He Was a Man of God

Raised in the church from the time he was born in Macon in 1932, Little Richard abandoned rock n roll in 1957 to enroll at Oakwood College, a historically Black school run by the Seventh-day Adventist Church.

Of course, he soon went back to rock n roll — but didn’t leave religion behind. In the 2010s, when some in the audience wouldn’t take seriously his proclamations about his faith, he replied, “When I talk to you about [Jesus], I’m not playing. I’m almost 81 years old. Without God, I wouldn’t be here.”