Pastor tells women to look more like ‘trophy wife’ Melania Trump

A Baptist pastor has been placed on leave after he exhorted women to be more like former First Lady Melania Trump and also made racist and homophobic comments.

“I’m not saying every woman can be the epic trophy wife of all time like Melania Trump,” Pastor Stewart-Allen Clark said last month in a sermon at First General Baptist Church in Malden, Missouri, as he stood in front of an image of her projected onto a large screen. “Most women can’t be trophy wives, but you know ... maybe you’re a participation trophy.”

He allowed as how most women, try as they might, will never be able to fully emulate Melania, according to USA Today.

“Not everybody looks like that, amen,” Clark said during the 22-minute session. “But you don’t need to look like a butch either.”

The goal, the pastor preached, was for women to please their husbands.

“Men have a need for their women to look like women. Sweatpants don’t cut it all the time,” said Clark, sporting an untucked button-down shirt. “Wearing flip-flops and pajamas to Walmart – that ain’t going to work. Ain’t nothing attractive about that. It ain’t. And men want their wives to look good at home and in public, can I get an Amen!”

He couldn’t.

What he did get was a flood of comments on social media, after one irate listener posted her own copy, with the juiciest Melania-specific snippet surfacing on Twitter.

In another clip, Clark, this time sporting a baggy brown T-shirt, can be seen asking, “If beautiful women from the south are called ‘southern belles,’ does that mean beautiful women from Mexico are called ‘Taco Belles?’ "

In the February sermon, Clark also doled out advice on marital make-up, hairstyles, fashion tips and sexual intimacy, as BBC News noted.

While the official video was deleted, irate listener Reagan Williams managed to post it on Facebook, along with a take-down of the sermon and its deliverer. She lambasted Clark’s “toxic and degrading” message, among other very specific shortcomings.

The General Baptist Ministries said it did not stand by his words, and placed him on leave.

“The sermon included comments that are not consistent with the positions and values of General Baptists,” the organization said in a statement. It added that Clark had been scheduled to moderate the General Association of General Baptist meeting in July 2022 but “has resigned from that position.”

In addition, the church told KCTV-TV, Clark is undergoing some sort of counseling.

And far from espousing Clark’s sentiments, the church backed women.

“General Baptists believe that every woman was created in the image of God, and they should be valued for that reason,” the church said. “Furthermore, we believe that all individuals regardless of any other factors are so loved by God that Christ died for them.”