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Do you use religious terms sprinkled throughout our language?

In the past, people confronted me with the supposition that if I use expressions which use religious references, I am not agnostic. I disagree, and wrote a FB post about it at the time.

Which of these expressions do you hesitate to use, assuming they fit your dialect? Which do you use by accident?

Bless you, after a sneeze
Bless you, to indicate good will
Jesus Christ, as an expression of frustration
Jesus fucking Christ, if you swear in other circumstances
God damn you
Dammit
Go to Hell
God knows, as in no one knows
Heaven on earth, or seventh heaven
Heavens, as an expression of surprise
Thank God, as an expression of relief
Oh my God, as expression of surprise

Are there any other phrases in the dialect you share, which you avoid or try to avoid?

LionMousePudding 6 Aug 10
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79 comments

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your question almost warrants a PhD in applied linguistics ... i wonder How perversive other Religions are. You should read Asterix & Obelix. The authors transposed these Religions reference to the Roman religio-linguistic background replacing all references.

I do have one bachelors’ and two masters’ degrees in Linguistics. However, my question is only of people here: to find out how agnostics in this group feel about using religious terms in everyday language, and whether it makes them uncomfortable either to use terms both from religion and literally meaningless without religion. That is, ‘heaven’ has one main meaning that religios agree on and we laugh at; ‘Heaven help us’ has another meaning which can be used secularly as a phrase.

We have each answer that interests me here. Some (fewer than I imagined) DO try to avoid religious language. Some use it on purpose to annoy religios. And most just use is because it is simply our language, who cares where the words come from.

In other words this IS applied (socio-)linguistics!

Any awkward turns of phrase above are entirely blamable on the baby rat racing around on the bed with me ?????

@LionMousePudding I am a staunch atheist but a culltural christian. Many expressions that imply religiosity at face value have been stripped of their religious essence. For me an expression like "God forbid I am an athesit" is not an oximoron.
Staunch believers are far more likely to avoid expressions that might allude to the value system of another religion or atheism.

@LionMousePudding I must admit that I systematically refuse to use religious titles, e.g. father, brother, sister ... but I am equally reluctant to use military titles.

@PontifexMarximus I use sister for myself when I have to choose a prefix.. to Hell with prefixes, why do forms insist on them?! .. and I am my sister's sister, anyway! ??

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I use all of the above, sprinkled with a lot of f bombs.

5

Jesus Mary and Joseph. I’m Irish

4

I occasionally use "Jesus H. Christ". If someone asks me what the "H" stands for, I say "Harold", as in "Our Father, who art in Heaven, Harold be thy name...".

4

Jesus Fucking Christ is a favorite.
As is holy shit.

That's divine masturbation ??

3

I make a conscious effort to not use Christian terms to the point where people give me strange looks. Instead of “oh god” I say “oh dinosaurs”. “Sweet Jesus” is replaced by “sweet Pamela Sue Anderson”. I try to keep Christians on their toes. Lol

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I use a lot of them, mostly without much forethought, because it is habit and they have no religious meaning to me. Sometimes I refrain if I think someone might be offended by say, a Jesus Fucking Christ. However, I never say bless you to indicate good will and don't like when others say it to me. Not sure why it is more distasteful, maybe it feels more like the invocation of some spirit.

Also for sneezing I am more in the gesundheit camp, since that is what I heard growing up.

3

The thing is they are just words to us and have no meaning except as invective., just a way of letting off steam. We are not committing blasphemy as we are not believers....so keep right on!

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God damnt to fucking holy hell no, never.

'Jesus Christ on a Bicycle' is always a good one too!

3

I use Jesus Christ, but you have to say it like this:

2

I would add “Jesus, Fuck!” as one I use. Have been know to use “Oh, god” to indicate pleasure, and “God-daaaaaamn” upon seeing someone really hot.

UUNJ Level 8 Sep 11, 2018
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I like the Jesus fucking Christ, unfortunately I rarely have the opportunity to use it.

