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Church Psychology
Mental Health Professionals looking at the intersections of social & behavioral science and the formed Christian life. Visit us for free resources and more at www.ChurchPsychology.org
Church Psychology
Exploring Profanity: Curse Words Communication, and Thoughts on Words in Christianity Formation
Ever wondered about the power of your words? Are you curious about how your language choices affect your relationships? This episode is a must-listen for you! We take a deep dive into the complex world of language and communication, particularly focusing on the Christian perspective on cussing, swearing, and profanity. Drawing from our personal experiences and the teachings of Scripture, we explore the intriguing paradox of these 'spicy' words and their impact.
We also broaden the scope of our discussions to go beyond mere cussing. By referencing Ephesians 4:29, we touch on how words - even those not typically seen as profane - can either edify or harm depending on their usage. The importance of context, nuances of language, and authenticity in our communication are also highlighted, especially in sensitive areas like Christian-based sex therapy and guiding children on appropriate language use.
The conversation wouldn't be complete without discussing parenting, and we dare to tackle the challenging aspect of teaching our children to express themselves freely yet within certain boundaries. Through our discussions, we underline the significance of validation and understanding the context and intent of the speaker. As our words can either build or break, we advocate for a mindful approach to our language choices. So, strap in for a thrilling exploration of language, communication, and their implications on our Christian journey.
Show Notes:
- Ephesians 4:29 - "No foul language is to come from your mouth, but only what is good for building up someone in need, so that it gives grace to those who hear."
- Ephesians 5:4 - "Coarse and foolish talking or crude joking are not suitable, but rather giving thanks."
- Colossians 3:8 - "But now you must also put away all the following: anger, wrath, malice, slander, and filthy language from your mouth."
- Matthew 15:18-19 - "But what comes out of the mouth comes from the heart, and this defiles a man. For from the heart come evil thoughts, murders, adulteries, sexual immoralities, thefts, false testimonies, blasphemies."
- James 3:10 - "Praising and cursing come out of the same mouth. My brothers, these things should not be this way."
Hey there, dr David Hall with Church Psychology here. Today's episode we're going to be getting into four-letter word. Don't know what you may call it in your cultural context. In the southern United States, where I'm from, we call it cussing, cursing, swear words, profanity Matt and I just got into a conversation about that. Now, to give you a heads up, it's fairly PG.
Speaker 1:We're not going to necessarily get into all the words, but we were just curious about, as Christians and in the process of formation in the spiritual life, what were the messages that we grew up with, what are our current thoughts about it? What does Scripture seem to tell us about how we should think about the language that we use, what's the psychology behind it and what does the social sciences kind of tell us about the relative benefits and drawbacks of using language of a certain spiciness? Again, we keep it pretty PG in it, but just to give you a heads up, that's what our conversation is going to be today. If you find interest in that. Hopefully you will get a lot out of this and we're going to get started in that now.
Speaker 2:Welcome to Church Psychology, a podcast of the Nagev Institute. We are mental health professionals looking at the intersections of social and behavioral science in the Christian life. Please connect with our free resources in our open community library at churchpsychologyorg. We would be grateful if you would follow, like or subscribe to Church Psychology wherever you are finding us, and also leave us a review as we start. If we are to love the Lord, our God, with all of our mind, it makes sense to work on our head space. Let's get to work. Welcome back everybody to the Church Psychology podcast. My name is Matt Schooniman. I'm here again with Dr David Hall. Hey, david.
Speaker 1:Hello Matt. Yeah, I am still getting used to my new microphone. For those who are catching this on YouTube, matt got a good microphone weeks ago Weeks ago and I started to and we ordered two identical ones at the same time and my mind just stayed on the box on my desk because I had another one, but it just died on me.
Speaker 2:It's like when you have that 98 Honda Civic that you just like drive into the ground 400,000 miles.
Speaker 1:That's what you're, this is the upgrade of mine. I've never had a car quit that I've hit well north of well. No, that's not true. I had a car that hit 400,000 miles.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's probably still going. You're that kind of guy. I see you as that guy, david. You will.
Speaker 1:No, I will. I've got shoes that I shouldn't have anymore. They've been super glued and that's my style.
