How to Use reproach in a Sentence

reproach

1 of 2 noun
  • She looked at him with reproach.
  • His conduct has brought shame and reproach to his family.
  • Accusations and reproaches from both parties made it difficult to pursue discussions.
  • The reproach was like a punch in the gut, Spring said.
    — Phil Wahba, Fortune, 18 Oct. 2025
  • There’s the tyranny of clean and, atop that, the specter of reproach.
    — Washington Post, 7 Feb. 2021
  • Your record must be beyond reproach.
    — Essence, 25 Nov. 2025
  • Femme enough for his mother to treat his mere presence like a reproach.
    — K. Austin Collins, Rolling Stone, 18 Nov. 2022
  • Bigelow’s Sphinx is far from perfect, far from above reproach.
    — Colin Dickey, Longreads, 31 Aug. 2017
  • But the mood in the room was downbeat and his friends’ questions were full of reproach.
    — Elizabeth Kolbert, The New Yorker, 9 Aug. 2021
  • Moshe wanted to be beyond reproach in his work with the Mishkan.
    — Rabbi Avi Weiss, Jewish Journal, 5 Mar. 2018
  • To be sure, the goings-on at the hotel were not beyond reproach.
    — oregonlive, 3 Feb. 2022
  • Or that its status as a tradition shields it from reproach.
    — Jack Lang, New York Times, 11 June 2026
  • The point is not that the past was better or that these presidents were beyond reproach.
    — William Muck, Chicago Tribune, 24 May 2026
  • Brewers go all in Hindsight tells you the trade was beyond reproach.
    — Jr Radcliffe, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, 20 Apr. 2020
  • The bitter tears of self reproach made my chances of my own recovery feel …unattainable.
    — Stephanie Petit, PEOPLE.com, 25 Oct. 2017
  • Here was so much competence, so much courage, and for a purpose beyond reproach.
    — Bucky McMahon, Popular Mechanics, 8 Sep. 2017
  • Journalists are not above reproach.
    — Adrienne Lafrance, The Atlantic, 1 June 2026
  • It was never meant to imply that all women were faultless and beyond reproach.
    — Christine Emba, Twin Cities, 2 Oct. 2019
  • The loss wasn’t just about Shanahan’s once-beyond-reproach play-calling.
    — Eric Branch, San Francisco Chronicle, 25 Oct. 2021
  • His son suffers from severe autism, a condition which struck Markram as a reproach as well as a tragedy.
    — BostonGlobe.com, 22 Apr. 2021
  • Lest this all sound a bit hyperbolic, George is hardly above reproach.
    — Eric Walden, The Salt Lake Tribune, 9 July 2023
  • Mrs Merkel delivered her message with a certain amount of reproach.
    — The Economist, 7 Nov. 2020
  • Onstage, the guests looked bored, purposefully bored, above-reproach bored.
    — New York Times, 31 Aug. 2021
  • That’s not a defense of Newsom, who is hardly beyond reproach.
    — Los Angeles Times, 15 Sep. 2021
  • The Nameless One goes to see him, and the archbishop greets him with a stern reproach for his evil life.
    — Joan Acocella, The New Yorker, 10 Oct. 2022
  • Meanwhile, her husband-to-be is above reproach regardless of the outcome.
    — Jessica M. Goldstein, Washington Post, 22 Nov. 2022
  • At the same time, her basketball acumen and ability to teach the game are beyond reproach.
    — Edward Lee, baltimoresun.com, 23 Apr. 2021
  • Boredom is a normal feeling, and there's no truth in the reproach that only boring people get bored.
    — Katie Hunt, CNN, 7 May 2020
  • No company, even the biggest and most philanthropic, is above reproach.
    — Patrick Moorhead, Forbes, 20 Sep. 2021
  • Her boss, another older White man, told her to ignore the reproach and keep shining.
    — Nicole Gaouette, CNN, 6 May 2021

