• A Funky Retirement: Celebrating Cornel West: As he retires from Princeton University and returns to his roots, our reporter reflects on the life, faith, and activism of Dr. Cornel West.
• Remembering Donna Summer’s Faith: Disco great Donna Summer may be remembered best for her music, but over time her Christian faith had become increasingly important to her.
• Media Courts Black Clergy on Gay Marriage: News outlets are flooded with Black clergy responses to President Obama’s same-sex marriage announcement. Are we all playing the politicians’ game?
• Roberts Women Reflect on Faith and Life: In her new book, Lucimarian Tolliver Roberts and her daughter, Good Morning America co-anchor Robin Roberts, share reflections on life and faith.
• Brian Jenkins: StartingUp Business Now: Non-profit leader Brian Jenkins says his new social media platform offers one-stop networking and business planning to budding entrepreneurs.
• Obama Marriage Evolution Over: Conservative religious leaders respond with ‘outrage’ to President Obama’s statement in support of same-sex marriage.
• Is Obama Courting Black Voters With ‘Evoloving View of Gay Marriage? Socially conservative Black voters are being cited as one reason President Obama hasn’t come out in support of same-sex marriage.
• New White House Guidelines for Faith Groups: White House Office of Faith-based and Neighborhood Partnerships issues new guidelines for faith groups.
• L.A. Riots 20 Years Later: People of faith and others reflect on the twentieth anniversary of the L.A. riots.

In this audio clip, Lupe Fiasco dedicates a song to the well educated women of Princeton and talks about West’s influence. And, in these videos he, George Clinton & P-Funk jam.

In this audio clip, comedian Bill Maher talks about how he’ll use Cornel West to get into heaven if there is one.

In this audio clip, actor Harry Belefonte talks about how Cornel West inspires him.

In this audio clip, the Princeton University Gospel Ensemble, who opened the show, gives praise to Jesus.

In this audio clip, jazz musician Terrence Blanchard talks about Cornel West’s influence on him and then he and his band jam.

In these two audio clips, you’ll hear the Cornel West Theory perform. You have to see them live though. Really you do.

Finally, in this audio clip, Dr. Cornel West gives thanks.

To read my reflections on Cornel West, go to UrbanFaith.com.

You’ll find my full photo set at Flickr.

• Doing College Diversity Well: Christian college administrators pursuing diversity for their institutions and other leaders committed to improving their schools’ troubled histories with race talk to UrbanFaith about their efforts.
• Arizona Immigration Law Has Its Day in Court: The U.S. Supreme Court heard arguments Wednesday about Arizona’s controversial immigration law. This is UrbanFaith’s round-up of coverage.
• Teen Birth Rates at Historic Low: Contraception and sex education are cited as reasons for historically low teen birth rates, but there is still cause for concern.

“There are generally two sides to every lovers’ quarrel and this is true in the argument between theology, once known as the “Queen of the Sciences,” and modern science, now the undisputed king. In two previous articles about Laity Leadership Institute Senior Fellow Elaine Howard Ecklund’s book Science vs. Religion: What Scientists Really Think, we looked at what people of faith sometimes contribute to the impasse. In this article, we’ll briefly consider what role scientists play. The scientists themselves provide clues.

Whether they were Catholic, Evangelical, Jewish, Muslim, or Hindu, believing scientists told Ecklund that they disapproved of an ‘extreme form of scientism that sees science as the only way of gaining access to truth or reality in the world.’

Science, for example, doesn’t provide a rational reason to care for students, they told her, and it doesn’t provide a framework for knowing what to do with their science or how to evaluate its ethics and impact on the world. …”

Read the whole introduction at The High Calling.

• Who Will Speak Up for Murdered Children? Violent crime is down nationally with the exception of family violence, says journalist Karen Spears Zacharias, author of a new book that tells the story of one child murder in order to bring attention to them all.
• President Obama’s Other Pastor: A conversation with the Rev. Dr. Joel C. Hunter of Florida about his civil rights testimony, defending President Barack Obama’s faith, and the local ministerial response to the Trayvon Martin case.
• Sanford Pastors Want Reconciliation: More clergy are speaking out on the Trayvon Martin case, but the story holds limited interest for Whites and Republicans.

