One of my favorite things is when we Christians put a holy spin on foul language. We know at some point we’ll stub our toe against the corner of our couch and will need a phrase to scream out. But instead of swearing, we’ll yell at the top of our lungs, “That hurt like H E Double Hockey Sticks!” Or we’ll say, “Dang,” or “Shoot.” If you’re really religious though, you’ll try to turn it into a worship moment. “Praise the Lord! It really hurt when I dropped that Precious Moments figure on my foot!”
It’s exactly what CBS did when they played the Bruce Willis movie, Die Hard 3, on television. When one of the characters was about to drop an MF, they instead made him scream out, “You melon farmer! Melon farmer!”
That’s funny to me. Swears are kind of funny to me too. They’re just words that over the centuries we’ve given power to. We’ve assigned them strength and importance and of course a degree of crudeness. But ultimately, they’re just words.
I’m all for not swearing, but cleaning up your mouth is really just a symptom. Maybe you’re supposed to work on your anger or your unhappiness that is producing your son of a gun foul mouth. It’s like people that go to all you can eat fried snickers and mayonnaise buffets and order a diet Coke. That’s great that you’re drinking diet Coke, but come on dude, it’s the mayonnaise fritter balls that are going to kill you.
