Cabbages and Kings

"Ushers! Get up and chain the doors! Nobody's going to escape while I'm preaching." This was the way Evangelist Jerry Owen created his own captive audience when he preached at Boston's Esquire Theatre last Sunday. "You know, folks," Owen went on, "that two old ladies jumped up and ran when I made that announcement yesterday." He gave a satisfied chuckle, probably indicating that they hadn't made it.

This use of forceful tactics comes as a hangover from the days fifteen years ago when Jerry Owen was number one sparring partner for boxer Max Baer. Baer moved on to Hollywood as a slapstick comedian; Owen left him and started up the sawdust trail as an evangelist. As Owen explains it, Jesus came down one night to call him to the pulpit. Jesus said "Come on Jerry, I'se got sumpin' for you--I'm gone make you a fisher of men." Then Jesus dropped into the background to brush up on his grammar, and Jerry Owen baited his hook.

Last Sunday's revival began promptly at 2:30, but Owen remained off-stage while a warm-up man kindled an audience which consisted mainly of old people. The dapper m.c. led several communal hymns, but most of the singing was done by an on-stage group of "Christian Youth." As a group the "Youth" averaged about forty years old--a lone teenager clasped his hands to his face and shook nervously during the first hymn. (During the second hymn he bolted into the wings.) There was an accordion number next, rendered by two girls in white. One of them announced in a flat monotone that she was "shout in' happy this afternoon because all the Lord has to do is close his hands and the whole of this big theatre will be crushed." At this point a young boy in front of me took off his glasses and yelled "Daddy, let me out of here."

Then Jerry Owen himself bounced onto the stage with a shout of joy--his expensive suit and spacious bay window hinted that the path of righteousness hadn't been too thorny. "Aren't you glad for Jesus?" he shouted, but the audience remained silent. Owen admonished "If you don't say 'amen,' I'm gone come down and get you." Apparently the threat worked, for a little later, when Owen asked everyone who wasn't there to say 'amen,' there was a chorus of automatic amens from the audience.

Explaining that "I don' sing too good," the plump evangelist snatched the microphone and struggled through six verses of "He'll Understand." As he sang the words "my hands sore and scarred from the work I have done," Owen glanced down at his own fat, pink hands and suddenly shoved them into his pockets. A small boy picked up his hat and coat, but was jammed back into a seat by his father.

For the next forty-five minutes the evangelist roared his way through a series of Bible quotations that bore little or no relation to each other. Then he called for converts to step forward. Nobody moved. Owen coaxed, pleaded, wheedled. He prayed, "Jesus, isn't there a paycheck in the audience?" He pointed to various people and berated them for their lack of faith. Deprived of converts, he demanded fifty dollar checks and threatened those who would not give with "sleepless nights." Finally he lost his temper and shouted, "all right, you don't have to stay, go on out" It was pouring rain outside, but the crowd started to file out.