The 29-year-old son of Bishop T.D. Jakes was arrested last month after he exposed his genitals to two undercover vice detectives at a public park.

       According to CBS 11 News in Dallas, Jermaine Jakes was charged with indecent exposure and released on a personal recognizance bond.       

       The arrest warrant affidavit from Dallas Police says Jakes walked up to one of the detectives at Keist Park on Jan. 3 with his pants unzipped.  He then began to masturbate while making eye contact with the detective, according to the affidavit.        

        Jakes’ attorney, Faith Johnson, released a statement on Wednesday saying, “We are aware of potential allegations involving Jermaine Jakes and are undertaking our own investigation of these allegations at this time.  Given an apparent government investigation, we have no further comment at this time.”

Related Info (downloadable): Read arrest warrant for Jermaine Jakes. (Please note file contains graphic material.)

Multiple Stellar award winner and worship leader Byron Cage is set to record his next live recording on March 13, 2009 at Second Ebenezer Church in Detroit, Michigan. Special guests for this effort include Marvin Winans, Marvin Sapp, and Tye Tribbett, with 2009 Stellar Award Producer of the Year Aaron Lindsay handling production duties. Cage's last recording Live at The Apollo: The Proclamation produced the hit "With All of My Might" and won Cage the 2009 Stellar Award for Contemporary Male Vocalist of the Year. (Feb 12, 2009)

Grammy Award winning songstress Regina Belle announced this week that an 'undetected illness' and two surgeries will limit her from continuing to make appearances and performances. Belle faces a long road of recovery and hopes her fans and supporters continue to understand.

     Belle is coming off the smash success of her Gospel project, “Love Forever Shines” and has been consistently touring and promoting the top-10 album since its release last May. Belle underwent her first of two surgeries and is recuperating successfully in her home in Atlanta.  In an open letter to her fans, Belle wrote:

     "I have had the first of two surgeries to correct my illness and because 'GOD IS GOOD' the first surgery went wonderfully!  The healing time requires no singing or flying for a 3 month period…..my second surgery will take place in six months, and I will have another 2 month recovery period….I really believe that God heals!

     "I will continue to heal and be thankful for what God has already done, while I trust that you are prayerful and sending me well wishes.  To all of my fans, pastors and churches, radio and retail, booking agents, promoters and everyone that has allowed my messages of music to go forward, thank you so much for your understanding in all of this.  I Love you all and I'm working hard to get back to you!"

     The 14 spirit-filled tracks on “Love Forever Shines” features the hit single, "God Is Good," which topped the R&R and Billboard Monitor charts at its debut and continues to be a radio favorite, as well as the current single, "I Call On Jesus," a duet featuring Shirley Murdock. 

     This is the debut CD release for the re-launch of Ruben Rodriguez' Pendulum Records, in association with Walker Davis Entertainment, distributed by Fontana.  The CD is executive produced by Ruben Rodriguez, Ray J. Davis and Chris Walker.

     “Love Forever Shines” is available everywhere and for more information on Regina Belle please visit www.pendulumrecords.biz or  www.reginabelleworld.com or www.myspace.com/msreginabelle

Rev. Robert H. Schuller is watching his life's work crumble after his son and recent successor, the Rev. Robert A. Schuller, abruptly resigned as senior pastor of the Crystal Cathedral. The shimmering, glass-walled mega-church is home to the "Hour of Power" broadcast, an evangelism staple that's been on the air for more than three decades.

     The church is also in financial turmoil: It now plans to sell more than $65 million worth of its Orange County property to pay off debt. Revenue dropped by nearly $5 million last year, according to a recent letter from the elder Schuller to elite donors.

     In the letter, Schuller Sr. implored the Eagle's Club members, who supply 30 percent of the church's revenue, for donations and hinted that the show might go off the air without their support.

     The Crystal Cathedral blames the recession for its woes. It's a problem common to personality driven ministries. Most have collapsed or been greatly diminished after their founders left the pulpit or died.

     “Members often tie their donations to the pastor, not the institution,” said Nancy Ammerman, a sociologist of religion at Boston University. “Schuller, with a style that blends pop psychology and theology, has a particularly devoted following.”