Speaker 2:Is it Brandy who sends you to get new stuff Like? Is she the catalyst for those things.
Speaker 1:It is Brandy's, my wife, and the person that keeps me looking decent in certain moment. And because it will, because it is, and I think just sometimes we need that there's unpolished parts of ourselves and that's, if it's like I think of what we're going to talk about today, the unpolished parts of ourselves. Unpolished parts of ourselves. So it's funny even thinking about the universal phrase or word for what we're going to talk about today, because it's funny there's a lot. And a common one for where Matt and I are in the South is we call it cussan.
Speaker 2:With no G. Yeah, it's no G. It has an N with the apostrophe. Yeah, N with apostrophe.
Speaker 1:C-U-S-S.
Speaker 2:Apostrophe N cussan, or that. Yeah, I was going to say I in apostrophe, but yes, that's good enough, I know, you know I, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1:Cussan, it's a or curse, or swearing, or speaking, four letter words, speaking profanity. So it's basically, and I will say for those who may be listening to this in company of different ages or certain things, we'll still keep this up so clean.
Speaker 2:We're going to just more talk about the thing, yeah yeah, yeah, yeah, perking up a little bit in the car, you're like oh, what are they going to talk about? What are they going to talk about today? Four letter words.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and so this is. I just thought you know we've gone through some heavy topics recently recordings with a lot of trauma related things, and because we do want to talk about things that are important. But this was just kind of even more of a curiosity. So how was growing up for you, manit? What were the, your understanding of acceptable language, what was acceptable, what was not?
Speaker 2:There was more unacceptable than acceptable.
Speaker 1:I will say that yeah, and what was the? My wife certainly had moments where my mother-in-law was not above literally washing, putting soap into her children's mouths.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I don't know if we got that far, we more had just the death stare. And I grew up as a kid that was, you know. I mean we could talk about this, maybe another episode like what kind of characteristics did you have as a kid? But I was a people pleaser, like I didn't want to get in trouble at all. But yeah, cussing was always a thing that you never really knew all of the boundaries of what was wrong. You knew, I mean, you kind of found out the ones that were wrong, like all the four letter ones or the things that were said on TV that your mom and dad were like never say that you know or?
Speaker 2:like just things and more. You found out more as you went in through school and people would say words and you'd bring them home to your parents and they would be like never say that again.
Speaker 1:And you're like I don't even know what I mean.
Speaker 1:And it is funny like it's the and this is, I do feel restrained because it's like, oh, I already said enough to say the words, but I remember even in high school, there were certain words I would learn and I would try to judge like what's the severity. And I remember there's one like I think I was like a freshman or something like that and I asked one of my parents I'm like well, what does this mean? And I go just means a jerk or something like that. Well, it had a much more kind of profane undertones.
Speaker 1:I used it in class and I got in trouble.
Speaker 2:Oh, but you did, yeah, and it was just I know what schools you went to. Yeah, I'm a private Christian school and you can't be saying stuff like that, so you know. And then there's the obvious ones of being kind of like a traditional southern church culture, which I don't necessarily disagree, I just don't hear that.
Speaker 2:But like you can't say the Lord's name in vain and so anything that had like GOD blank you know, or or even, like you know, saying Jesus Christ out of context of talking to Jesus, you know, like there was just things as an expletive to say that. Yeah, yeah, and it was obviously really really bad, you know, and so I think that, but they're all under like you're talking about. They're all under the umbrella, though, of cussing or cursing, even like crap. You know, cr.
Speaker 1:you know Cool.
Speaker 2:No.
Speaker 1:Well, here's what's funny about that word.
Speaker 2:You couldn't say it.
Speaker 1:And so, yeah, go ahead. And he was funny about that word, like I could. I started saying that like in middle school and it was one of the ones that was acceptable.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1:That was acceptable, but like I overused it because it's like well, I can. So this one is yeah right, this one I could do and like it is.
Speaker 2:It wasn't until and I apologize to any parents, this is not a cuss word, but it is maybe making you feel uncomfortable but like even it's even like high school that I felt real uncomfortable about saying sucks and that one like Some people would say like oh, that, you shouldn't say that and it's the yeah, exactly.
Speaker 1:But now it's, it's, it's interesting.
Speaker 2:It was sex pond water. It was then what came out of it. Yeah, it's the one.
