Kirk Franklin has spoken forcefully in defense of GloRilla after religious criticism surrounded their gospel collaborations, framing the dispute as something more consequential than a disagreement over genre or celebrity pairings. For Franklin, the backlash raises a direct question about who people believe is permitted to make music about faith.
Franklin discussed the reaction during an interview in which he addressed his own approach to gospel music, his faith, and the scrutiny directed at his work with the Memphis rapper. He said the ridicule aimed at GloRilla had been painful to watch, particularly the suggestion that she was not sufficiently “holy” or “church” to participate in a gospel song.
“It’s been breaking my heart some of the ridicule that some of the religious have given her,” Franklin said. “That she’s not holy enough or church enough to be able to do a song.”
The pair have worked together on “Rain Down On Me” and “This Time.” Franklin’s comments do not present those records as an attempt to turn a rap artist into something she is not. Instead, his argument is centered on a more basic point: praise should not be treated as the exclusive possession of people who meet another person’s preferred standard of religious presentation.
The objection Franklin is challenging
The criticism, as Franklin described it, is rooted in gatekeeping: the impulse to decide who is allowed into a creative, cultural, or spiritual space. In this case, the dispute is not merely whether listeners enjoy the songs. It is whether GloRilla’s public identity as a hip-hop artist disqualifies her from recording music that expresses belief, worship, or spiritual interest.
Franklin rejected that premise. He also stressed that GloRilla does not need a gospel collaboration as a commercial lifeline. She had already made her own place in hip-hop, he said, and the idea that she requires approval from gospel audiences to establish a career misses the point. His concern is instead with attempts to police who may speak about Jesus.
That distinction matters. A crossover collaboration can be discussed in business terms, as an effort to reach a new audience or merge different sounds. Franklin’s remarks place these songs in a different context: one in which a participant’s right to voice faith is being examined before listeners even reach the music itself.
Franklin has spent more than 30 years making gospel music with an approach that has, by his own account, prompted criticism from within his community. In another recent interview, he said he accepted the fight involved in trying to reach people through his faith and sound. The difficult part, he explained, has been rejection from those closest to the religious space that shaped his work.
Related coverage includes Kirk Franklin Stands With GloRilla Amid Criticism of Their Gospel Collaborations.
“What has been difficult is sometimes a rejection that you get from your own community,” Franklin said.
That longer experience gives his defense of GloRilla added context. He is not describing an unfamiliar backlash from the outside; he is identifying a recurring tension over how gospel music should sound, whom it should address, and which artists are regarded as acceptable messengers.
GloRilla’s answer that stayed with Franklin
Franklin said the moment that affected him most came when GloRilla spoke about the criticism herself. She referred to the biblical idea that rocks and mountains can praise God, then posed a question to him: if a rock can praise God, why can’t she?
Franklin recalled being overcome by the question, calling it painful. Its force lies in its simplicity. It does not claim that criticism is impossible or that every listener must interpret an artist’s work the same way. Rather, it challenges the assumption underneath the criticism: that some people are too flawed, too secular, or too unfamiliar with a religious community to offer praise at all.
For listeners, that is the central issue in Franklin’s response. He is not asking people to erase the differences between gospel and hip-hop, or to pretend that public personas and artistic catalogs do not exist. He is opposing the idea that a person must first satisfy a gatekeeper’s definition of worthiness before being allowed to make a faith-centered song.
Church music was part of GloRilla’s upbringing
GloRilla’s connection to church music also predates these collaborations. In a 2023 interview, she described being raised in a strict Christian household where secular music was forbidden. One of 10 children, she spent much of her childhood being homeschooled, and gospel was the music permitted in the home.
She also described how she and her siblings sought out rap outside those household rules. They watched BET’s 106 & Park, obtained CDs by Lil Wayne and Drake, and copied music onto a PlayStation. The account does not reduce her musical identity to one influence. It shows that gospel and rap existed side by side in her early life, even if they occupied very different places under the rules of her household.
That background does not settle debates about taste, theology, or collaboration. It does, however, complicate the idea that gospel is a foreign or opportunistic detour for her. Franklin’s defense is reinforced by the fact that church music was among the foundational sounds of her childhood, while rap became another formative part of how she listened and expressed herself.
What “crossover” means in this case
Crossover is often used to describe artists moving between genres or audiences. The term can be useful, but it can also flatten the personal histories behind a record. A gospel artist collaborating with a rapper may look like a straightforward genre crossover from a distance. In this case, though, the available context points to an overlap that was already present in GloRilla’s upbringing and in Franklin’s own career-long effort to communicate beyond narrow expectations.
That does not mean every audience will respond alike. Some listeners may prefer gospel music to remain within familiar musical traditions or may have concerns about the contrast between an artist’s mainstream catalog and a worship-focused track. Those are responses people can hold. Franklin’s argument addresses the next step: whether personal discomfort should become a rule that bars someone from participating in praise.
There is a practical implication for artists and audiences alike. Artists working across musical communities can expect their choices to be interpreted through reputation as much as through the songs themselves. Audiences, meanwhile, can distinguish between saying a collaboration is not for them and declaring that another person has no standing to make it. Franklin’s comments clearly object to the latter.
Franklin’s current release and label chapter
The discussion arrived as Franklin prepared to release I Am What I Am on October 30. His current professional chapter also includes a partnership involving Uptown Records, Fo Yo Soul Entertainment, and TRIBL Music Group.
Uptown Records has a notable place in R&B and hip-hop history, having helped build the careers of Heavy D & The Boyz, Jodeci, Guy, and Mary J. Blige. That legacy makes the partnership a notable fit for an artist whose work has frequently existed at the intersection of gospel, R&B, pop, and hip-hop audiences. For another recent development involving one of Uptown’s defining artists, see Mary J. Blige’s Las Vegas residency update.
Franklin’s defense of GloRilla therefore arrives during an active moment rather than as a detached reflection on an old controversy. He is preparing new music, working through a new label arrangement, and reiterating a position that has shaped his career: faith-centered music can be serious about belief while refusing to limit its speakers, sounds, or potential listeners to a narrowly approved circle.
At the heart of his response is GloRilla’s question about a rock being able to praise God. Franklin’s emotional reaction suggests he sees the question not as a clever rebuttal but as an indictment of the barriers critics try to place around worship. His position is unambiguous: a person’s opportunity to praise should not depend on whether religious gatekeepers think that person looks, sounds, or lives “church enough.”
