Princeton professor Dr. Cornel West is among the speakers at the Great Gathering in Columbia, South Carolina.

Instead of letting her son spend his spring break at a beach with friends, Sheila Wilson-Freelon took him to another gathering this week: a convention of black church leaders aimed at finding solutions to the problems that plague young African-Americans.

The three-day summit, known as the Great Gathering, is the first time in more than 45 years that the African Methodist Episcopal, the African Methodist Episcopal Zion and Christian Methodist Episcopal churches - with a combined membership of more than 5 million - have come together.

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