Articles By: Carole Smith Turner

Carole Turner, Baton Rouge, Louisiana, United States I entered the world, Carole Sue Smith on August 10th, 1967. I am a wife, mother,writer, singer, music lover, artist, movie extra and orphan care activist. My family serves the people of the inner city at the Baton Rouge Dream Center. I have been married to Dean, since September 18th, 1994. Our first child, Evangeline, was born on July 17th, 1996 and she is our miracle of birth. At age two she was diagnosed with Juvenile Diabetes.We pray there will be a cure one day. Our first adoption miracle was Steele, born on May 21st, 2004. We adopted him at birth from here in the U.S. Our second adoption miracle was Abel from Ethiopia. He lost his parents to AIDS when he was two, he became part of our family in January 2009. He was given a birth date of March 26th, 2002 (his age is a guess and his actual date of birth is unknown). I plan to die empty, what about you?

No Girls Allowed in the Elephant Room

Last year Ben Arment blogged about the first, The Elephant Room a one day gathering of high profile and influential church leaders, who get together to discuss issues that they classify as “Elephants in the room” in the church. So I watched the clip of current and former pastors discussing...

October 18th, 2011 | Becoming the Great Us, Essays, Featured, Part of the Solution | Read More

Connecting with God

Skye Jethani’s book, The Divine Commodity, is on my list of top 20 books, so when I heard that he was coming out with another book, I knew I had to read it. I ordered it as soon as it was available on Amazon and I read most of it last week while doing stand-in work on a movie set. You know...

October 12th, 2011 | Books, Featured | Read More

Votetivism is not Activism

In 1988, I had been a Christian for a couple years, when I first really read Matthew 25, “..when I was hungry you fed me, when I was naked you clothed me…” and James 1:27 “Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in...

August 11th, 2011 | Part of the Solution | Read More

Book Review: Half The Church, by Carolyn Custis James

I tweeted the other day that I felt this book should be taught in every bible college, mainly because I think if it were, then maybe, just maybe, men and women both would give more thought to long held views of their perceived assigned rolls in the body of Christ. I felt encouraged by...

April 8th, 2011 | Books, Featured | Read More

Renting Lacy

I have been a part of Midnight outreach for four years, going into the streets late at night, reaching out to prostitutes, once or twice a month for four years. I also work for a federal grant program aimed at helping homeless and at-risk youth, most of our clients are either currently being pimped...

December 29th, 2010 | Books, Featured | Read More

Music the Soul Invader

Cornel West said, “Music is the only thing that can enter the soul uninvited.” When I heard that, I was immediately in sync with that thought. Music does something to our souls, whether we invite it to or not. I connected with what Cornel was saying because of my deep love for music....

December 10th, 2010 | Arts, Featured, Music | Read More

It’s Our Problem, Too: Sexual Abuse in the Evangelical Church

The Boys of Plank Road In October four young men accused Atlanta bishop Eddie Long of sexual abuse. The men’s sworn statements, which said that Bishop Long insisted they call him “daddy” while using them for sex, is disturbing. If he is guilty of what they are charging, then Bishop...

December 3rd, 2010 | Featured, Social Justice | Read More

Idea People

There are a lot of idea people in ministry, but very few follow-through people. There’s the “I think of stuff but then leave it for others to do the work part…but I like credit for what goes right about it, and I can disconnect from the parts that don’twork..you know, since...

September 13th, 2010 | Essays | Read More

The Problem of Social Justice and Libertarianism Christianity

There is now a strong and perplexing dichotomy in American Christianity: the Social Justice Christian and the Libertarian Christian. Both have been formed and strengthened by the politics of the last 10 years. They are polars, they wage against each other, yet both ideologies base their belief in...

September 1st, 2010 | Essays, Featured | Read More

Margarette: A Face of Domestic Human Trafficking

Margarette was 18 when someone forcefully took control of her life. She had been dating a guy for a while; he was good to her and the relationship seemed to be going well. One day while she was driving and he was in the passenger seat, he punched her in the face. Between the pain and the shock,...

August 26th, 2010 | Social Justice | Read More