Ray Charles's daughter to sing at church

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DETROIT, Jan. 1 (UPI) -- Sheila Ray Charles, daughter of late music icon Ray Charles, has been booked to sing and speak at Detroit's New Galilee Missionary Baptist Church.

Charles is to appear during Sunday's 10:45 a.m. worship service, the church said.

"Having Sheila Ray Charles come to us on the first day of a brand new year and the beginning of a new decade, with her poignant message of both how her and her father triumph over their trials, is precisely the positive message of hope and how to overcome the odds that my, and other, young people on the east side of Detroit need to hear and embrace," the Rev. Horace L. Sheffield III, pastor of New Galilee, said in a statement Thursday.

"Just this week, three lives were lost near our church and another just about destroyed. Perhaps, if our young people hear her story and how she handled and rose from her personal hell then maybe, just maybe, we can spare a few others from an early and needless death by her teaching them how to really live."

Sheffield did not offer details about the people who were killed in the area this week.

Charles is expected to autograph her book, "Behind the Shades," which is about her relationship with her famous father, after the service, the church said.