Yale’s campus served as the involuntary host to 25-year-old evangelist Jesse Morrell, who spent Tuesday and Wednesday sermonizing to pedestrians about the “evils of sin” on Old Campus, Cross Campus and the section of Wall St. near Woodbridge Hall.
Morrell is head of the Open Air Outreach, a Christian ministry that focuses on reaching young people in the United States and Canada. The mission of the ministry, its Web site said, is to “reach the lost with the gospel of Christ Jesus through open-air preaching on streets and college campuses and to train other Christians to do the same.”
According to a Nov. 29 article from the Record-Journal, the New Haven Police Department has threatened Morrell with arrest several times because he was violating noise ordinances. Last August, he won $25,000 in damages from the NHPD for unnecessary interference in his sidewalk sermons, the New Haven Register reported.
Tuesday morning, Morrell shouted at passing students and demanded to know if they were homosexuals. He went on to call President Barack Obama immoral and corrupt. Wednesday afternoon, Morrell referred to the University as a “modern Sodom and Gomorrah,” calling pedestrians sinners and banging his hands against a Bible.
“What I don’t understand is why anyone would open brothels in New Haven,” Morrell asked, “when all the sorority girls are giving it away for free?”
Police appeared on the scene at about 1:00 p.m. and put an end to Morrell’s zealous rant.
Click here to read an article from the University of Connecticut’s student newspaper, the Daily Campus, describing Morrell’s similar tirade on their campus.