Award-winning pastors unite in historic church in suburban D.C.
Photo by Timothy Cox
The Rev. Dr. Otis Moss III, left, was the main speaker at historic Alfred Street Baptist Church on March 1, whose pastor is the Rev. Dr. Howard-John Wesley, right.
TIMOTHY COX
SPECIAL TO THE CHRONICLE
Two pastors presented with the Chairman’s Award during the 47th annual NAACP Image Awards united in suburban Washington, D.C. on March 1st, The Rev. Dr. Otis Moss III was the main speaker at the Alfred Street Baptist Church, the historic church organized in suburban Alexandria in the mid-1800s.
Moss, the former pastor of Augusta, Ga.’s historic Tabernacle Baptist Church, is pictured with the Rev. Dr. Howard-John Wesley, pastor of Alfred Street Baptist Church.
Both Moss and Wesley were recently acknowledged by the NAACP’s National Board of Directors during the organization’s nationally-televised 47th annual NAACP Image Awards.
The Los Angeles-based event lauded both pastors with the prestigious 2016 Chairman’s Award, touting the ministers as “outstanding trailblazing leaders under the age of 50.”
Other recipients of the special award included Rev. Dr. Jamal Bryant, pas-tor of Empowerment A.M.E. Church in Baltimore, and actor/singer Jussie Smollett of the Fox TV series, “Empire.”
Moss addressed the capacity-filled church and kicked-off a month-long lecture series called “March Gladness.” He discussed several topics, including the “Black Lives Matter” movement, and the nation’s current political climate.
Moss served as Tabernacle Baptist’s pastor from 1997 to 2006, before leaving to head Chicago’s Trinity United Church of Christ, where he’s currently minister. His ministry espouses a black-based theology concerned with positively reaching inner-city black youth.
The Rev. Jeremiah Wright Jr. is pastor emeritus at Trinity United Church of Christ. Moss is the son of the Rev. Otis Moss Jr., retired pastor of Olivet Institutional Baptist Church in Cleveland, Ohio. The elder Moss was a colleague of the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and the Rev. Jesse Louis Jackson Sr., a graduate of North Carolina A&T University in Greensboro, N.C.