Gosh I use it all the time! You must lead a very calm life ???? because that is what I say any time when I am frustrated or annoyed ????

... and then I like to say "that's divine masturbation."

@LionMousePudding cursing and swearing exert some weird, rough charm.

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I only avoid "thank God", "God knows", and "Bless you". I use all the others, and take it as understood that it's not meant religiously. And get a blaspemous catharsis by saying "Sweet freakin' Jesus", usually from frustration, or "Sweet freaky Jesus" as an expression usually of lust.

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For christ's sake, what a stupid question! (Only kidding)

Of course I do, it's just words that have no depth to the way I use them like twat, bollocks, knobhead etc 🙂

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Jesus Christ on a pinwheel!

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I tried for a while to exorcise them from my vocabulary, but it was too much. They're simply too ingrained in me as exclamations. But I have tried to switch to "Salut!" when people sneeze. I'm not trying to bless anybody, even in German.

When I hear someone say “bless you” when I sneeze, I ask them to save their blessings for the children laying sick in hospitals. Or in cases where I know the person is catholic, I ask them to instead bless the children raped by priests. ?

Gesundheit means health.

The actual tradition in German is a bit more complicated.

"Gesundheit" (health) is what one says after the FIRST sneeze.

After the second sneeze one says "Glück" (luck).

And after the third sneeze you say "und ein langes Leben" (and a long life).

We simply demand health over and over. It is because we need single payer health care!

@LionMousePudding Ah, thanks for the correction, my apologies.

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Yes. I more use it as a culturally understood expression, though. Like "God dammit" or "Jesus Christ".

I always thought of them that way because I was never religious, so the religious origins of them were lost on me.

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I do not use any of those terms.

Why?

@LionMousePudding At one time I did. Long ago a good friend noted using the terms specific to their fantasy world pays credence to their faith based belief structure. I have managed to replace all those saying with equally colourful and graphic) secular phrases.

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A lot of these are really said out of habit. as we're younger you learn to say 'Bless you' after someone sneezes which proves the fact that it could be a religious thing is entirely irrelevant.

Personally I'm trying to get in the habbit of saying these alternatives:
'Oh... your...god!'
'Thank Darwin!'
'Gordon Gecko!'
'Darwin knows how that happened...'

Hope this helps!

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I use them all as I choose.

Religion is no more owned by a theist than by an atheist. It is a part of our history and unfortunately present as well. It's just a bunch of made up stories and it's not my problem if some people don't know better than to believe them.

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My ex wife used to say "Oh my god oh my god oh my god" as she orgasmed, I thought she meant me.

????

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I use Holy Shit a lot.

Seriously, words are words. When/if I do say them, it's out of habit.

I do use "thank the Gods" just to piss of Christians since they insist there is only one true God.

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Sure. It's just part of the shared cultural heritage. I don't use "I'll pray for you" because that personalizes it into an expression of personal religious belief. I might say "it's colder than a witch's tit" but that doesn't mean I believe in witchcraft or witches, or that in those who call themselves witches that there is some sort of thermal anomaly to their tits vs. the tits of the non-witches.

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I use most of them that you mentioned, and at one time was upset with myself for hanging on to them. After a while though, I realized that they are just words, and not literal. I might also say Kiss my ass, Go fuck yourself, stupid bitch/dickhead/asshole, etc. They are just expressions I was raised with which express emotions or meaning. Granted, I may used expletives more often than I should, but I don't think I'm promoting religion by saying such things.

1

I am fine with using religious terms in self- expression. Personal favorites include:

Christ on a crutch! - surprise and exhaustion
Fucking Hell! - variations on fuck
Good God! - exposure to a funky jam
Good Lord! - exposure to remnants of air from my vegetarian diet

I have others...

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Yep, use them all the time. They are just part of the vernacular. I can’t be arsed to eliminate them. TBH that sounds a bit extreme and as bad as people who get upset at “using the lord’s name in vain”.

Livia Level 6 Aug 12, 2018
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