The Priest at Prayer for July 28, Moderation in Speech

The Third Part - Vices and Virtues

Moderation in Speech

First Meditation - Motives

I. Let us bypass the great defects: blasphemy, cursing, perjury, obscenity. . . we are dealing in terms of Christian and priestly perfection. All the while, how­ever, let us be alive to the possibility of our easily stooping to calumny or of becoming an accomplice and thorough-going purveyor of calumny.

Of this possibility there is observable, even in pious people, in religious, in priests, a symptom that is unmistakable: the tendency to disbelieve or give little adherence to the good that is reported of our neighbour. We want substantial evidence, we fear an exaggeration; and even when a thorough investigation establishes the fact, we begin to query our neighbour's good intentions; or else we forget the good report, as being of trivial importance.

The evil we hear, on the other hand, would seem to commend itself to our ready acceptance; we are inclined to take it almost as an article of faith at the first intimation; one witness is enough, no matter how little trustworthy; or rather, we have no need of witnesses, we don't want them; the slightest rumour commands our assent with­out our going to the trouble of asking from what low­down haunts the pestilential breath of gossip arose.

Why should this be? Belief belongs to a great extent to the will - motus voluntatis - so we believe what we wish to believe; and thus we believe the evil about our neigh­bour because it gives us a sort of joy and satisfaction, whereas we reject belief in the good because in some way it pains us to see our neighbour possessed of some­thing good, it clashes with our own self-interests; there­fore we are more pleased to hear evil of our neighbour than good.

Such are the pious instincts we harbour in our hearts, however much we try to camouflage them with the holiest of appearances.

If this analysis corresponds to facts, would it not be enough to make any rightminded person reject off-hand all imputation of blame against his neighbour? At least, in the words of Fr. Avila, until he had given to the accused or calumniated thirty days in which to defend himself? Even the greatest criminal is not denied this right by the law of the land.

II. The tongue is one of the bodily members subject to the sovereign jurisdiction of the will, its acts are com­manded by the will - actus imperati - like those of the hands and the feet; and more so than the acts of eyes, ears, and imagination. The tongue is in bondage to the free will.

But the free will in all its operations, elicited and commanded, should be governed by the dictates of right reason and moral principle; and the tongue is no excep­tion.

Consequently, every word that strays from this simple and obvious rule is to be considered morally defective, a sin; more or less grievous according to the speaker's intentions, the gravity of the matter, and other circumstances.

In the light of this plain reasoning, how clearly I see the distance I have to travel before I acquire mastery over the tongue's domain! A domain of insignificant dimensions, it would appear, but a domain vast enough for the tongue to run amok as a slave, not to reason or faith, but to caprice, to a riotous imagination, or to the basest appetites of lust, envy, and anger!

III. Many advantages accrue from the right use of the tongue. Prudence, for example.

"Where least is said, most prudence is." (Prov. x, 19)

And prudence is the standard measure for all human life; without prudence the good becomes weakness and turns into evil.

Peace of mind is another advantage:

"Guard lips and tongue, as thou wouldst guard thy life from peril." (Prov. xxi, 23)

Peace of mind is imperilled, countless griefs gnaw the heart, when the tongue goes unchecked. Which of us has never known the torture of an untimely or imprudent word, that could not be taken back?

And which of us would have suspected that Christian perfection, that high estate to which our Divine Lord so eagerly invites us, could be purchased at the small price of keeping the tongue under control? Yet that is the mind of the Apostle St. James:

"A man who is not betrayed into any faults of the tongue must be a man perfect at every point." (James iii, 2)

IV. Let us follow up the thoughts of St. James concerning the tongue's tremendous power for evil, as he sets them down in the lively third chapter of his Canonical Epistle. The unrestrained tongue produces evils beyond computation, but this is what he says: to curb the tongue is to curb the whole body, just as by putting a curb in their mouths we can make horses obey us and we can turn their whole bodies this way and that; just as with a tiny rudder a huge ship, driven along by boisterous winds, is steered by the ship's pilot in the direction he wills; just as a small spark is enough to set fire to a vast forest.

And this, precisely, is what the tongue is: a raging fire, fire caught from hell itself, a fire that devastates the whole course of our lives. Every­thing that is harmful seems to find its natural abode in the ungoverned tongue. It defies all mere human effort to tame it down. It is a pest that is never allayed, all deadly poison, a source of infection to the whole body.

Why should this be? asks the Apostle. Why should we use it to bless God our Father, and at the same time use it to curse our fellow men, who were made in God's image? Blessing and cursing from the same mouth!

"My brethren, there is no reason in this. Does the fountain gush out fresh and salt water from the same outlet? . . . can a fig-tree yield olives, or a vine figs? No more easily will brackish water yield fresh." (Cfr. James iii, 1-12.)

If these terrible truths remained only on paper! But is it not truer to say that they are engraved on my life with the corrosive ink of the many ravages that immoderation in speech has inflicted upon me?

With subtle discernment the same Apostle singles out the good or evil use of the tongue as the mark of true or false piety:

"If anyone deludes himself by thinking he is serving God, when he has not learned to control his tongue, the service he gives is vain." (James i, 26)

Resolutions
1. I shall attach far greater importance to short­comings of the tongue, examining them more seriously and frequently at night, taking them as subject matter for my weekly confession, and, if needs be, making my daily panicular examen before my midday and evening meals on this particular weakness of mine if I find it hard to cure.

2. Seeing that, according to St. James, "no human being has ever found out how to tame the tongue", I shall ask God for this mercy, knowing that "it is the part of man to prepare the soul, and of the Lord to govern the tongue". (Prov. xvi, 1).

I shall beg God to hold my tongue in check, and not to permit the monstrosity of its being used at one and same time to bless Him and to curse man, who is made to His image and likeness. When any special danger looms ahead I shall try to forestall lapses of the tongue by reciting the words of the psalm:

Pone, Domine, custodiam ori meo, et ostium circumstantiae labiis meis; non declines cor meum in verba malitiae ad excusandas excusationes in peccatis. (Ps. cxl, 3-4)

"Lord, set a guard on my mouth, post a sentry before my lips; do not turn my heart towards thoughts of evil that point the way to wrong-doing."
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Adapted from The Priest at Prayer
by Fr. Eugenio Escribano, C.M. (© 1954)
Translated by B.T. Buckley, C.M.

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Please pray for our priests and pray for vocations to the priesthood!