• Cory Booker’s ‘Come to Jesus’ Heroism: Newark Mayor Cory Booker calls saving his neighbor from a firey blaze a ‘Come to Jesus’ moment and thanks God that they’re both alive to talk about it.
• Prayer Mentioned at Zimmerman Arrest: Prayer makes a surprise appearance at Florida Special Prosecutor Angela Corey’s press conference announcing the arrest of George Zimmerman on second-degree murder charges in the shooting death of Trayvon Martin.
• Romney’s Black, Mormon Problem: Mitt Romney is reportedly not even trying to court the Black vote and doesn’t want to talk about his church’s racist past. Will Black Republicans rally for him anyway?

Would it surprise you to learn that only two percent of scientists are evangelical, or are willing to identify as such?

This is what Laity Leadership Institute Senior Fellow Elaine Howard Ecklund found when she surveyed approximately 1700 natural and social scientists at top U.S. research universities and then conducted in-depth interviews with 275 of the survey respondents.

“In the interview portion, it would sometimes come out that folks had beliefs that would be considered evangelical, such as belief in the efficacy of the resurrection and the authority of scripture, but on the survey they would not identify as evangelical when I asked if they identify with a specific religious label,” Ecklund told The High Calling.

She attributes their hesitancy to the “fraught relationship” evangelicalism has had with politics and science in the public sphere.

“It’s very difficult for scientists to align with a specific faith community when they feel it takes a negative stance towards scientific research,” she said. “Those who are not people of faith often have never seen a person of faith who is a committed Christian and an evolutionist, for example. I don’t think that position is very widely talked about, and so it is difficult for scientists to see how it could be a possibility.” …

Read the rest at The High Calling.

• Southern  Baptist Leader Accuses Obama of Race Baiting in Trayvon Martin Case: Should Christian ethicist Richard Land take a look in the race baiting mirror before calling out President Obama and others in regard to Trayvon Martin?
• Can Bullying Lead to Murder or Suicide?  From the Oikos University shooting to Tyler Clementi’s suicide to the new film, ‘Bully,’ the ‘bullied into it’ narrative is a common one. But could this storyline do more harm than good?
• Diving the Fate of the Affordable Care Act: After three days of U.S. Supreme Court testimony about the Affordable Care Act, pundits sound ambivalent in their predictions about its fate.

• John Piper on Race and the Christian: Minneapolis pastor John Piper’s commitment to racial reconciliation is rooted in Reformed theology, his own history as a Southern racist, and his love for his African American daughter. He talked to UrbanFaith about his unlikely story.
• A Note of Grace in Sugarhill Gang’s Sad, Angry Film: There is a surprising grace note in an angry new documentary about the pioneering hip-hop group, The Sugarhill Gang.
• Taking Stock of the Tryvon Martin Case: Now that the road to justice has been cleared in the Trayvon Martin case, perhaps it’s time to calm down and consider how we got here.
• Supreme Court to Judge Affordable Care Act: It’s been two years since the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act was signed into law. Will it survive Supreme Court scrutiny?
• Will There Be Justice for Trayvon Martin? A Florida self-defense law allowed a volunteer crime fighter to go free after he shot and killed an unarmed black teen, even though police instructed him to stop following the boy. Will justice be served?

John Piper was one of the first and the few white evangelical pastors to make a public statement on the controversial shooting death of Florida teen Trayvon Martin. Not only is his passion for racial reconciliation informed by his self-proclaimed history as a Southern racist; it also fueled by his experience as the father of an adopted African American teen daughter. Piper is the author of Bloodlines: Race, Cross, and the Christian, a book that inspired a public discussion about Race and the Christian at the New York Society for Ethical Culture in New York City Wednesday night. The Minneapolis, Minnesota, pastor of Bethlehem Baptist Church was joined onstage by New York’s Redeemer Presbyterian Church pastor Tim Keller and Anthony Bradley, a theology professor from the King’s College in New York City. Christianity Today spoke with Piper on Thursday about various kinds of reconciliation, including what it would mean to reconcile with someone like author Rob Bell. …

Read the interview at Christianity Today.