Sidewalk sermonizing is just one of the features of life in a major American city — even on a college campus like Temple’s. But one man has returned so consistently over the last two decades that generations of students know him simply as “The” Street Preacher.
Patrick Donlevy says he first embraced Christianity at the tail end of his teenage years: A party era fed by his sense of immortality crashed against a cancer diagnosis and the realization he certainly wasn’t. Then, while dancing at Rutgers, Donlevy believes he had an epiphany.
“I realized I was screwed up, messed up,” he said. “And I realized Christ was alive.”
Reactions to Donlevy’s walkside sermons are often negative: Indifference among headphone-wearing passersby. Offense from Jewish, Muslim, and nonreligious students who find his gospel exclusive. Anger and even bewilderment from the LGBTQ+ community and younger Christians who think he’s needlessly divisive. Donlevy keeps coming back, anyway.
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