Speaker 1:Well, and it's funny, like so, there's certain connotations of words that get classified in this and I think, from a lexicographer background sort of thing, it's interesting because stuff changes and depending on what language you speak, different things. What's considered profane or not profane? Yeah, you know, typically the words that become much more restrictive in at least our modern hearing of things of you know, what's allowed to be said in certain movies or you know is is words related to certain bodily functions, usually, or words involving with sexual connotations. Yeah, that those are kind of the two main categories of things, and but it is funny, like in talking about what we even call these things, you know cursing or swearing. It's interesting in in relating to scripture, like both those things were talked about. Yeah, but they meant things much more specifically.
Speaker 2:We'll talk about like swear words.
Speaker 1:Yeah, but in the context of swearing, is this is to make oaths or vows Right? This idea of and that's not typically when, at least in our hearing of when someone says it's a swear word in English.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's not the same thing.
Speaker 1:That's not what we think we mean, yeah, yeah, curses, get a little closer. This is the idea of like your words are bringing something down on somebody that to their harm, or this idea of like you want them to experience consequences. Mm-hmm, and sometimes it could be that you get caught off in traffic and you say something directed at somebody that in some ways you're you are desiring to curse them in some way. Yeah, and it is just funny of like you know what we do and how we respond, like I was on a camping trip a number of years ago with a dear family friend who's since gone home. To you, jesus, john Dee who was this yeah?
Speaker 1:He was a alternating Chuck Norris of a man, but we were on rafts going down the river in Alaska and the nature of it it wasn't white water necessarily, but you get in these kinds of rapids at points and sometimes you'd have to get in and out of the boat to pull it along. But sometimes the boat would get going and anyway I and we could see it coming where my leg was swung over the side of the raft and we were going pretty quickly into a rock and my leg, with the weight of the boat behind it, slammed into this rock and several people in our group saw it happen and John, who had spent a lot of his life in Zimbabwe, in a bit of that accent, he sees it happen and I grimace and all that, but immediately out of his mouth he goes bless it, David, bless it Versus. It was specifically this idea. He wanted me to bless what had just happened versus curse it, because that's oftentimes our, you know, we'd stub our toe.
Speaker 1:We'd like don't curse it, bless it.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, and Bless it, David.
Speaker 1:Yeah, he's calling over the water for me to do that, but the so it's funny. We and part of my understanding of this as a kid growing up, of why I shouldn't say things was scriptural, was that you know, we as Christians we shouldn't say things. And I think one thing I wanted to dive into that I've just thought would be interesting is one of the more common scripture verses in this, which is Ephesians 4, 29,. Which is the different translations. But do not let any profane or course, or it gets translated different things. Speech come forth from your mouth, but only that which is used for edifying that may minister grace upon the hearers. And that word it gets translated different things. Of course. Language, profane language, fowl Fowl language yeah, that is the Greek word for that.
Speaker 1:Supras is what it is, and the translation that's out of Strong's is rotten, putrefied, corrupted by one, or no longer of good use. It's worn out, poor quality, bad, unfit. To go back to my shoes that sometimes get used for too long. I think it's a different. Here's why I challenged this from both a Christian life standpoint and also from a psychological standpoint. I think sometimes we'll put guardrails on our language and we have this idea of this kind of categorization of this word in and of itself is problematic, and the way what I understand in kind of looking at this scripture is the I love to this different way of thinking about this idea of like it is, it is passage use. It is spoiled, like spoiled vegetables or something like that, and I even think in our work mat we talk about negative self-talk is something that will often come up in Therapy. People will sometimes have words that they'll put on themselves.
Speaker 2:Yeah, Even yeah, like failure.
Speaker 1:Yes and, and we wouldn't necessarily treat that as a foul word, as a cuss word or profane sort of thing but as I'm considering as a non biblical scholar, but just as a as a Christian and as someone who works with people in this space, I'm considering Ephesians 429 kind of in that light. Yeah, what might be the old language that we use? The language is no longer fit, the language that is past due, that we may put on ourselves and others. Hmm, and particularly in the context of Ephesians, how that's juxtaposed against. Instead, do what is, edify, what is, what is a building process.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so building up that man? Well, I so it's not. The angles have come to say, like you know, what the Bible says about cussing is We've had it wrong this whole time and we have the freedom to cuss. It actually goes the other way is that I think Any language that we use that is not for building up or edifying Becomes cursing and that that opens up a whole Pandora's box of the things that I know. I have said that aren't essentially like cussing and are probably. I mean, they're clean words. Whether I'm talking about myself or another person, they become very foul in nature, mm-hmm, because of the intention the heart behind it is is Wrong or is foul inversely.
