Robyn Blumner spent 16 years as a nationally syndicated columnist and editorial writer at the Tampa Bay Times newspaper, where she wrote a lot about civil liberties, church/state separation, and free speech issues. In 2012, she was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize along with the rest of her editorial team.

Before she was writing professionally, she headed up ACLU affiliates in Florida and Utah. She entered the world of organized atheism, if you will, in 2014, when she was tapped to run the Richard Dawkins Foundation. Recently, RDF announced a merger with the Center For Inquiry, and Robyn will soon become CEO of the new merged organization.

I spoke with Robyn about her experience coming out as an atheist publicly long before it became commonplace, how the CFI/RDF merger took shape, and — yes — Richard Dawkins‘ tweets.

William Shunn is the author of The Accidental Terrorist, a book about his time as a Mormon missionary. He was supposed to preach in Alberta, but it wasn’t long before he was convicted of felony mischief after making a false bomb threat.

He’s still not allowed to return to Canada.

We spoke with Bill about what it’s like to be a Mormon missionary when your heart’s just not into it, how the Mormon Church catches escaped missionaries, and the extreme length he went to to prevent his mission partner from leaving the base.

Linda K. Wertheimer is a former education editor of the Boston Globe and a reporter at the Dallas Morning News and Orlando Sentinel. She recently published a book called Faith Ed: Teaching About Religion in an Age of Intolerance.

We spoke with Linda about groups that oppose the teaching of basic Islamic beliefs in public schools; whether teachers are properly equipped to objectively discuss religion in the classroom; and why atheists, Mormons, and Jews tend to know more about religion than larger faith groups.

Chris Shelton spent 27 years in the Church of Scientology, where he attained those high levels you only hear about in HBO documentaries. But he got out about three years ago and is now a vocal critic of the Church.

He just published a book called Scientology: A to Xenu: An Insider’s Guide to What Scientology is All About.

We spoke with Chris about what tipped him off to the Church’s deceptions, what he was taught about Xenu, and what he believes would be the single biggest blow to the Church’s existence.