Alvin J SchmidtAlvin J. Schmidt (PhD, University of Nebraska) retired in 1999 as professor of sociology at Illinois College in Jacksonville, Illinois, where he still lives. He is the author of several books, including The Great Divide: The Failure of Islam and the riumph of the West, and served as a consulting editor for Dictionary of Cults, Sects, Religions and the Occult. Read More Read Less