Where Does Misusing Language Rank on the Sin-O-Meter?

Dear Readers,

How bad is misusing language on the sin-o-meter? I don’t know. There’s swearing, cussing, telling dirty jokes, lying, exaggerating, being melodramatic- and all those things could be imperfect.

Religion is so hard on children sometimes. (But a lack of religion could be harder on children.) So many people have felt like, “Oh, I’m going to hell for sure,” when they really weren’t that bad. I remember in elementary school, or maybe it was in middle school, one of my classmates said that if you ever said the words out loud, “I swear to God” you would go to hell no matter what. I might have thought that was real for a little while. It scared me.

And in some ways, it doesn’t matter that a church’s official doctrine didn’t say “If you say, ‘I swear to God’ then you will definitely go to hell.” That’s what my former classmate believed.

If a Sunday School teacher or a Preacher or a parent isn’t careful enough, they might give children the impression that they are not beloved children of a loving and merciful Heavenly Father, but that they are “sinners in the hands of an angry God” (like the sermon by the early American Puritan Jonathan Edwards). If church leaders or parents aren’t careful enough in the way they preach, children might think -and many do think, like my former classmate- that God hates them for sinning, and that God will not have mercy on someone who accidentally or ignorantly says, “I swear to God.”

Misconceptions about damnable behavior don’t only thrive in the minds of children, but in the minds of many adults. I met this one guy on my mission who said that he believed that if you ever called anybody a fool, then you would go to hell for sure. He cited Matthew 5:22, which says, “…whosoever shall say to his brother, Raca, shall be in danger of the council: but whosoever shall say, Thou fool, shall be in danger of hell fire.” So I guess this guy I talked with really believed that it was a major sin to use the particular word “fool.” I’m not sure if he really believed that or if he was just saying it to stir the pot or play devil’s advocate or something. It was a long time ago.

My personal thoughts are that the meaning of Matthew 5:22 is that you should avoid being angry with people and you shouldn’t insult them too much. But honestly I don’t think I see any difference between saying, “you’re a moron” and “you’re a fool.” Did that guy believe that if you called people morons or idiots, that only scored a 1 out of 10 on the sin-o-meter, but if you said the word “fool” then you would burn in hell forever? That seems unjust and unGodly to me.

Oh! But I just found a wonderful rebuttal to that guy’s ideas about how if you called somebody a fool, you would go to hell. Jesus himself called people fools! And Jesus was perfect! Our Savior called the Scribes and the Pharisees fools in Matthew 23: 17 and 19.

In conclusion, where does misusing language rank on the sin-o-meter? I don’t know. And what exactly constitutes misusing language? I don’t know that either. The more I think about it, the harder it gets to tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth.

Sincerely,
Telemoonfa