighter+zen%2Caps%2C162&sr=8-1

Meido Moore Roshi was a disciple of the lay Zen master Tenzan Toyoda Rokoji, under whom he endured a severe training in both Zen and traditional martial arts. He also trained under Dogen Hosokawa Roshi, and later under So'zan Miller Roshi. All three of these teachers are in the lineage of the famous Omori Sogen Roshi, perhaps the most famous Rinzai Zen master of the twentieth century. Meido serves as abbot of Korinji, a monastery near Madison, Wisconsin, and is a guiding teacher of the international Rinzai Zen Community, traveling widely to lead retreats. Buy the book: https://www.shambhala.com/hidden-zen.html

Dag Hammarskjöld served as secretary-general of the United Nations from 1953 until his tragic death in a suspicious plane crash in 1961. During those years he saw the fledgling international organization through numerous crises with skill that made him a star on the international stage. As readers of his now-classic diary, Markings, are aware, Hammarskjöld understood political leadership as an honor calling for resourcefulness, humility, moral clarity, and spiritual reflection. Buy Roger Lipsey's books here: https://www.shambhala.com/authors/g-n/roger-lipsey.html  

Guo Gu (Dr. Jimmy Yu) is the founder of the Tallahassee Chan Center (www.tallahasseechan.com) and is also the guiding teacher for the Western Dharma Teachers Training course at the Chan Meditation Center in New York and the Dharma Drum Lineage. He is one of the late Master Sheng Yen’s (1930–2009) senior and closest disciples, and assisted him in leading intensive retreats throughout the United States, Europe, and Asia. Guo Gu has edited and translated a number of Master Sheng Yen’s books from Chinese to English. He is also a professor of Buddhism and East Asian religions at Florida State University, Tallahassee. Visit Tallahassee Chan Center on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/user/Tallahasseechan

Dr. Arlene Sánchez Walsh is a professor of religious studies and the author of the award-winning book Latino Pentecostal Identity, which was released by Columbia University Press in 2003, as well as the book Pentecostals in America from Columbia University Press in 2018. She has served as a media expert for outlets such as the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, and On Being with Krista Tippett, and served as an expert on Latino/a religious history for the PBS series God in America.

Rachel Quist specializes in East Asian Buddhist imagery with focuses in pre-modern Japan and China. Her research centers on questions of interaction with imagery, materiality and object agency, and the accessibility of image-based practices. She has written on topics such as Buddhist reliquary design and expressivity, the didactic project underlying the hell tableau at Baodingshan, and the construction of a collective memory surrounding the Shingon monk Kōbō Daishi at the temple complex of Mount Kōya. Rachel is currently conducting research on early imperial patronage of Daigoji, a Shingon temple in Kyoto, for her dissertation.​ Michael VanHartingsveldt received an undergraduate degree in English Language and Literature before teaching in South Korea in  at an English immersion school. While there, he became enamored with the religious art of East Asia. He finished a Master’s degree in East Asian art and its markets from Claremont Graduate University in 2017, after which he worked for two years as an Asian Art collections specialist at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art.  Michael has collaborated with the Los Angeles office of The Japan Foundation in the curation of three exhibitions and two public lecture series. He now studies at the University of Kansas.

S. Brent Rodriguez Plate is a writer, editor, public speaker, and college professor. He's interested in how sensuality affects spirituality. His writings all circle around questions of the ways sense perceptions influence ways of being religious, and how religious traditions change our ways of perceiving the world around us. In other words, religion and spirituality are rooted in the body. Along these lines, he has authored and edited fifteen books, while his essays have appeared in Salon.com, the Los Angeles Review of Books, America, Religion Dispatches, The Christian Century, The Islamic Monthly, Killing the Buddha, Chronicle of Higher Education, and other venues. Having taught at the University of Vermont and Texas Christian University, he is currently visiting associate professor at Hamilton College, NY. Visit Dr. Brent Plate online at: https://www.sbrentplate.net

Dr. Maldonado-Estrada is Assistant Professor of Religion at Kalamazoo College where she teaches classes on religion and masculinity, Catholics in the Americas, urban religion, and religions of Latin America. She is an ethnographer and her research focuses on material culture, contemporary Catholicism, and gender and embodiment. She is the author of Lifeblood of the Parish: Men and Catholic Devotion in Williamsburg, Brooklyn (NYU Press, 2020).  Pre-order "Lifeblood of the Parish" and use the code "LIFEBLOOD30" at checkout to receive 30% off your order.  Preorder here: https://nyupress.org/9781479830497/lifeblood-of-the-parish/

Jonathan McFarland teaches Classical Ideas and World Religions at Hickman High School in Columbia, Missouri. 

In this special episode, friends, family, past students, and colleagues of George tell stories about why they loved him. George founded Classical Ideas and World Religions at Hickman High School in Columbia, Missouri in 1989-1990 and taught the course until 2016. George passed away May 14, 2020 in Columbia, Missouri.