Kirk Franklin

Gospel music megastar Kirk Franklin recently boycotted the Christian Music Association’s Dove Awards, the Trinity Broadcasting Network (TBN), and the Gospel Music Association for both its lack of diversity and for editing a piece out of his Dove Awards acceptance speech in which he asked the audience to send up prayers for Atatiana Jefferson, the twenty-eight-year-old black woman who was gunned down in her Texas home by a Fort Worth police officer. Franklin’s boycott is what happens when an artist with clout takes a socio-political stance without bastardizing their artistic legacy (unlike, for instance, the charades surrounding Kanye West’s recent foray into gospel music). Because there’s certainly a thing or two to learn from the thirteen-time Grammy Award-winning “Stomp” singer and soon-to-be-grandfather about how to navigate between the secular and spiritual while maintaining integrity. Released earlier this year, Franklin’s thirteenth album Long, Live, Love is a return to his crossover genius, breathing sanctity into R&B-leaning songs like “Love Theory” and “Just For Me” and clutching souls that were none the wiser or holier to begin with. For all those missions and talents, Franklin should forever be praised and celebrated. –Eric Tullis