sermonize

American  

[sur-muh-nahyz] / ˈsɜr məˌnaɪz /

especially British, sermonise

verb (used without object)

sermonized, sermonizing

1. to deliver or compose a sermon; preach.

---

verb (used with object)

sermonized, sermonizing

1. to give exhortation to; lecture.

sermonize British  

/ ˈsɜːməˌnaɪz /

verb

1. to talk to or address (a person or audience) as if delivering a sermon

---

Other Word Forms

• sermonizer
  noun

Etymology

Origin of sermonize

First recorded in 1625–35; sermon + -ize

Explanation

To sermonize is to lecture someone in the style of a minister delivering a sermon. The best teachers don't sermonize; they talk to students in a sincere and straightforward way. If you tell someone at length what they should do, especially if there's plenty of judgment and moral superiority in your speech, you sermonize. This verb can also be used simply to mean "give a sermon," so you could also say that you like church because your minister sermonizes so well. This was the earliest meaning of sermonize, which comes from the Latin sermo, "speech, conversation, or talk."

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

sermonize sermonized sermonizing

Johnson said he didn’t mean to sermonize but it’s clear he’s the kind of artist who sees the stage as a pulpit and the arena as a church.

From Seattle Times ● Apr. 28, 2024

This upcoming Easter Sunday, he intends to sermonize on which one would prevail.

From Washington Post ● Apr. 7, 2020

With a zealous quickening, Brooks begins to sermonize, not about his own soul but the country’s.

From The New Yorker ● Apr. 29, 2019

Hill has a salty beard, smiling eyes and booming voice to sermonize about the suffering he sees so often in the Shenandoah Valley.

From Washington Times ● Nov. 12, 2018

In the other room the woman twists the dial, and voices sermonize from the speaker.

From "All the Light We Cannot See" by Anthony Doerr

“Haha You Clowns” isn’t like the old “Davey and Goliath” or “South Park,” which purposely sermonized.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 16, 2025

The Rev. Charles Cannon, pastor at St. Hilary’s Episcopal Church, sermonized about the temporariness of the community’s losses.

From Seattle Times ● Oct. 3, 2022

By the time he returned, nearly all of the churches that the Porter family had sermonized in along Lakeview Avenue and Union Avenue were rubble.

From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 27, 2020

Toward the end of his address, Pence sermonized more, dwelling on the mass shooting last year at a Southern Baptist church in nearby Sutherland Springs, Tex.

From Washington Post ● Jun. 13, 2018

Her religious views had modified since the days long past when she had sermonized so earnestly to George Blood.

From Mary Wollstonecraft by Pennell, Elizabeth Robins

But Perkins hops so quickly from one outrageous death to another that his screenplay leaves little room for rumination amid his constant fatalist sermonizing.

From Salon ● Feb. 21, 2025

Are viewers craving more carnage and darkness or cable news sermonizing?

From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 9, 2023

“Leaf skillfully engages with larger social issues while steering clear of the kind of sermonizing that too often seeps into similarly themed dramas,” she added.

From New York Times ● May 24, 2023

This week, former NFL player Emmanuel Acho, sermonizing while staring into a Fox Sports 1 camera, even tried speaking directly to Tagovailoa.

From Washington Post ● Dec. 31, 2022

Take, for instance, the question of the too great love of money which is now the subject of so much writing and sermonizing.

From The Thirteenth Greatest of Centuries by Walsh, James J. (James Joseph)