A Jesus-loving Missouri pastor is seeking “professional counseling” following the fervent panning of a sermon during which he—among other things—urged heterosexual women to lose weight in order to please their presumably insufferable husbands.
“Your man needs an attractive wife. … Don’t give him a reason to be like this distracted boyfriend,” Pastor Stewart-Allen Clark told the congregation in the sermon, which regional outlet KCTV said was first delivered back in February. “Don’t give him a reason to be looking around. Hello! Don’t do that. I’ve said this for a long time and I’ll say it again. It’s free, by the way. I really don’t believe women understand how visual men are. I really don’t. I don’t think it’s in their capacity or their ability to understand how visual men are. I really don’t think women understand how important it is for a man to have a beautiful woman on his arm.”
The sermon, which took place at the First General Baptist Church in Malden, went on to include bizarrely impassioned comments from Clark about Melania Trump and his brief stint as a faith-based marriage counselor.
“I’m not saying that every woman can be the epic trophy wife of all time like Melania Trump,” he said. “I’m not saying that at all. Most women can’t be trophy wives. Maybe you’re a participation trophy…but you don’t need to look like a butch either.”
As for the “weight control” elements of the sermon, Clark got into those when sharing a story about a counseling session involving a woman he described as resembling “a sumo wrestler.” The session, according to Clark, ended up resulting in a physical altercation between the couple.
“Here’s the first thing I’d say to you, and boy I hate to say it,” he said. “This is why I don’t do marital counseling anymore. And that is weight control.”
Elsewhere, Clark lovingly reflected on a friend of his who had instituted a so-called “divorce weight” limit on their wife. He also espoused thoughts on makeup and hairstyles, expressed support for ageism, lamented what he described as women with “snakes in their heads,” and told the congregation that—after marriage—women no longer have all the rights over their own bodies.
“Whenever she’s not in the mood, bring out your Bible,” he said.
According to a brief statement shared to the church’s website earlier this month, Clark has since “taken leave” and is “seeking professional counseling,” though it wasn’t made clear exactly what sort of counseling services he would be utilizing. It’s also not clear whether Clark’s sermon fits snugly into the church’s publicly stated value system comprised of loving God, loving “God’s people,” and loving their community.
