Peter Quinn (moderator)
Peter A. Quinn is a novelist, essayist, and chronicler of Irish-America. He is the author of two novels, Banished Children of Eve, which won the American Book Award, and The Hour of the Cat. His most recent book is the semi-autobiographical, Looking for Jimmy: A Search for Irish-America. He served as a speechwriter for New York Governors Mario Cuomo and Hugh Carey and as Editorial Director at Time Warner.

Shaun Casey (panelist)
Shaun Casey, a graduate of Harvard Divinity School, is Associate Professor of Christian Ethics, Wesley Theological Seminary in Washington, D.C. He has recently completed a book (to be published by Oxford University Press) on the role of religion in the 1960 presidential election, which includes archival material on Kennedy's 1960 speech to the Houston ministers. That material is the subject of his panel presentation.

William Galston ( panelist)
William Galston is Senior Fellow for Governance Studies, The Brookings Institution in Washington, D.C. He previously served as Professor, School of Public Affairs and Director, Institute for Philosophy and Public Policy at the University of Maryland. He worked in the Clinton administration as deputy assistant for domestic policy, and was an advisor in the presidential campaigns of Walter Mondale (1982-84) and Albert Gore, Jr. (1988).

Robert P. George ( panelist)
Robert P. George is McCormick Professor of Jurisprudence and Director of the James Madison Program in American Ideals and Institutions at Princeton University. Named by President George W. Bush to the President’s Council on Bioethics, he has advised the administration on issues like abortion and embryonic stem cell research. He is the author of In Defense of Natural Law, Making Men Moral: Civil Liberties and Public Morality, and The Clash of Orthodoxies: Law, Religion and Morality in Crisis.

J. Bryan Hehir ( panelist)
J. Bryan Hehir is the Parker Gilbert Montgomery Professor of the Practice of Religion and Public Life at the Kennedy School of Government, Harvard. A priest of the Archdiocese of Boston, he serves as the secretary for Social Services and the president of Boston Catholic Charities. His research and writing focus on ethics and foreign policy and the role of religion in world politics and in American society.