Preacher Whips His Hearers with Sarcasm

Ohio, 1922

Marietta Pastor Recommends Jack Dempsey as Successor and Quits Job in Disgust

MARIETTA, Ohio, Sept. 26. — "They tell me when your last pastor preached his farewell sermon he said he would never recommend a preacher for this pulpit. I would not go as far as that. I think I have someone in mind who would be the right man for this church. He is a London minister and is called 'the fighting parson.' Whenever anyone disagrees with him he takes them outside the church and gives them a good licking. I recommend him for this pulpit.

"But, you say, 'Oh, we don't want an Englishman.' Then you can get someone in this country. There is Jack Dempsey; he's good enough for you. Failing him, you could get a mechanical, life sized preacher that some of the officious in the church could run."

In these words Rev. Mayson H. Sewell opened his farewell sermon in the fashionable First Presbyterian church here Sunday evening.

Before he had finished he made the arraignment of his congregation so hot that many of Marietta's "first citizens" arose from their pews and left the church.

Mr. Sewell lambasted the card players and dancers and continuing said: "There are lots of people who have lots of money, fine clothing, beautiful homes and fine limousines who are poor — poor in sympathy, poor in charity, poor in the experience of real, vital religion, maybe poor in honesty and in integrity. You think you are educated and know it all. Christ says you are blind — blind in regard to your spiritual state and your lack of spiritual vision. There is a great difference between what some people think themselves to be and what they really are. There is little hope for the man whose eyes are sanded with self-conceit and blinded to his own deficiencies."

Dr. Sewell came to Marietta eight months ago from New Philadelphia. He is an Englishman by birth and soon after coming here asked for a three months leave of absence to visit his European home. The session of the church refused this and the refusal led to an open break. The pastor appealed the case to the congregation, declared the session was autocratic and tendered his resignation.

The congregation voted nearly unanimously to accept. Dr. Sewell says he has had enough of America and will return to his native land.

—The Coshocton Tribune, Coshocton, Ohio, September 26, 1922, p. 3.

Note: The above article actually gives the pastor's first name and middle initial as "Myson M.," changed here. Other newspapers all give his first name as "Mayson" and whether it's "H" or "M" would be a toss-up. But his name appears on a Google search as "Mayson H. Sewell," being pastor at Arlington Heights Presbyterian Church, Pittsburgh, 1912-1913, and the same name at another place in 1910-1912. The great "sarcasm" headline is from an Indiana paper.