Program Directory

 
City Club of Cleveland - Reverend Otis Moss, Jr.
 
 
 

Theologian, pastor, and civic leader the Reverend Dr. Otis Moss, Jr. is one of America's most influential religious leaders and highly sought-after public speakers.

Moss is a native of the state of Georgia. He earned his B. A. degree from Morehouse College in 1956 and his Masters of Divinity Degree from the Morehouse School of Religion/Interdenominational Theological Center in 1959. He completed special studies at the Inter-Denominational Theological Center from 1960 to 1961 and earned his Ph.D. degree in ministry from the United Theological Seminary in while leading the Olivet Flock in 1990.

From 1954 to 1961 Moss served as pastor of the Mount Olive Baptist Church in LaGrange, Georgia. From 1956 to 1961, he served as pastor of Atlanta's Providence Baptist Church and therefore, simultaneously led two congregations from 1956 to 1959. From 1961 to 1975 he pastored the Mount Zion Baptist Church in Lockland, Ohio and in 1971 he served as co-pastor, with Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King Sr., at Ebenezer Baptist Church in Atlanta.

In 1975, Reverend Moss became pastor at the Olivet Institutional Baptist Church.

Moss has been involved in advocating civil and human rights and social justice issues for most of his adult life. Having been a staff member of Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., he currently serves as a national board member and trustee for the Martin Luther King, Jr. Center for Non-Violent Social Change. His work in the international community has taken him to Hong Kong, Taiwan, and Japan. He also traveled as a member of a clergy mission to the Far East in 1970 and to Israel 1978. In 1994, he was the special guest of President William Jefferson Clinton at the Peace Treaty signing between Israel and Jordan, and, in that same year, he led a special mission to South Africa.
December 19, 2008