by William Branch, Fred Lynch, Fred Oduyoye, Edward Bayonet, and Oddthomas
Talk presented Fri, May 18, 2007 at the Urban Youth Workers Institute Conference 2007.

Decription

A Do-Not-Miss experience! Come and dialogue about the church and hip-hop music and culture with some leading speakers, pastors and artists who can give all of us some great advice on navigating this topic that can sometimes get heated and taken out of context in the faith community.

About the Speakers

Willliam “Duce” Branch a.k.a. “The Ambassador,” is a co-founder and spokesperson for the nationally known Christian rap group The Cross Movement, president of the non-profit organization Cross Movement Ministries, and is coleader of an inner city church plant, Epiphany Fellowship in Philadelphia. He has been ministering the gospel through rap and preaching for 15 years. He holds a Bachelors of Science degree in Bible from Lancaster Bible College as well as a Masters degree in Theology from Dallas Theological Seminary. Duce is married to Michelle and together they have four children.

Fred L. is a dynamic youth communicator with over 18 years of inner-city ministry experience, and is the founder of UrbNet, a national network of urban youth workers. At the age of 18, Fred helped found P.I.D. (Preachas In Disguise), one of the first gospel rap acts, and went on to record six albums. Fred is the author of “The Epic,” an artistic translation of the Gospel of John in rap. Fred and D’Ann, his wife of 14 years, currently live in Texas with their two children, Asia and Jordan.

Fred O. is the RELOAD Director for UYWI and is joining us from Cincinnati, Ohio. Fred brings to the table years of experience in both the corporate world and youth ministry. He brings to the UYWI team his passion for emerging urban leaders to see them trained and equipped so that they may do all that the Lord has commissioned
them with for the Kingdom.

Spec is a staff member of Crossover Community Church in Tampa, FL, which focuses on reaching those influenced by hip-hop culture. He is the director of the media department, and has final say on all design and media that Crossover produces. He also serves as CEO & President of the national label, Flavor Alliance Media Group in partnership with Tommy “Urban D.” Kyllonen & Mike Estep. Spec continues to push himself to the cutting edge of design and concept so he can effectively communicate to the culture today.

There are many ways to describe the music of Oddthomas because of his mass appeal with Rock and Hip-Hop genres; it becomes hard to label him as just a Rapper, MC or even Poet. It is easy however, to understand the purpose of his words and music. In 2007, he was in the Top 100 indie artists to check for on My Space and the most downloaded Hip-Hop artist in May 2005 on My Space.

• Artist: William Branch, Fred Lynch, Fred Oduyoye, Edward ￢ﾀﾜSpec￢ﾀﾝ Bayonet, and Oddthomas
• Title: Hip-Hop and the Church
• Album: UYWI 2007
• Genre: Speaker
• Year: 2007
• Length: 78:38 minutes (36.19 MB)
• Format: MP3 Mono 44kHz 64Kbps (CBR)