Speaker 1:I this will be a whole episode I'm sure we'll do in the future, but one of the niches I work in is I'm I'm certified as a sex therapist, which is very interesting to do as a Christian, and I was trained in a specifically Christian program for it. I did my training through a group called the Institute for Sexual Holiness, which is I currently have the privilege to serve on their, their board. It's a nonprofit that's been in existence since the early 2000s to specifically train believers in a Biblically based, holistic view of working with people in their health and brokenness, both in the sexual part of their being. Yeah, and we have our introduction class. We teach in that course and I've taught that course or co-taught that course in a few different contexts, in In seminaries, in graduate schools.
Speaker 1:I've even taught it in a counselor training program in the United Kingdom, and one of the exercises we do in this course and so this is it's taught by Christian individuals and to a pretty overtly Christian audience and oftentimes people from very socially conservative backgrounds, and one of our exercises that we do. Again, talking about that, a lot of profane things are often related to sexual sorts of things, and so what we do is we, we get these white poster boards and in the front of the class, at the top of the white poster board, we have the, the most technical word for a sexual act, or a body part Kind of a rogen is considered body part, and what everyone in the class has to do is everyone has to come up and write another Word or phrase for that thing.
Speaker 1:But they cannot repeat something someone someone else's grit, and then it's an exposure exercise yeah, it is mental thing so they have to do that, and then afterwards we read them out together as a class and there's a lot of squirming. Well, why do we do that? It's the goal is not to make people uncomfortable, nor is it to take something that is unedifying, something that's crass or un unworthy, and Normalize it.
Speaker 1:But our goal is is for this idea that this is training people to be able to talk plainly and clearly in Areas of people's lives that they may have a lot of reservations about, where clarity is important, yeah, and so our goal is to desensitize people to what To phrases and words that they may have feel very uncomfortable with, because these are the phrases and words that clients may be using, that they're working with, and there needs to be ability to step Into that in ways that that are helpful.
Speaker 2:Yes, it's really good, my mind goes to. Even so, I've done some topics, and some topics have been done at our church that Talk about sexuality, and, and when it's done from like, the main stage at least in the past it's been this way is that there's been this kind of disclaimer that this is a PG-13 type conversation, and, granted, I want I want parents especially to have the ability to Dissern when is it appropriate for my child to learn these things? And if you've got a six-year-old coming in, maybe you're not ready to have those conversations yet, and that's fine. Yeah, the converse of that, though, or the the flip side, is that I Think that we have allowed some of the restrictions of some of these things. There's not just curse words or cuss words anymore, or foul language, it's. It's it's conversations of things that feel uncomfortable, like sexuality, become taboo in our culture of Christianity, so much so that Nobody talks about it in openness at all because we think of it as foul, course, crude, whatever. And here's the, here's the downfall of that. My, so our group, that we do For men struggling in sexual integrity. We sometimes all well, most of time I ask this question of who talked to you about sex when you're growing up, and Most often, almost 99% of the time, neither the parents provided a lane for conversation.
Speaker 2:They may have had a like birds and the bees type conversation, but there were no ongoing dialogue about this and especially their church had no dialogue about this. It was very much a Sex is bad until marriage and then after marriage, have fun. Whatever you know, like it's, it's like awful, and then it's great. And so it became very confusing for people and such a nuance thing of sexuality and new on sense of there's such complexity to what your understanding is your, especially as you're going through puberty. And so All this is what this is stirring up for me is, I think our restrictions on foul language or even the discussion of certain taboo things as a Christian culture has caused, I think, a disservice to the ability to have deep conversations about this, and so people get caught in In other lanes to have the conversation. So these men, they they learn it through pornography or they learn it through peers who don't have any right to teach them anything about sexuality and so.
