From 2009 to 2012, Elena Lloyd-Sidle of Louisville, KY directed the Spiritual Affinities: Judaism and Islam book series project at Fons Vitae and has been involved in planning inter-religious festivals and congresses since 2005. She co-produced the film Death and Transformation: The Personal Reflections of Huston Smith with Gray Henry in 2006. She has spent considerable time in the Middle East and North Africa as a student of Arabic and religious studies. She studied the spiritual significance of the natural world in Quranic commentaries in Fes, Morocco with a Fulbright grant. She has a Master’s in religion from Yale Divinity School and a PhD in Theology from the University of Chicago Divinity School.