&**%$##!!!!! (part 3)

"It is not what goes into the mouth that defiles a person, but it is what comes out of the mouth that defiles.
"What comes out of the mouth proceeds from the heart, and this is what defiles. For out of the heart come evil intentions, murder, adultery, fornication, theft, false witness, slander. These are what defile a person..."
Matthew 15: 11, 18-20

I've heard the above passages cited as an argument against profanity. But I have to wonder and ask: does a cuss word really defile? Is swearing the fruit of "evil intentions, murder, adultery" etc.? I'm thinking that perhaps Jesus was not referring to those "seven dirty words" that George Carlin was so fond of. (And no, I'm not going to link to those. You can find them easily enough if you are so inclined!)

I think Jesus meant that evil ideas and actions (kind of like the legal definition of free speech) - whether spoken, written or acted upon - are what defile us. It is the recurrent theme of the Gospels: what is in our heart matters to God. Our appearance, wealth and language do not.

I know a young woman - a friend of my kids - who is a devout Christian and an avid Giants fan. She was enamored of Brian Wilson (and this was before the beard), in part because he is not shy about proclaiming his Christian faith. (There is a lovely article about that here.) But one day she saw a game where he gave up a crucial hit, and let an unmistakeable F-bomb fly with full force.

kind of like that.

(photo from google images)

She said that it changed her opinion of him. I was surprised at this, and sarcastically wise-cracked, "yeah, because of course we know that professional ball players never swear..." It gave her pause, and I think she eventually changed her tune. (Besides, Brian's not only an amazing athlete and bone fide goofball, he is a genuinely Good Guy.)

Maybe sometimes profanity is the only way we can express our passion in the heat of the moment. Not all of us can be creative in these moments.

I'm coming to understand that the use or non-use of those few words have little to do with our personal faith walks. After all, what is more harmful: to withhold care for the poor, or an expletive? To wage violence, or to let fly with an angry cuss word? I really think that God cares much less about the words we use than what abides in our hearts.