Do Christian and gospel music artists make a difference around the world? That was the question that was explored at a new addition to the Gospel Music Association’s GMA Music Week schedule. The Artist Symposium, “Christian Music Making A Difference Around The Globe”, was be held earlier today in the Music City Room of the Renaissance Hotel.

FOX News Channel’s Kelly Wright moderated a diverse panel of artists in an enlightening and invigorating discussion of how Christian and gospel music artists use their platforms to impact culture and make a real difference around the world. Steven Curtis Chapman, Dan Meyers, Alvin Slaughter, Todd Smith (Selah), Rebecca St. James, and Phil Stacey attended the event, which was sponsored by AIM (Adventures In Missions).

About the panelists:

• Most awarded Dove Award recipient, Steven Curtis Chapman, founded Shaohannah’s Hope, a ministry established by he and wife Mary Beth, to care for orphans by engaging the church and helping Christian families reduce the financial barrier to adoption. www.showhope.org
  
  

• For 10 years, Citadel graduate and singer/songwriter Dan Meyers has been ministering to U.S. soldiers and their families at military bases worldwide. His “Acoustic MRE” CD was packaged specifically for military personnel. www.danmeyers.com
  
  

• Dove Award/Stellar Award nominee Alvin Slaughter is founder and CEO of Alvin Slaughter International, a non-profit organization which works to feed, clothe, and educate those in dire situations, as well as training leaders in Africa to stem the tide of poverty and disease in their own nation. www.alvinslaughter.com
  
  

• Multi-Dove Award-winning and gold-selling Curb recording artist Selah member Todd Smith is a proud supporter of Laban Ministries. Founded by Smith’s father, the ministry operates three schools that are located in the Heart of Africa. These schools are training Nationals in the pastoral or evangelistic fields and mof the any graduates have established churches in the bush of Congo. www.labanministries.org
  
  

• Multi-Dove Award recipient Rebecca St. James has been a voice for Compassion International for more than a decade. She is the voice of a major campaign for Compassion’s “Malaria Awareness Day,” April 25th. www.compassion.com
  
  

• Country recording artist Phil Stacey (American Idol Season Six) is an avid supporter of St. Jude’s Children’s Hospital, an organization active in researching and treating children with cancer and other catastrophic diseases, regardless of the family’s ability to pay. www.stjude.org
  
  

About moderator Kelly Wright:

Wright serves as an anchor/reporter for Fox News Channel’s Washington, D.C. and New York bureaus. He recently was co-anchor of “Fox & Friends Weekend”. Wright has secured numerous news stories, such as with First Lady Laura Bush and on the Hurricane Katrina recovery. He attended Oral Roberts University in Tulsa, and has received numerous awards for his reporting, including two local Emmy® Awards. Wright is also a Gospel music recording artist.

About AIM (Adventures In Missions):

AIM (Adventures In Missions) is an interdenominational missions organization focusing on discipleship with an emphasis on prayer and relationships in their work amongst the poor. In its 19 years of history, AIM has taken over 65,000 people to the mission field. By giving people the opportunity to hold orphans, bring hope to the hopeless, and pray for the sick, they believe lives are transformed. The vision of the organization is to raise a generation of radically committed disciples of Jesus Christ.

www.adventures.org

PHOTO GALLERY

[L-R]: Dan Meyers, Rebecca St. James and Phil Stacey

Ali Matthews asks the panel how an artist affiliated with a smaller charitable organizations can be more effective in their efforts to raise awareness

[L-R]: Steven Curtis Chapman, Todd Smith and Alvin Slaughter

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