Speaker 1:Mm-hmm.
Speaker 2:Anyway, that's what comes up for me as you talk about the desensitizing, desensitizing especially over the aspects of sexuality.
Speaker 1:Mm-hmm I Scripture is a highlight that I think that are good references and kind of talk about. Think about language. There's what we already referenced in Ephesians 4, 29, and this is a translation out of Holman Christian Standard Bible, which is a translation we use a lot in this podcast for those who are curious, but I'll read them. So it's Ephesians 4, 29,. Let no foul language, no foul language is to come from your mouth, but only what is good for building up someone in need, so that it gives grace for those who hear. And then Ephesians 5, 4, worse and foolish talking or crude joking are not suitable, but rather giving thanks. And Colossians 3, 8. But now you must also put away all the following anger, wrath, malice, slander and filthy language from your mouth.
Speaker 1:I'm going to read the words of Jesus now in Matthew 15, 18, and 19,. Chapter 15, verses 18 and 19. But what comes out of the mouth comes from the heart, and this defiles a man. For the heart. From the heart, for from the heart come evil thoughts, murder, adultery, sexual immoralities, thefts, false testimonies and blasphemies. And then finally, James 3, 10, praising and cursing come out of the same mouth. My brothers, these things should not be this way. And to riff further on what Matt and I have been talking about is I think there's a big disservice when we focus too much on the words by themselves versus the purpose of the words. Now there are certain words that have much more restrictive use. The nature of language, too, is that this shifts. There's something that I will charitably refer to now, because it's one that's not easily said in public, nor should it be as the R word, but to refer to somebody with developmental or intellectual disabilities. That's right. When I was a kid, that was thrown around pretty so much, so much.
Speaker 1:And it's funny, I'll watch PG movies and things like that. Now that came out in my childhood.
Speaker 2:In the 80s and 90s. Yeah, and they use that word, so they use that word and it's funny.
Speaker 1:My wife and I will watch a movie and it will come up and it's just a casual sort of thing. They'll sling in at somebody else and we're like whoa, because that doesn't feel right anymore. But that just shows the shifting nature of language. We recognize that, this idea that to use this as a slur for somebody I have a beef on this right now in my current work. In a recent episode we talked about personality disorders, which is something I cover people with borderline personality disorder, but particularly narcissistic personality disorder. That's still very much a slur. To call somebody a narcissist is a slur and I'm trying to put them down and I find that problematic because narcissism is a problem. But I see it much more in the context of somebody's mental health and I want to be able to use the word where it's not just, it's more descriptive versus I'm trying to put you down.
Speaker 2:Well, even using homosexual language or lingo or definition or even slurs, when it comes to that was I feel a lot of shame, for regret, at least for some of the times I've used that language towards other people, being silly, not really trying to be hurtful.
Speaker 1:But now, if I would hear that I would feel like there are certain words again ones that feel too crass to say that, particularly in our childhood, we would have used in as ways to tear people down. But language is shifting, the meaning of language shifts, so sometimes I think about how and what I say about things. There's certain language I use very freely in my home because it is a combination of what is accurately expressive to how I know it's going to be taken by my wife, who's the only other person I look with.
Speaker 2:Your cat.
Speaker 1:Or my cat? Yeah, that I would not say in other settings. And it's not that I'm trying to be hypocritical, but I'm understanding the context, shapes some of the language and considering what, but at no point am I allowed to forego that which is edifying, at no point am I allowed to move against these directions that Scripture calls us to. And likewise, I think there are a lot of people whose language may technically be very clean, but it is very unedified.
Speaker 2:Not to ruffle feathers, but we joke a lot about bless your heart as the southern cultural statement. That seems a very edifying statement, but the heart behind it is often very bitter.
Speaker 1:Yeah or critical. Or critical, yeah, it is. And so I've known a lot of people that are very immersed in very churchy culture, that would be horrified by somebody's looser language, but their speech is very unedified. Their speech is like how they speak to All the words technically pass, but how it's strung together and you brought up things about. There are things like, I think, as you have young children that you are raising, that I think some of us considering what's age appropriate, what is clearly understood, what are things that should be talked about much more openly versus not and again going back to a lot of curse words being related to sexual sorts of things what's appropriate to be talking about publicly and with what company, what might be taken as just unkind or unedifying or possibly threatening to individuals those are things we absolutely should be considering and thinking about.
