Biting My Tongue

Occasionally I notice people who are constantly trying to prove that they're not afraid to speak their mind, and the result is that they are unnecessarily grating, argumentative and belligerent. Then I recognize these same traits in myself and am embarrassed.

I'm trying to get better, and sometimes I'm profoundly tested. I'm thinking of the recent visit with an old friend from my Protestant days. Again I recognized some of my traits and was embarrassed. How quick I was to feel that Catholics (or Orthodox if I had known any) who referred to what I would have called their "denominations" as "The Church" were being arrogant and judgmental. How quick I was to prove that I wasn't afraid to speak up for Jesus by subjecting them to my ignorant arrogance.

As I said, I'm trying to get better; I'm trying to keep in mind the effect my words will have on their hearers. So when my old friend graciously admitted that there were even some Orthodox who were Christians, I bit my tongue. When I was repeatedly warned about letting icons and incense become idols, I bit my tongue. When my friend's monologue turned to "the end times", the latest frothy evangelical publishing phenomenon (a book to be either forgotten and completely contradicted, or called 'a Classic' in ten years), or Pat Robertson, I bit my tongue. When I was told that even Mormons and Jehovah's Witnesses can be Christians, I bit my tongue. It was obvious that she had a different definition of Christian than I had, than most Christians have always had. For her to be a Christian you only had to to say nice things about Jesus and have good intentions. To say that somebody wasn't a Christian meant that you thought they weren't "going to heaven". This is not charitable. What would have been the point of trying to have a conversation with somebody when almost every word we shared would have to be redefined? Add to this my knowledge of my friend's set jaw and changing of the subject when met with this kind of disagreement, and we have a weekend in which I bit my tongue an awful lot.

There was one time I did speak up. My friend was going on with a not so subtle warning that having too many externals associated with your religion (with 'too many' being defined as more than she had) can lead future generations to a shallow attachment to these externals instead of having a relationship with Jesus. I pointed out that of course some will see only the externals since relationships (the internals) are invisible. But that the knee-jerk reaction of eliminating externals only results in new externals. And we're back to the same scenario in the next generation. A better solution is to do a good job of teaching the next generation about the invisible things that these externals are supposed to point to. My remarks were met with a set jaw and a changing of the subject. So I bit my tongue.