     Church-based televangelism led by powerful personalities filled TV in the 1980s, but now only a handful of shows remain. Among the struggling ministries are those of Oral Roberts and the late D. James Kennedy of "The Coral Ridge Hour" TV show.

     The elder Schuller, who called his weekly show "America's Television Church," founded his ministry in a drive-in theater after moving to Southern California in 1955. He studied marketing strategies to attract worshippers and preached a feel-good Christianity, describing himself as a "possibility thinker" and spinning his upbeat style into a 10,000-member church and a broadcast watched by millions worldwide.

     The church's main sanctuary, the Crystal Cathedral, is a landmark designed by renowned architect Philip Johnson, with a spire visible from afar amid Orange County's suburban sprawl. Thousands make the pilgrimage to see where the broadcast is filmed before a live congregation.

     The Schullers consider the church a family business and the younger Schuller's 2006 appointment was sanctioned by the Crystal Cathedral's parent denomination, the Reformed Church in America, but the church announced on Nov. 29, 2008 that Schuller Jr. had resigned as senior pastor, just a month after he was removed from the church's syndicated broadcasts.

     In a news release, Schuller Sr. said, "Robert and I have been struggling as we each have different ideas as to the direction and the vision for this ministry."

     The church has since instituted a rotating roster of high-profile guest preachers, including Bill Hybels of Willow Creek Community Church, the Chicago-area mega-church, and evangelist Luis Palau.

     Schuller Sr.'s daughters and sons-in-law remain involved in the church, some in key roles. But Juan Carlos Ortiz, the interim senior pastor, hopes to appoint a senior pastor with no ties to the Schuller family within two years.

     On the church Web site, concerned members and TV fans have posted hundreds of comments protesting the upheaval, with some indicating they have stopped giving or will leave altogether. (Source: GospelToday.com)

 winners in red

Best Gospel Performance

The Inaugural ceremony of President Barack Obama on January 20 had the world talking — about the official oath of office, the President's Inaugural address, the record breaking attendance, the adorable First Family, Aretha Franklin's gospel-infused rendition of the anthem "My Country 'Tis of Thee," and "the hat."

The Smithsonian Institution has now asked Franklin if she will donate the now iconic Inaugural hat to the museum to become a part of an exhibit of President Obama's Inauguration, joining other items scheduled for display including First Lady Michelle Obama's Inaugural night gown.

Commenting on the Smithsonian's request, Franklin says, "I am considering it. It would be hard to part with my chapeau since it was such a crowning moment in history. I would like to smile every time I look back at it and remember what a great moment it was in American and African-American history. Ten cheers for President Obama."

The now-famous bow-tied, Swarovski jewel-studded, heather grey wool hat worn by the Queen of Soul seemingly took on a life of its own, becoming an overnight sensation worldwide in the media and cyberspace. Everyone from Jon Stewart on the "Daily Show" to the ladies on "The View" to Jay Leno of The Tonight Show" talked about the hat the following day, and Ellen DeGeneres wore an exaggerated version of the hat on her show. Women's Wear Daily (WWD), the fashion-industry trade journal sometimes called "the bible of fashion," wrote about the hat in their daily publication. On the Internet, people have created dozens of sites devoted to the hat and, using software, it has been placed on mug shots of Dick Cheney, dogs, President George Washington and the heads of Mt. Rushmore, among many others. The hat even has its own Facebook page (www.facebook.com/pages/Aretha-Franklins-Inauguration-Hat/71597018624).

With the onslaught of coverage the hat generated, newspapers from across the country began writing about it: "Aretha Franklin's Inauguration Hat Becomes Overnight Fashion Sensation" (Detroit Free Press), "Aretha Franklin's Inauguration Hat Inspires a Line of Toppers" (People Magazine), "Aretha Franklin's Hat, Detroit-Made, Wins Global Acclaim" (Detroit Free Press), "Fans Flock to Copy Aretha Franklin's Big Bow Inauguration Hat" (New York Daily News), "Aretha's Hat Upholds Tradition Born in Churches of the South" (The Providence Journal) — many outlets asked readers to voice their own opinions about the hat.