Speaker 2:Well, as I reflect back to Ephesians 4, and this is the thought that just came to me is, I think, in efforts to be so careful not to do the first half of that passage, we are foregoing the second half, like I think that at least I'll speak for myself.
Speaker 2:The way I grew up, I think my heart was much more for not letting foul language come from my mouth, but it wasn't so much for doing edifying language. Does that make sense? And so I think, culturally, we've at least the culture passed, maybe even culture present. And again, when we talk, if you're listening, we're talking very much from the context of what we've grown up in, which is the southeastern Christian cultural context, and so this isn't everywhere. Maybe the northeast would be different, maybe in Europe it would be different, but at least here there was that sense of just don't do blank. But then we would forego the most important, the more important things of like having those tough conversations where we would have to say talk about difficult things, maybe not in the public sphere, but in the intimate sphere. We did, and I think those were let go of because we didn't want to say the bad things.
Speaker 1:We've talked about it from kind of the scriptural sort of thing and to move into some of the psychology. What are the reasons for and against? You know, sigmund Freud had this concept of that there needed to be like a release valve, that particularly for young men he had this idea that there needed to release valve for aggression and that if they could speak more freely that would be part of it. Now, that was Freud's theory. The science doesn't really support it, the release valve idea in that sort of way, but I do believe in our. This is, I think, for people's personal mental health and definitely for relational health. Being able to speak clearly matters and I think sometimes in our resistance to anything that may sound profane, we remove the possibility of certain vocabulary, and how does that impair us in our relationships? How does that impair us in our ability to live well? I think, particularly I've seen this in the context of for those who may have experienced sexual abuse, particularly as children, if they did not have language to describe parts of their body or things like that, because that was considered too profane, that often became an enabling part of ongoing abuse, because they could not articulate what was happening to them because literally there were parts of their body that remain unnamed, and I do believe that the ability to be truthful and to be clear from a mental health perspective, it's one of the main things we work towards, and I believe that is a very consistent thing with the Ark of Scripture of the truth and honesty. One of my favorite episodes that Matt and I have done so far in this first season has been talking about the authenticity, vulnerability kind of continuum, and I think the call to authenticity is real important and I think having enough words is a part of that.
Speaker 1:My wife teases me on my word choice quite often because I will invoke words, and probably this has been experienced on the podcast. I will invoke words that aren't as common, and I appreciate when people stop me and say like, okay, what does that mean?
Speaker 1:I was with a friend recently I used the term avuncular. Oh, I got nothing on that one Uncle like to be like an uncle. So I was saying this person was behaving in an avuncular way, I mean like they were acting like an uncle. But it implies more like not just that oh, I'm the sibling of your parent, if you were to say what in your mind?
Speaker 2:let's just take a deep dive for just a second on David's mind. Where does the like decision tree happen, where it's like I should use this extreme word that most people wouldn't know, rather than just saying uncle way.
Speaker 1:Well, because uncle way is not a phrase. So here's the decision tree.
Speaker 2:Okay, okay.
Speaker 1:I'm going to do this in complete honesty.
Speaker 2:You just said all that I needed to know right there. It's incorrect, it's incorrect, it's wrong.
Speaker 1:Here's what it is. So my mind, the decision tree goes to. I always am looking for what feels like the most precise word Uh-huh, and so sometimes I'll stumble a bit more on words because I'm trying to find the precise word. Yes, I get that I understand that and I do not often. I often don't think about will this person know this word? That's just that's kind of an absent minded sort of thing, Like I assume, if I know the word, that the other person knows this word.
Speaker 2:I've learned from the experience.
Speaker 1:That's not necessarily the case.
Speaker 2:That's not true. No, but no our relationship should tell you that too.
Speaker 1:My default is that I'm not, because I'm not legitimately for anyone who experiences in different contexts, because honest hand on heart is to get say my goal is never to make anyone feel stupid.
Speaker 2:Yes, I believe that to be true. Yeah.
