The Role of the Black Church Today

CNN's Soledad O'Brien hosted a panel discussion on the role of the Black church while on-board a Tom Joyner Cruise as part of the promotion of her CNN Black in America: Churched documentary which will debut on October 14.

The CNN documentary series BIA is in its third year. The "Churched" installment focuses on the black church. In black America, it has always been the center of the community.

During segregation, the church served as an extended family that embraced and bolstered black America while supplying members with food, money and connections during hard times and providing leadership, vision and manpower for the movement that literally reshaped America.


Video of part of that panel discussion

Soledad O'Brien on the Black Church

CNN's Black in America series will continue this fall with the documentary "Churched."

Martin Luther King, Jr. described 11-o’clock on Sunday mornings as “the most segregated hour in America.”

Churches have long been central to African-American community life, supplying food, money, and social connections.

Four decades after the Civil Rights Movement, CNN anchor and special correspondent Soledad O’Brien will examine how close the Black Church remains to this vision and talk to church leaders and believers about today’s role of the Black Church in America.



             Video recorded June 2010