The Reverend Dr. Lisa Allen-McLaurin is an Emmy and Webby-award winning pastor, professor, and public theologian. She is Helmar E. Nielsen Professor of Church Music and Worship and oversees the Master of Arts in Liturgical Arts and Culture degree at the Interdenominational Theological Center in Atlanta, Georgia, and is appointed the Coordinator of Practical Ministries for the Sixth Episcopal District of the Christian Methodist Episcopal Church. Dr. Allen-McLaurin holds Bachelor’s, Master’s, and Ph.D. degrees in piano and music education from Millsaps College and the University of Southern Mississippi, and the Master of Divinity degree from the Candler School of Theology at Emory University.

She is the author of A Womanist Theology of Worship: Liturgy, Justice, and Communal Righteousness (Orbis Books, 2021), Worship Matters! A Collection of Essays on the Practical and Spiritual Discipline of Worship (Creative Publishing, 2015), and Development Comes Before Deliverance: A 9-Week Sermon Series and Bible Study on the Book of Exodus (Creative Publishing, 2018), and is a featured musicologist in the 2015 Emmy-award winning documentary, Reflect, Reclaim, Rejoice: Preserving the Gift of Black Sacred Music.

Dr. Jessica Young Brown is a licensed clinical psychologist in Richmond, VA. Dr. Brown’s research and clinical work focus on making mental health accessible and equitable for people in marginalized communities, and equipping mental health professionals to better serve these communities.

Dr. Brown’s areas of interest and expertise include the impact of racism and race-related stress on mental health, generational and cultural trauma, and the intersection of faith and mental health. In addition to various peer-reviewed and popular media articles, Dr. Brown is the author of Making Space at the Well: Mental Health and the Church.

Melanie C. Jones is a womanist ethicist, millennial preacher, and intellectual activist. Melanie joined the Union Presbyterian Seminary faculty as Instructor of Ethics, Theology and Culture and Inaugural Director of the Katie Geneva Cannon Center for Womanist Leadership in fall 2019. Formerly, Melanie served as the 2018-19 Crump Visiting Professor and Black Religious Scholar-in-Residence at Seminary of the Southwest in Austin, TX, and Lecturer at Brite Divinity School in Fort Worth, TX, American Baptist College in Nashville, TN, Chicago Theological Seminary, and The Illinois Institute of Technology in Chicago, IL.

Melanie’s research probes the scripting of the body in theology and philosophy that fosters religious, cultural, and moral meaning for the present with particular attention to Black women’s body politics. Melanie engages womanist theological ethics and sacred texts, millennials and faith, and Black aesthetics and popular culture. For her distinguished research, Melanie has received notable fellowships and scholarships, including The Forum for Theological Exploration, The Louisville Institute, Wabash Center, and Villanova University Center for Church Management.

Melanie is a thinking woman of faith embodying radical love and revolutionary justice in the academy, Church, and global community. Melanie is co-curator of #MillennnialWomanism Digital Forum and Co-Founder of The Millennial Womanism Project (TMWP)—an enterprise committed to enhancing the well-being of Black millennial women of faith and justice and fostering trans-generational womanist dialogue. As a global leader serving professional societies and international boards, Melanie is the chair of the board of directors of the Daughters of the African Atlantic Fund.

A third-generation ordained Baptist preacher and sought-after lecturer, Melanie is an emerging millennial voice with noted academic and popular publications as well as features on television, radio, and news outlets.

Rev. Dr. Kimberly D. Russaw is a dynamic and diversely gifted woman of God who brings all of her gifts together to serve the God she loves. She is the Associate Professor of Old Testament at Pittsburgh Theological Seminary in Pittsburgh, PA, where she blends intellectual rigor with an infectious passion for teaching. To prepare for this ministry, she earned the Master of Divinity degree (Biblical Studies) from the Interdenominational Theological Center (Atlanta, GA), and the Master of Arts degree (Hebrew Bible) from Vanderbilt University (Nashville, TN). When Russaw completed her Ph.D. in Religion at Vanderbilt University, she joined a select cadre of African American scholars who passionately teach the next generation of Christian leaders at our seminaries, colleges, and universities. 

Dr. Russaw is the author of Daughters in the Hebrew Bible (Fortress Academic, 2018) and Revisiting Rahab: Another Look at the Woman of Jericho (Wesley's Foundery Books, 2021). She has written several articles and essays such as “Veils and Lapcloths: The Great Cover Up of Bynum, the Bible, and Black Churches,” “Wisdom in the Garden: The Woman of Genesis 3 and Alice Walker’s Sofia,” and “Undaunted: Reading Miriam for the Sisters They Tried to Erase.” Additionally, she has contributed to online spaces such as OnScripture, Church Anew, Huffington Post Religion, and The Christian Recorder (the official organ of the African Methodist Episcopal Church) on topics such as the Bible and popular culture.

Born in Chicago, Illinois, Russaw is committed to the life of the local church and is a life-long member of Greater Institutional AME Church. There she has been most committed to those ministries that empower women, girls, and those who love them. Russaw shares her gifts as a sought after keynote speaker, workshop facilitator, and preacher.

Named one of “Six Black Women at the Center of Gravity in Theological Education” by NBCNews.com, Russaw is an ordained itinerate elder in the African Methodist Episcopal Church, an inductee into the prestigious Martin Luther King, Jr. Collegium of Scholars at Morehouse College, and holds membership in many professional organizations including the Society of Biblical Literature, the American Academy of Religion, the Society for the Study of Black Religion, and the National Black MBA Association.  Russaw is a member of the editorial board for the Journal of Biblical Literature, serves as a member of the Sisters Chapel Advisory Council (Spelman College), and is a dedicated member of Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority, Inc.

Above all this, God has blessed Russaw with a loving family to whom she is devoted.  She is the daughter of Drs. Floyd and Ethel Russaw, the sister of Kaye and Kelly, the sister-in-love of Sean D. Shelton, and the adoring auntie of Sean William Floyd Shelton.