Listen

“How do you expect them to listen to you”? (Saint Josemaria).

Christ on the Cross (Institute of Chicago)

Before I married and had children – as a young adult – I tried to never swear.  I felt that it sounded vulgar and horrible to hear people swearing.  My parents did not swear very much – if at all – and so it was easy enough to follow their example.  When my own children were born, I tried very hard to never swear in their presence.  After all, I did not want my young children learning this terrible habit from me.

By the time my children started in Kindergarten, they were exposed to other children who lived a little differently than we did.  Some of those children swore very badly.  AT times my own children would come home from school and try out new words that they had learned and therefore swearing started to come into our home more easily.

Over time, I am ashamed to admit that I began to swear more frequently.  At first it was in shock and involuntarily when I reacted to something – like burning a finger or stubbing a toe.  But the things that happens with swearing – as it does with all sin – is that a small thing grows over time.  And what really happened was that over time I began to swear a little more casually.  At first there was no swearing in formal settings – business meetings were clean and polite.  But there was swearing at home or among friends.  Initially the swearing was to add humour to a story, but eventually it became a habit so entrenched that moments of anger are expressed with swearing.

And I have been thinking about this today.

You see, I would like for my children not to swear.  It is a simply sin to rectify and one that can be nipped in the bud with a bit of attention, but unless I can do this first, how can I expect them to listen o my words in this…?

And if I cannot set an example for my children in relation to swearing, then how can I possibly set an example for them in relation to other things in life?  How can I show them how to be holy?  How can I teach them to avoid sin and the near occasions of sin?  If I spend my life falling over on little things like swearing, how can I really say that I love my God?

After all, if each swear word is enough for God to suffer and die, then how can I say that I wish to express love for God when I am the one killing Him just because I choose not to control my own tongue.  Saint Faustina wrote in her Diary that if souls only knew that they would have to account for the sins of their own tongue then they would choose not to speak.  She wrote of how easily we sin by word and how easily we could stop this sin if we simply chose to control ourselves and the words coming out of our mouths.

So today, I pray for the Grace to be able to stop swearing altogether.  After all, in the words of Saint Josemaria, “How do you expect them to listen to you” if you cannot set an example for them to follow with your own person?

For with prayer, I stand on Holy Ground where everything is clear. Here. At the Foot of the Cross.