Sermon

A sermon is a religious discourse delivered by a member of the clergy, typically addressing a scriptural, theological or moral subject through exposition, exhortation and practical application, with the act of delivering one called preaching. As a written and oral genre it has been central to Christian worship since the earliest church, with the Sermon on the Mount in the Gospel of Matthew among its most cited biblical instances, though the gospel writers themselves did not use the word to describe it. Comparable preaching genres exist in other traditions, most notably the khutbah, the formal sermon delivered at Islamic Friday prayers.