Speaker 1:I'm trying to find the right word, but in that process I am, I will say, but related to the idea of going back to profanity. Is this the most accurate thing I want to say? And sometimes now I do have to take into account, like, how is this going to be taken in my context by the other here? What's my relationship with this other person? Right In that? Yeah, but even kind of goes to this idea of like, quote who do I hug? Like I have a pretty for people in my life.
Speaker 1:There's certain people in my life, friendship-wise, that hugging is just much more of their love language and I'm comfortable with it and so that's just. They're a handful of my male friends that they're just huggers and I'm inclined to do it. But I do have a decision tree of in my life for, particularly for women in my life that aren't family members I have I don't default to it typically and there's certain ones that I'll think through. But even the ones that in my mind, yeah, this feels okay Context matters too Right Of like, when I'm with my wife and their husband and we're greeting each other and a hug happens, that feels like more versus how would I think about it if it was just the two of us meeting together, and in what context and those sorts of ways and things like that, and same with texting conversations like I.
Speaker 1:this feels tangential but I guess it's related. But I was reaching out to a female friend the other day needing like her phone number for something and I just thought, and so it was a social media message, but I just thought.
Speaker 2:I added my wife was also friends with this person and I made it a thread where it was me and my wife asking this person Well, you go to this aspect of edifying and building up, yeah, I mean, I think that that's when you take into consideration the heart of the person that you deeply care for or that you're committed to or that you have responsibility to. It's really important to consider these avenues rather than just being kind of, you know, and that's not directly what we're talking about but just being callous or just careless with what you do, not caring about the effect yeah.
Speaker 1:Some of it is is that and I don't want to come across it like I feel I'm just super virtuous in this Some of it, in complete honesty, is fear because in the nature of the work that I do, we've seen where people have not thought these things through and it leads them to trouble, either real or perceived. And so I think about that and I also just and but I also know people that the cultural context that can feel super restrictive, it can feel kind of patronizing of that, like oh, for me to talk to a woman, it needs to be in this way, and I think that's something to be unpacked at some point of. What do we normalize, what do we don't, what are the reasons for it? But all that to say, it's going back to the idea of recognizing context, recognizing how things are going to be received, that and are you moving towards edification? I think from the psychological standpoint, for us to have clarity has a lot of value to it.
Speaker 1:But looking at and I think scripture supports that, but looking both from the scriptural side of things and the mental health side of things, it goes to what Matt was saying in Ephesians 4, the importance of the second part of the verse and the second like is this edifying, am I trying to, because you might have G-rated language all day, every day, and your mouth may be filthy in that sense of the rottenness that comes out of it. And if that stings a little bit, maybe you need to wrestle a little bit with the Holy Ghost on that.
Speaker 2:Amen wrestle, that's good stuff, Anyway.
Speaker 1:Matt, we're getting towards wrap up Any thoughts? Yeah, I think. What do you be? I'm curious, I guess, as a parent, because I'm not a parent. As a parent, how do you think about what you want your kids to feel the freedom to say or not say.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I a quick caveat story. My wife was driving our daughter, who at times we thought we had like Tourette's because she would just like go off on these like tan, with her little four-year-old language. Her predominant emotion is anger, and so she got real angry at my wife for something. And they were driving down the street and on the way from our house to her daycare there's this really cool like farm with cows on the right, and so Emily, being a really good mom, is just trying to like get our daughter off the whatever plane of anger she's at and just be like hey, kate, look at the cows over there, you know. Just like trying to like distract, you know.
Speaker 2:And Kate goes like poopy cows, poop, poop, cows like just like poopy and poop are her like languages there. And so I giggle because in some ways she just needed to express herself and just like, ventilate a little bit. And how healthy that was for her, I don't know, but it just makes us laugh all the time because of her little self. But all that back to like being a parent of little kids is I don't want people to use, I don't want people to use cuss words around my kids, because part of it is I don't think they're ready yet to understand the context of the language that it is. You know, I want them to be clear with me and be able to express their anger with me as well. You know there are times when I'm with my wife that I'll use words that I didn't know I would use when I was 17, you know, but I don't do them around my kids yet Now, when they become 18, I don't know. I don't know what I'm going to do with that.