Aretha Franklin performed at President Obama's historic Inauguration during the Swearing In Ceremony in front of an international audience of billions. Franklin is now recording and releasing a commemorative version of "My Country 'Tis of Thee."

On the eve of Black History Month, the Pew Research Center's Forum on Religion & Public Life released a new analysis that paints a detailed religious portrait of African-Americans. The analysis finds that African-Americans are markedly more religious than the U.S. population as a whole on a variety of measures, including reporting a religious affiliation, attendance at religious services, frequency of prayer and the importance of religion in people's lives.

Compared with other racial and ethnic groups, African-Americans are among the most likely to report a formal religious affiliation, with fully 87% of African-Americans describing themselves as belonging to one religious group or another. The analysis also finds that nearly eight-in-ten African-Americans (79%) say religion is very important in their lives, compared with 56% among all U.S. adults.  Per Forum representative Robert Mills tells Path MEGAzine that 3,101 African American adults were surveyed for their analysis.

These are among many findings of the new Pew Forum analysis detailing the unique nature of religion in the African-American community. Other highlights include:

    * A large majority of African-Americans who are unaffiliated with any particular faith (72%) say religion plays at least a somewhat important role in their lives; nearly half (45%) of unaffiliated African-Americans say religion is very important in their lives, roughly three times the percentage who says this among the religiously unaffiliated population overall (16%).

    * African-Americans express a high degree of comfort with religion's role in politics, with roughly six-in-ten saying that houses of worship should express their views on social and political topics and roughly half saying that there has been too little expression of faith and prayer by political leaders. At the same time, most African-Americans support certain restrictions on the mingling of politics and religious institutions, with nearly six-in-ten (58%) saying that churches and other houses of worship should refrain from endorsing political candidates.

    * The link between religion and some social and political attitudes in the African-American community is similar to that seen among the population overall. For instance, just as in the general public, African-Americans who are more religiously observant are more likely to oppose abortion and homosexuality and more likely to report higher levels of conservative ideology.

    * On a variety of other questions, including political party identification and opinions about the proper role of government in providing services to the citizenry and assistance to the poor, there are few differences in the views of African-Americans across religious groups. Perhaps most strikingly, the partisan leanings of African-Americans from every religious background tilt heavily in the Democratic direction.

The analysis is based on the U.S. Religious Landscape Survey, conducted by the Pew Forum in 2007 and released in 2008, as well as other Pew Research Center surveys.

The economic stimulus bill before the Senate contains a provision that would discriminate against religious activity, according to a Christian legal firm.

The legislative team at American Center for Law and Justice has noticed that a provision in Section 803 of the measure contains language that would prohibit schools that accept funding for the renovation of university facilities from allowing religious activity to take place at those facilities.

ACLJ made the observation on Tuesday.

The provision reads: "Grants awarded under this section shall be for the purpose of modernizing, renovating, and repairing institution of higher education facilities that are primarily used for instruction and research," according to ACLJ, which specializes in protecting religious liberties.

Funds may not be used for "modernization, renovation, or repair of facilities -(i) used for sectarian instruction, religious worship, or a school or department of divinity; or (ii) in which a substantial portion of the functions of the facilities are subsumed in a religious mission."

"This is a discriminatory measure that must be removed from the stimulus bill," writes Jay Sekulow, chief counsel of ACLJ on his Trial Notebook blog.

The D.C.-based legal group says the provision would prohibit universities that allow student groups to use facilities for Bible studies or worship services from receiving federal funds under the stimulus package.

ACLJ said its teams are looking into the issue.

President Obama's economic stimulus plan was approved by the House last week without a single Republican vote.

The bill has drawn fire from pro-family groups because it set aside $400 million for the Centers for Disease Control to screen and prevent sexually transmitted diseases (STD) but killed funding for abstinence education programs.

On Monday, Senate Democrats dropped the controversial STD program from the bill after Republican leaders released a list of provisions they deemed "wasteful," reports CNN.

The Senate version of the bill stands at nearly $900 billion, while the House version included approximately $825 billion in funding.

President Obama wants a bill signed by Presidents Day.