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Jeremiah Wright needs no defense from me. Anyone who has built a congregation from 87 members to some 8,000 and whose congregation has created models of ministry in one of the poorest areas of Chicago has a body of work that speaks for itself. A recent press release from Trinity United Church of Christ, issued by its new senior pastor, Otis Moss III, notes that on Sunday mornings alone, over 36 years, Pastor Wright has spoken for a total of 207,792 minutes.

Trinity United Church of Christ on the South Side of Chicago has received a great deal of media attention because one of its members is presidential candidate Barack Obama. The head pastor of the 8,000-member church is Otis Moss III, 36, a graduate of Yale Divinity School, who recently took over the day-to-day leadership of the church from Jeremiah Wright. Moss is the son of Otis Moss Jr., longtime pastor of Olivet Institutional Baptist Church in Cleveland, who served with Martin Luther King Jr.