reproach

2 of 2 verb
  • This was not the moment to reproach the sailor deputies, though, or even to devise a punishment.
    — Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, National Review, 12 Oct. 2021
  • Her smile had a sweetness that almost seemed to reproach those who looked at it for their dim and suspicious view of life.
    — Rachel Cusk, New Yorker, 24 Aug. 2025
  • Year after year, my parents reproached me on the way to and from parent-teacher conferences.
    — Zameena Mejia, refinery29.com, 22 July 2024
  • The European countries that had seen fit to reproach Russia over the war had now moved on.
    — New York Times, 16 Jan. 2022
  • Pope Francis reproached him by giving him his encyclical on climate change.
    — Dana Milbank, chicagotribune.com, 3 June 2017
  • The left of his party reproaches him for being too favorable to business, and on the right he is seen as not doing enough for it.
    — Adam Nossiter, New York Times, 28 Oct. 2016
  • The Supreme Court would be beyond reproach, if only its critics would stop reproaching it.
    — Yvonne Abraham, BostonGlobe.com, 6 May 2023
  • Parents reproach their children for failing to supply a polite answer instead of the real one.
    — Washington Post, 26 Mar. 2021
  • His oppressive trainer reproaches him for being too soft, too feminine.
    — David Kortava, The New Yorker, 5 June 2020
  • Amidror called Yoni Koren, Barak’s chief of staff, and reproached him for not reporting the meeting with Emanuel.
    — New York Times, 4 Sep. 2019
  • As expected, Carly didn’t take the bait, reproaching Z for referring to her daughter by her last name, spy style.
    — Ryan Coleman, Entertainment Weekly, 6 July 2026
  • And the incident also displays his reluctance to reproach his fans, however nasty their behavior.
    — Ed Kilgore, Daily Intelligencer, 30 May 2018
  • His daughter Luiza, now in her late 30s and living in Spain, reproached him for being absent from her life for the last 20 years.
    — Kit Gillet, New York Times, 30 Mar. 2018
  • The pillow talk on Man’s Best Friend often takes the curt, assertive tone of a person reproaching a precocious pet.
    — Craig Jenkins, Vulture, 3 Sep. 2025
  • The president reproached one reporter who questioned what the purpose of the national stockpile is if not to supply states with medical equipment when asked.
    — Tim Pearce, Washington Examiner, 3 Apr. 2020
  • The woman eventually jumps back to the other side of the baggage conveyor belt but continued to reproach employees.
    — Amaris Encinas, USA TODAY, 15 Aug. 2024
  • If any of your relatives attempt to use your grandmother’s recent death in order to reproach you, feel free to ignore that transparently distracting tactic.
    — Mallory Ortberg, Slate Magazine, 23 Mar. 2017
  • Similarly, leaders are more reluctant to reproach a violator when strategic interests are at stake.
    — Foreign Affairs, 20 Feb. 2024
  • If Oosterhoff did end his patient’s life, however, God might reproach him for having acted without knowing all of the consequences.
    — Charles Lane, The Atlantic, 15 Mar. 2026
  • Nigerians from the North reproach the British with withholding the schools which their grandfathers had stipulated should not be introduced.
    — Helen Andrews, National Review, 18 Dec. 2017
  • Bellingham reproached the Ballon d'Or favourite for being greedy, but Ancelotti only saw positives in the exchange.
    — Tom Sanderson, Forbes, 19 Oct. 2024
  • Facing allegations of bias and the specter of regulatory action, social networks have been reluctant to reproach politicians.
    — Robert Hackett, Fortune, 27 May 2020
  • Michelle exists on a level that is invulnerable to reproach, termination, or cancellation.
    — Justin Chang, New Yorker, 24 Oct. 2025
  • Gibson, 75, would reproach Shapiro, 74, for being more shocked and offended by what happened to Gibson than Gibson was.
    — Chris Kaltenbach, baltimoresun.com, 12 Mar. 2018
  • After exiting a coffee shop in Tampa, the first lady stopped to reproach a group of reporters questioning her about Joe Biden’s candidacy.
    — Christian Datoc, Washington Examiner - Political News and Conservative Analysis About Congress, the President, and the Federal Government, 11 July 2024
  • During her tenure, she was openly critiqued for her lack of political knowledge and reproached for her Christian-fundamentalist views on evolution.
    — Shamira Ibrahim, Vulture, 19 Sep. 2025
  • Truffaut sharply reproached established French filmmakers for complaining about pressure from producers or from official censors.
    — Richard Brody, The New Yorker, 8 June 2019
  • But while aggression in women remains suspect, the public is drawn, now more than ever, to girls who reproach and rebuke, calling the world to account for its ills — and girls in turn are learning to harness that public gaze to effect larger change.
    — Ligaya Mishan, New York Times, 30 Sep. 2020
  • In addition to targeted and national sanctions, democratic countries have other ways to reproach states that violate international law.
    — Shelley Inglis, The Conversation, 7 Apr. 2021
  • Conservatives reproached it for competing with commercial companies.
    — Amie Tsang, New York Times, 10 Apr. 2020

Some of these examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'reproach.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.

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