# Non-Christians: Do You Curse/Swear in Christian? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [June 3, 2009, 3:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/non-christians-do-you-curse-swear-in-christian/498587 "2009-06-03T15:25:19Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 11\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Captain\_Awesome](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/a698b9/32.png) [@Captain\_Awesome](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Captain_Awesome)\ **Post date:** [June 5, 2009, 7:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/non-christians-do-you-curse-swear-in-christian/498587/41 "2009-06-05T19:40:34Z")
Blasphemy is a victimless crime. ---
**Author:** ![jayjay](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jayjay/32/6765_2.png) [@jayjay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jayjay)\ **Post date:** [June 5, 2009, 8:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/non-christians-do-you-curse-swear-in-christian/498587/42 "2009-06-05T20:02:23Z")
> [@Jack\_Batty](#): > > I got the opposite from my mother once. > > In the course of a conversation, I’d said, “God love him…” > To which her response was to leap up and wave an accusing finger, “Aha! I thought you were an atheist!” > > Got me there, mom. Well, my mother doesn’t really know I’m an unbeliever. She knows I don’t go to church anymore, but thinks I’m basically just lazy, rather than not believing in God. ---
**Author:** ![Mervyn\_Pumpkinhead](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/3ab097/32.png) [@Mervyn\_Pumpkinhead](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mervyn_Pumpkinhead)\ **Post date:** [June 7, 2009, 2:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/non-christians-do-you-curse-swear-in-christian/498587/43 "2009-06-07T02:00:08Z")
I am a Buddhist who holds animistic beliefs as well, and I use all the usual American curse/swear words, although liberally peppered with British ones too. As an aside; I find it rather annoying that people generally seem to think that the Buddha is somehow equivalent to God. We don’t believe that Buddha created anything that any other person couldn’t have. ---
**Author:** ![Malleus\_Incus\_Stapes](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/malleus_incus_stapes/32/3293_2.png) [@Malleus\_Incus\_Stapes](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Malleus_Incus_Stapes)\ **Post date:** [June 7, 2009, 2:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/non-christians-do-you-curse-swear-in-christian/498587/44 "2009-06-07T02:17:03Z")
I don’t use Christian swearwords. Heck, I don’t even use regular 'ol cusses. I make up my own “profanities” on the spot- my most common one being “flurg”. ETA: I’m Jewish. ---
**Author:** ![robardin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/43a26b/32.png) [@robardin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/robardin)\ **Post date:** [June 7, 2009, 2:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/non-christians-do-you-curse-swear-in-christian/498587/45 "2009-06-07T02:19:13Z")
Count me in as a non-Christian who has always “cursed” in Christian terms based on the local culture. I was a little surprised to meet people eventually who objected to saying so much as “Oh my God”, much less “goddamn” (something I think of as one word and with no religious overtones at all), as “taking The Lord’s name in vain”. Though I try to be respectful of that sensibility now (there’s a guy at work who’s uncomfortable with it, even as he drops the F- and S-bombs and crude sexual puns with no qualms). I did believe, or try to convince myself to believe, in things Deist if not Christian for a while, after reading a short story of Paul’s conversion, St. Augustine’s _Confessions_ and excerpts of St. Thomas Aquinas’ works. And reading the Narnia books as a child definitely primed me for that sort of thing. Then I got over it, you might say. I consciously chose to curse even more blasphemously for a while, going from simply exclaiming “Jeez” or “Jesus” or even “Jesus Christ” to “Jesus H. Christ on a crooked cross!” or “Jesus, Mary and Joseph!” That was enough beyond the usual that it drew attention though, which I guess is why I was doing it, but as so much else in my life, “I got over it”. I said “Holy Shi’ite” for a while too, which I picked up from a college roommate who’d served in the Gulf War, but dropped that after a while as it really was kind of offensive. Nowadays I occasionally drop some blasphemous reference to a now-gone religion, like “By the blood of Osiris!” (or if I feel I can get away with it, “By the Lost Dick of Osiris!”). ---
**Author:** ![Maggie\_the\_Ocelot](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/df705f/32.png) [@Maggie\_the\_Ocelot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Maggie_the_Ocelot)\ **Post date:** [June 7, 2009, 2:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/non-christians-do-you-curse-swear-in-christian/498587/46 "2009-06-07T02:24:42Z")
Having worked at Renaissance Faires for about 20 years now, I tend to curse in Elizabethan. “God’s Teeth!” “Fie!” etc. ---
**Author:** ![robardin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/43a26b/32.png) [@robardin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/robardin)\ **Post date:** [June 7, 2009, 2:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/non-christians-do-you-curse-swear-in-christian/498587/47 "2009-06-07T02:29:24Z")
> [@Oni no Maggie](#): > > Having worked at Renaissance Faires for about 20 years now, I tend to curse in Elizabethan. > > “God’s Teeth!” > “Fie!” > > etc. I thought the Elizabethans invented workarounds for saying “God” like “Od’s Bodkins”? ---
**Author:** ![Maggie\_the\_Ocelot](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/df705f/32.png) [@Maggie\_the\_Ocelot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Maggie_the_Ocelot)\ **Post date:** [June 7, 2009, 2:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/non-christians-do-you-curse-swear-in-christian/498587/48 "2009-06-07T02:37:34Z")
> [@robardin](#): > > I thought the Elizabethans invented workarounds for saying “God” like “Od’s Bodkins”? “Od’s Bodkins” is actually a reference to the consecrated communion wafers. “od’s” is of course short for “God’s” and “bodkins” translates to “little bodies.” Small pieces of God’s Body = the Host. So it wasn’t really a workaround, just a sloppy way of saying it. Like “Goddammit” instead of “God Damn It!” ---
**Author:** ![EvilTOJ](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/ee59a6/32.png) [@EvilTOJ](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/EvilTOJ)\ **Post date:** [June 7, 2009, 7:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/non-christians-do-you-curse-swear-in-christian/498587/49 "2009-06-07T07:08:19Z")
I’m quite partial to “Jesus H Roosevelt Christ”, and I’m sure **Claire Beauchamp** is, as well. ---
**Author:** ![Alessan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alessan/32/465_2.png) [@Alessan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alessan)\ **Post date:** [June 7, 2009, 3:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/non-christians-do-you-curse-swear-in-christian/498587/50 "2009-06-07T15:52:41Z")
Sure, I’ve been known to say “Jesus fucking Christ” at times; also “Allah Yerahmo.” I’m eclectic. ---
**Author:** ![Larry\_Borgia](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/larry_borgia/32/156_2.png) [@Larry\_Borgia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Larry_Borgia)\ **Post date:** [June 7, 2009, 4:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/non-christians-do-you-curse-swear-in-christian/498587/51 "2009-06-07T16:37:35Z")
I suspect blasphemous swears are probably more common among atheists than theists, as theists have to worry about the wrath of an offended God. I’m an atheist, half Christian and half Jewish by descent, I use religious swears all the time and also say things like “thank God” or “God himself could not help the Washington Nationals now.” [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/non-christians-do-you-curse-swear-in-christian/498587.md?page=2)