Word.ws English Dictionary

How to use profess in a sentence

25 example sentences · verb

Profess means to administer the vows of a religious order to (someone); to admit to a religious order. Example: “They've professed themselves delighted with the results.”

Examples of profess by meaning

verbTo administer the vows of a religious order to (someone); to admit to a religious order.

  • This swayed the balance decisively in Mary's favour, and she was professed on 8 September 1578.2000, Butler's Lives of the Saints, page 118

verbTo declare oneself (to be something).

  • They've professed themselves delighted with the results.

verbTo declare; to assert, affirm.

  • Having professed her belief in the remedy, she had little choice but to try it.
  • The Governor immediately professed that he knew nothing about the incident.1974 February 11, “The Kansas Kickbacks”, in Time
  • They also exposed the blatant discrepancy between the west's professed values and actual foreign policies.2013 June 7, Gary Younge, “Hypocrisy lies at heart of Manning prosecution”, in The Guardian Weekly, volume 188, number 26, page 18

verbTo make a claim (to be something); to lay claim to (a given quality, feeling etc.), often with connotations of...

  • Many profess to despise what secretly they hunger after.
  • Ed Miliband professed ignorance of the comment when he was approached by the BBC later.2010 September 28, Hélène Mulholland, “David Miliband voices displeasure during Labour leader's speech”, in The Guardian
  • Caution needs to be exercised in regards to claims of coinage as the data contained a number of examples of writers professing the invention of a term that had actually been in existence for many years.2018, James Lambert, “A multitude of ‘lishes’: The nomenclature of hybridity”, in English World-Wide, page 13

verbTo declare one's adherence to (a religion, deity, principle etc.).

  • The remainder of the population, about two-thirds, belongs to the Mongolian race and professes Buddhism.1983, Alexander Mcleish, The Frontier Peoples of India, Mittal Publications, published 1984, page 122

More sentences with profess

  • Possessing The Quraan and professing “Muslimship” do not make righteous people.2013, Mu Octavis Taalib, How to Study the Quraan, page 23. From the entry Muslimship
  • He of the fabulous long-range shot or the useless blooter professes to love everything about Rangers.2002 December 23, Daily Mail. From the entry blooter
  • The Lesbian Primer does not profess to cover every conceivable aspect of lesbianism.1979 August 4, Lisa Nussbaum, “Lesbianism 101”, in Gay Community News, page 15. From the entry grist for the mill
  • One rests upon observance of principle, and the responsibility of professing.1975, Allan Craig, Counting Things and Magic Rings, →ISBN, page 112. From the entry pismirism
  • Zuism is defined as an international religious movement which intends to represent all the groups professing Sumerian-Mesopotamian religions.2019, Chris Allaun, Upperworld: Shamanism and Magick of the Celestial Realms, Mandrake of Oxford, →ISBN. From the entry Zuism
  • Today, Ansari professes to regret the joke.2019 July 11, Megan Garber, quoting Aziz Ansari, “Aziz Ansari and the Physics of Moving Forward”, in The Atlantic. From the entry fat-shame
  • Personally, I do not profess to express an opinion.1914, Ernest Bramah, Max Carrados. From the entry Boadicea
  • Here was the first ecclesiastic in the Greek Church professing the most thorough-going Protestant tenets, even echoing arrant Calvinism!1908, Walter F[rederic] Adeney, “Cyril Lucar and the Reformation”, in Charles A[ugustus] Briggs, Stewart D[ingwall] F[ordyce] Salmond…. From the entry arrant
  • Cryer said — which is something worth keeping in mind, he added, while you scroll through social media stories that profess the brew’s detriments.2023 January 17, Trisha Pasricha, “Is It Bad to Drink Coffee on an Empty Stomach?”, in The New York Times, →ISSN, archived from the…. From the entry detriment
  • Like chaoplexologists, Big Data adherents profess an almost religious faith in the power of computers to solve problems that have resisted traditional scientific methods.2015, John Horgan, The End Of Science Facing The Limits Of Knowledge In: The Twilight Of The Scientific Age, Basic Books, →ISBN. From the entry chaoplexologist
  • The moment has now come when we may tender in evidence an ancient document which professes to state the hidage of certain districts.2013, F. W. Maitland, Domesday Book and Beyond: Three Essays in the Early History of England, page 455. From the entry hidage
  • Allism is inconsistent with theism, and, therefore, anyone who professes ignorance as to whether Allism is true should profess ignorance as to whether God exists.2009, Melville Y. Stewart, Science and Religion in Dialogue, →ISBN, page 823. From the entry allism
  • According to the International Law doctrine of debellatio (KO’d by war), under which we profess to operate, it is the coalition, through Ambassador L.2003 February 22, Victor T. Le Vine, “Factions Need Some Autonomy”, in St. Louis Post-Dispatch. From the entry debellatio
  • As a film that professes an antitravel message, it asserts the beauty of cinematic spectatorship as a more spectacular and fluid form of virtual mobility.1994, Anne Friedberg, Window shopping: cinema and the postmodern, page 100. From the entry antitravel
  • In the U.S., which professes as much respect as Britain for the principle that "justice delayed is justice denied," it takes more than four years.1955 October 17, “The Law: Battling the Backlog”, in Henry R[obinson] Luce, editor, Time, volume LXVI, number 16, New York, N.Y.: Time…. From the entry justice delayed is justice denied
  • I do not profess to be a judge of such things, but they appeared to me to be singularly wanting in merit."1912, Arthur Conan Doyle, The Lost World […], London; New York, N.Y.: Hodder and Stoughton, →OCLC. From the entry singularly

Meaning of profess

  1. verb To administer the vows of a religious order to (someone); to admit to a religious order.
  2. verb To declare oneself (to be something).
  3. verb To declare; to assert, affirm.

Full definition of profess

Questions about profess in a sentence

How do you use profess in a sentence?
Profess is used as a verb. For example: “They've professed themselves delighted with the results.”
What is a short sentence with profess?
“They've professed themselves delighted with the results.”
What does profess mean?
Profess means to administer the vows of a religious order to (someone); to admit to a religious order.

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: profess (page history and authors) and the entries each sentence comes from. Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws chose the sentences, left out offensive ones and quotations older than 1900, and marked the word in each. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

Last updated:

Cite this page: “How to use profess in a sentence.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/sentences/profess. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.