Kirk Franklin Reveals He’s Finally Found His Birth Father at 53 — and They Only Lived Minutes Apart (Exclusive)

When Kirk Franklin began work on a new album earlier this year, the Grammy-winning musician had no idea what was in store.

“This is the first time I’ve had a behind-the-scenes cameraman shooting content to make a project,” Franklin, 53, says of working on his 13th album. “I recorded the first song in March. Then in April everything changed and became something I couldn’t have planned.”

What the cameras ended up capturing was the intense, emotional journey the star went on after suddenly learning who his real biological father was. He also saw it as an opportunity to reconnect with his estranged eldest son Kerrion, 35, whom he had not seen for a decade.

Franklin compiled the footage from those events into a short documentary that will air on September 15th on his YouTube channel ahead of the release of his new album on October 6th. Both projects are aptly titled Father’s Day.

Now, Franklin is sharing with PEOPLE what it took to get to this point, along with exclusive footage of the moment a doctor broke the news of his biological father’s paternity.

Kirk Franklin and Richard Hubbard.

Courtesy of Fo Yo Soul Entertainment

“My life before my career was terrible,” Franklin says. Long before he became the leading voice of gospel music, orchestrating decades of hits like “Revolution” and “Wanna Be Happy?”, Franklin had a difficult childhood growing up in Fort Worth, Texas, where he was adopted at the age of 4 by a woman in her to the church. According to Franklin, his biological mother, then a young teenager, was unable to care for him. Although he knew who she was, they rarely connected during his youth and he often felt abandoned.

“I was bullied as a child. I had a learning disability, I dropped out of high school. A young lady got pregnant when I was 17 and the church crucified me for it,” he says, recalling his early struggles. “It’s like I never had anyone to occupy me or have my back.”

As for the woman who adopted him, “she was 64 years old. She was a widow and she did the best she could when I was young. She got government assistance and found money to pay for my piano lessons,” he says. “But at 12 or 13, I felt abandoned by her because I could tell I became more irritating. I wanted to go out and go out and I always felt like I was making her uncomfortable. It just added to the feeling of ostracism.”

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When Franklin was 6 years old, he was introduced to a man who his biological mother said was his biological father. “I didn’t see him again until I was 13, and then he started showing up at concerts after my first album came out,” he says. “I was angry at the fact that I don’t have a father and that he would dare to show up one time when my life would have some sense of order. The same with my biological mother.” Franklin says she also began to appear more and more as his career took off. – It was very traumatic for me.

The man Franklin long thought was his biological father died in recent years. But while he was recording his new album, a singer he hired from her hometown told him she met a man at a funeral who said he once dated Franklin’s mom. The man’s name is: Richard Hubbard – and he lived in the same neighborhood where Franklin grew up his entire life.

As rumors swirled that he might actually be the star’s father, Hubbard submitted to a DNA test. The results matched paternity 99.9 percent. “Living for over half a century with someone who lived in the same town as you…” says Franklin, who is still struggling with the news, “I suffered so much as a young man without guidance. I struggled with love, intimacy, faith , identity. And knowing that the answer was less than 10 minutes away.”

Richard Hubbard and Kirk Franklin.

Courtesy of Fo Yo Soul Entertainment

The documentary chronicles the emotional first meeting between the star and Hubbard, who was 14 or 15 when Franklin was born and says he didn’t know at the time that he had fathered a child. “He’s a great guy,” says Franklin Hubbard, who also has a daughter. “She was honest about how hard this is for her, finding out not only that she has a brother, but that that brother is Kirk Franklin.”

Despite finally learning the truth, Franklin says things aren’t perfect. As shown in the documentary, his biological mother refuses to accept the DNA results, even after the second test is completed. “She’s just firmly convinced that this man is not my father,” he says. “I haven’t heard or spoken to her since the second test result.”

Someone he became close to again was his own son, Kerrion. The two had been at loggerheads for years and had a very public falling out when Kerrion released audio of a heated conversation with his father in 2021. Before the meeting featured in the documentary, it had been two years since they had spoken.

Kirk and Kerrion Franklin.

Courtesy of Fo Yo Soul Entertainment

“My son is a beautiful soul. There are parts of his life that he can share. I’m just very proud to see him in my own way,” Franklin says, stopping short of detailing what ails their relationship. “He’s starting to open up and testify about his struggles, his struggles with certain things that have cost him at times. I know a lot of young black men struggle with those same things and as he continues to get help and healing, so many will help. He has me, and now also my grandfather who will be there to help in any way.”

Kirk and Kerrion Franklin.

Courtesy of Fo Yo Soul Entertainment

After everything that happened this year, Franklin, who is also father to daughters Carrington, Kennedy and son Caziah with wife Tammy, reflected on his own experience as a father.

“For most of my parenting life, I was a father out of fear,” he says. “Because of what I went through, I thought, ‘I’ll be damned if I’m going to let my kids feel that kind of pain.’ So a lot of times I over-parented and over-performed, bought too many bikes, ran away from too many boys, just wanting to protect.”

“I had to learn,” he adds. – Children were the best part of my life.

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He incorporated all these experiences into his inspiring new gospel album. “Title Father’s Day has a triple meaning,” he explains. “The line is, ‘It’s what I missed, where I am and what has always been.'” And after everything he’s been through, “even when I want to curse the sky,” he says, “Still I was always made to believe.”

Franklin’s new documentary Father’s Day airs on YouTube starting Friday.

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Source: HIS Education