Swearing Is Caring?

This whole conversation started in the car with Mr. D (my son) and Ms. G (my daughter) and Luna (my dog) of course who was sound asleep trying to ignore the music and the chatter all together. Justin Bieber’s song Peaches was playing and Mr. D—who is now well into his ninth year of life on this earthly plane—inquisitively asked, “I don’t get it, this guy talks about being holy one minute then swears in another song the next”. Ms. G—who is the strong silent type and who is now rounding out her twelfth year—spoke up and said that being good, holy or religious doesn’t mean you can’t swear, “Shit. See I’m Catholic and I just swore. Big deal.” I sat quietly while the two exchanged words when suddenly I saw a teachable moment—so I took a hard swing at this perfect pitch!

I started off talking about religions and how I respect them all but—as I see it—it is more important to be spiritual and to focus on seeing people as being wholly connected to one another, rather than focusing on which religion they belong to. Like fingers on a hand, we may appear to be all separate but we all belong to the same hand—we are all one people. Religions have rules and regulations that may or may not be agreed upon by all. Spirituality has no rules to follow or judgements to be made, just treat everyone and everything as equals.

They sat silently. Truthfully, I think they were a little shocked to hear me say some of these things because I have not been completely honest with them about my feelings on this subject. I never wanted to be a heavy influence one way or another. I think they should discover and experience life with as little judgement from me as possible, or at least I try my best to live by this motto. Similar to being a vegetarian most of my life—which I only recently shared this part of my past with them—I think if they enjoy something, like eating meat for example, then who am I to say it’s wrong?

I proceeded to explain my feelings about some of the issues I see with Catholicism specifically (emphasizing how this was just my opinion). Although religions can provide great comfort for many people, and there are wonderful things to learn from the teachings of Jesus, I just cannot wrap my brain around some contradictions. For instance, they talk about an all loving and inclusive God, yet they don’t believe women are capable of being religious leaders, such as priests. They talk about ‘loving thy neighbour,’ yet they draw lines in the sand with the LGBTQ2+ community by not acknowledging their marital unions (even though it is legal in Canada!). Hell, evil, and original sin depict a God that places rules, judgement, punishments or ultimatums on his children that he supposedly loves unconditionally? It just does not make sense to me.

Now I know many of you won’t agree with me but my very being tells me that this description of a heavy handed God is ‘man-made’ for one ultimate reason—to have ultimate control. I didn’t take the conversation this far with my children, instead I invited them to think about how a loving God, whether it be a ‘he’ or a ‘she’ or an ‘it’ would exclude any one human being for whatever reason if we were all truly children of God. I said to my children that I think God places NO judgement on anyone. Being spiritual means working on being the best person you can be and remembering who you really are, which is an extension of God—this is the most important thing to remember.

When Mr. D is silent I can assure you he is absorbing and meditating on the information he is taking in because he normally never stops talking or asking questions. Instead, Ms. G is harder to read because she normally listens and asks fewer questions. I continued by talking about how we really should try not to hate anyone (a very difficult task I can acknowledge) because even people who are not nice to us still have a purpose in our lives—namely to teach us an important lesson about who we are or who we want to be. The lesson might not always be apparent right away, and this does not mean that you should not walk away from anyone who is not good to you—actually you should wish them well and move on.

Mr. D broke his silence by exclaiming how difficult it can be to walk away from a bully who follows you around the school yard. I agreed, but told him that he can choose to ask for help in that situation. In the end, it is up to them to decide who they want to include in their lives, and to walk away from people who are not treating them with respect. He seemed to be happy with my response because he let me go on without any further interruptions (which is a tall order for him!).

We were nearing our destination and so I wrapped up the conversation as they exited the car by reminding them to love ALL things equally. No person, no animal, no tree, no plant or even insect is better than you, for all living and non living things are created with God’s energy—therefore all things on earth should be respected! The little smirk on their faces and gentle gazes as they walked away told me they ‘got it’. I don’t always hit home runs as a parent but this time—in this moment—I felt like an all-star winner. I left no one on the field because I brought everyone home!