Speaker 2:But I think these passages are helpful for context of like, what do we need in this moment? Because I even reflect on my counseling practice. I have clients that sit in this room who've come from they're still believers in their and they've come from very traditionalist Christian backgrounds and they use some of the words that we talk about as being bad, but it's in a way of like just expressing something that needs to just be expressed. In a way Now, maybe I don't encourage it, but I also don't shut it down. I give space, and that's one thing that I think I would echo in this conversation is that you're going to be in the private sector of your conversations, in the intimate sphere. You may have to have conversations where people are going to use some language with you that you may find coarse or foul, and how you hold it with them. If they're expressing something very emotionally, maybe of great value, rather than being like you can't say that, then shut them down within validation.
Speaker 1:I mean, we come back to it every episode, but there's a tension. There's a tension of this idea of, I think of a friend of mine who has older kids than what Matt's talking about but talks very openly about they let their kids cuss. Some of it is the feeling that they came from a place where it was overly restrictive and they felt the negative side of things and we just want our kids to be able to be expressive with us. It could be pros and cons in their approach to that. But I also kind of think on the other side of like well, for me it's just imagining, since I don't have children, but how would I imagine it be with my own kids.
Speaker 1:I think one of the things I would think about is like well, again, going back to what we're talking about, how often the words relate to body parts. I think a more positive conversation that is more common with kids, as universal as it should be, but more common. This idea of differentiation between what is private and what is public, this idea that this is okay. In these ways, in these settings, we can talk about this idea of your body's not bad, but we only share it in certain ways, that being an instructional thing, particularly for young kids. I think to have the delineation between what's public and private space makes sense for certain words, but I think it all kind of goes back to the question of is this edifying, is this encouraging, is something good coming out of this? As you talk about your daughter, it's possible that something good came out of her saying poop cows, because it let her just kind of get some of that out.
Speaker 2:Let's take it to the people in my room. I wouldn't say it's edifying to talk about their spouse in a way using such language, but when they are grieving and they're expressing their grief, I think it is healthy to allow some of that out so that you can kind of move to a place of edification, because when all that stuff is built up and tense, it's hard to move into a place of edifying another. Yeah Well, this has been a really fun conversation. Brings back a lot of memories.
Speaker 1:No, it's good. A lot of how these things kind of come is Matt and I. As we say. We work in the same office and we'll just be kicking around ideas. Sometimes it feels like a deeper thing, sometimes it feels like this wasn't one, this was just like I just was it literally was something, yeah, just something came up as I was going through Strong's, looking at references for another episode we recorded, and it just sparked my mind about how do we think about cussing?
Speaker 2:How do?
Speaker 1:we think about from a psychological standpoint, from a spiritual standpoint. So appreciate y'all being on the ride with us. You may agree with everything we said. You may agree with nothing of what we said, but we do appreciate you, Lenny, as have the conversation in your ears.
Speaker 2:Yeah, Thanks again for listening Again. Check us out online. Do you want to tell them about the free resource library?
Speaker 1:Yes, I guess we didn't start the episode like that. For those also trying to get in the habit of doing the plugs and this if you follow us, if you like what we've put out, please check out our free resource library at churchpsychologyorg, because if you sign up for that, it's a free thing. But that gets you connected with our email list. That allows you because we do different things. We don't have a regular the time of recording, we're not doing a regular email newsletter, but I'd like to see it.
Speaker 2:We're going to start doing that, yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah, we'd like to see it in the future, but more than that. It's also just we have different events that happens, different online trainings or webinars. We'll have different articles come out, and it just gives us a way to be able to get that directly to you by getting on our email list. Also, by giving you access to the free content that we already have created. We've got a few recorded webinar trainings that are part of the free resource library Currently. More things will be there in the future and that's the biggest way we're looking for support right now. Just those who will connect with us in this resource library gets you on our email list, and we're just grateful to be able to do that. But thank you for reminding me, and you remember to do that at the beginning of the episode.
Speaker 2:But it's all right.
Speaker 2:We got it in. We got it in Well. Thank you all for listening. It's been a pleasure to talk with you and we look forward to talking to you again next time Later. Thank you again for being a part of our latest episode of Church Psychology. If you have enjoyed it, we hope that you will share this episode with others in your life, and please do remember to follow, like and or subscribe to Church Psychology wherever you're finding us, and leave us a review. We look forward to connecting with you again soon.