January 3 is the Feast of the Most Holy Name of Jesus.
It’s a good day to remember the Second Commandment: You shall not take the name of the Lord, your God, in vain. (Exodus 20:7) This commandment is probably the most forgotten and most violated of the ten; everywhere you go you will hear the phrases “Oh my God,” “Jesus Christ,” and their variations almost constantly, and definitely not in the context of prayer or praise to God.
The sad fact is that even Christians habitually sin against the second commandment by misusing the holy name of God and of Jesus.
Misuse of God’s name offends Him and gives a bad example to the people around us: consider what St. Paul wrote to the church in Rome: The name of God is blasphemed among the Gentiles because of you. (Romans 2:24)
Here are 3 simple things you can do to increase your own devotion to God’s name and help foster obedience to the second commandment:
1 – Make a slight bow or nod of the head at every audible mention of the name of Jesus, especially during Mass or the recitation of the rosary.
2 – When making the sign of the cross, don’t say, “Father, Son, Holy Spirit” and wave your hand around like you’re brushing away flies. Make the gesture carefully and reverently, clearly pronouncing each word: “In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.”
3 – Say “Blessed be God. Blessed be his holy name” or “Blessed be the name of Jesus” in reparation every time you hear or accidentally utter an offense against the second commandment. If it is prudent, say it out loud with the same volume as the offense. Otherwise simply say it quietly. This habit alone will sensitize you to the rampant misuse of God’s name: you may start to wince as, wherever you go, you hear the name of someone you love being thrown in the dirt. Keep at it, though, and you will find yourself slipping up less and less, and often the people around you will start to modify their speech.
This third suggestion is, in my experience, the most effective of the three. I got the idea from the Catholic Children’s Treasure Box booklets. These books were first published in the 1950s, so they are somewhat outdated and sometimes too syrupy for my taste, for mostly they are very sweet. In booklet 8 there’s a charming story about a little girl who asks what “taking the Lord’s name in vain” means and what she can do to better honor the holy name of God. The person she’s talking to suggests that every time she hears someone utter God’s name as an expression of dismay, peevishness, anger, and so on, she should say, “Blessed be God, blessed be his holy name” or “Blessed be the name of Jesus.”
I taught my children to do this, and mostly they follow through. When we’re watching a show or a movie together, and someone blurts out “OMG!”, it always warms my heart to hear a little chorus of “Blessed be God, blessed be his holy name!” from the children.
Andy Eells also makes some excellent points in his essay “His Name” from his booklet The Catholic Challenge:
In current times, it is necessary to address the negative use of God’s name. Christians can hardly expect others to abe attracted to our faith, or even to respect our faith, if our speech is casually disrespectful of our own God. And if it is true that God hears whenever we use his name, what does he hear us say? In the first place, are we really even thinking of God when we use his name? If not, isn’t that rather like placing a phone call and then hanging up when the other party answers? Truly, it is not conducive to intimacy with God to continually “hang up the phone” on him.
Slipshod use of phrases such as “for God’s sake” and “oh, my God” to express personal outrage, surprise, or shock should be studiously avoided. These phrases are nearly always spoken with no thought of their literal meaing. Even more serious an error is using the names “Jesus” or “Christ” separately or together as a personal exclamation about mundane topics like high prices, or automobile traffic. (Dr. Lester Sumrall thinks we should even avoid the use of abbreviations like “gee,” which is really derived from “Jesus.” It can also be observed that under stress, “gee” slips into “Jesus” with great ease.)
If you’re in the habit of using the Lord’s name wrongly, make a resolution today to break that habit by implement the three suggestions above. The Catechism (para 2144) says, Respect for his name is an expression of the respect owed to the mystery of God himself and to the whole sacred reality it evokes. (Copyright 2008 by Clare Siobhan)
Links
Catholic Children’s Treasure Box
https://www.tanbooks.com/index.php/page/shop:flypage/product _id/474/
Note: Andy Eells’s booklet, The Catholic Challenge, appears to be out of print. It was published in 1990 by Max Cotto Books. I couldn’t find any resources on the internet, but the mailing address for Max Cotto Books is 2322 E. Oakland Park Blvd., Fr. Lauderdale, FL 33306. Don’t confuse this booklet with a similarly titled book by Thomas W. Rezanka: The Catholic Challenge: A Question of Conscience. Rezanka’s book promotes dissident Catholic ideology and the website for the book (thecatholicchallenge.com) links to dissident groups Call to Action and Voice of the Faithful.
I quoted extensivelly from Eells’s booklet in a recent series of articles on honoring Sunday: 5 Things Catholics Can Do to Keep the Sabbath Holy (part one, part two, part three, part four, part five)
“O Lord, our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth!” (Psalm 8:1)
