More than words

by Editor · July 11, 2007

This week an opinion writer makes the pertinent point that calling out God’s name when God is not being addressed is a habit best dropped by Christians. The writer stops short of calling the misuse of God’s name blasphemous, but does draw our attention to the injunction in the second commandment.

Through the generations, people have been mindful of the commandment’s admonition. Exclamation such as gosh and gee whizz have their etymology in attempts to avoid the careless enjoinment of God the Father or his Son.

Now, there is a general indifference towards the meaning of the words God or Jesus. Instead of being voiced with reverence and love in a spirit of prayer, the Holy Names are more frequently used loudly to signify anger or frustration, alternating for more obscene or scatalogical expletives.

Many who do so don’t exercise the Christian faith (or even any other), and may be unaware of the offence their usually careless use of God’s or Christ’s name can cause. Others yet become creative in their profanity, imagining Our Lord on modes of transport, sometimes accompanied by obscenities, in the name of wit.

It is reasonable to take umbrage at the latter types of blasphemy, though our protests would likely fall on deaf ears. We may have better prospects of persuading the casual misuser of the Holy Name to amend their means of expression.

Before we correct others, however, we must reflect on our own behaviour in this regard, and that of our fellow Christians a point columnist Tanya Watterud reinforces when she speculates that God might stop hearing us when we call his name thoughtlessly.

Do we at all times exhibit the proper respect for God and his Son? Even when we bang on our thumb with a hammer or drop a tray of cups? Do we have a mechanism to ward off the culturally inculcated temptation to blaspheme?

Once we have cleared ourselves of suspicions of misusing the Lord’s name, we may turn our attention to fellow Christians. When we do so, our approach should be determined but gentle, not irate (never mind self-righteous). Ms Watterud’s analogy of Jim, whose name is being incessantly called in a restaurant, may well form a sensible context for such instruction.

It is right that we should remind reasonable people who misuse God’s name that this habit can be offensive to Christians. Again, this should be done with tact.

So ingrained into our language is the misuse of God’s name, that there is little to gain from countering it by confrontational means. It is not an easy task to explain to secularised people why the exclamation of God’s name should be objectionable, when to them it is just a word.

People, Christians and non-believers alike, need to be sensitised to the potential of blasphemous rhetoric causing personal offence. The Knights of da Gama in their anti-blasphemy campaign have already accomplished much by taking just that approach.

And in our own spheres, all of us have a responsibility to create awareness that the misuse of the Holy Name is not acceptable.