Is saying "Oh my Gosh/Goodness" blasphemy?

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Agreed. We have to be mindful, though, that sometimes the ‘line’ is in a very different place for different people.

For someone with an unhealthy fetish about shoes, or simply a tendency to spend far too much money on them, to linger at a shoe shop may indeed be “dancing up to the line”. For your average Joe or Josephine with no such difficulties, it doesn’t even go near the line.
 
Joe_5859 said:
If I say “Oh fudge”, I am not thinking of the f-word because that is a word I would simply never say.
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I hear ya, Joe, but respectfully have a hard time believing that your mind does not go the the “f” word, even though “fudge” is a “f” word. LOL! Did you every notice that most alternative words for a curse word start with the same letter and are close in sounding to the “real” word?

Why “Oh fudge?” Deep down, I think you really want to say the real word!

Oh, don’t get me wrong…I do the same thing! And, at times, when the hammer hits my finger at full force, I’m not thinking of “fudge,” not hungry at that time! LOL!
 
Point being? I may really want to punch my annoying neighbour in the face, but if I refrain from doing so and instead punch a punching bag as a harmless way of dealing with those feelings, then that is perfectly acceptable.
 
LilyM said:
Point being? I may really want to punch my annoying neighbour in the face, but if I refrain from doing so and instead punch a punching bag as a harmless way of dealing with those feelings, then that is perfectly acceptable.
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Point being exactly what you posted. As you punch the bag, you are really thinking of that annoying neighbor.
 
I’m thinking of NOT punching him to be exact - and I’m punching the bag because it makes any feelings of wanting to punch him go away. Much as other people might do yoga or write in a secret journal or pray for him. It’s called catharsis. And there is nothing morally wrong with it at all.
 
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I tend to avoid using such phrases. Don’t know if it’s mortally sinful.
 
I always told my daughter “You shouldn’t be using God’s name unless you are talking to him”. Oh My Gosh and Goodness aren’t the same as God so they are okay.

My MIL, a devout Catholic, used to “Jesus, Mary and Joseph” when she was astonished by something…some things are just habits for people and perhaps could be gently corrected, but I believe you have to look at the intent behind the exclamation. A person who gets angry and says GD SOB, or whatever, probably has anger issues and needs to address that, but saying Oh my gosh is not something I’d be terribly worried about.
 
LilyM said:
I’m thinking of NOT punching him to be exact - and I’m punching the bag because it makes any feelings of wanting to punch him go away. Much as other people might do yoga or write in a secret journal or pray for him. It’s called catharsis. And there is nothing morally wrong with it at all.
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Nonetheless, you are admitting of thinking of him: “feelings of wanting to punch him go away.” I am not saying that there is anything morally wrong or right with that. Trust me, I get it. I’ve been there before too.
 
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I agree with you, Janet. I don’t mind gosh or goodness. I don’t let my kids say “jeez” though, because they drag it out and it is just too close to the name of Jesus for my personal comfort level.

I’ve discussed with my kids that some words, while not wrong, are just too close to the real thing to use. I also have to ban words like “frick” and “freakin” because they will just use them too much. If I give them an inch, they’ll take a mile, it seems. 🤭

They attend a small Christian school and any mildly inappropriate words are frowned on, like crud, cr*p, darn, etc. So I have to try and reinforce that at home, which is not easy.

But even though we can abide by the rules, I don’t necessarily think all of those “minced oaths” are sinful for others. I do think that the closer we approach holiness, the less we would say such idle words or anything that might even appear to be unwholesome.

But as someone else pointed out earlier, not everyone is at the same point in their journey and folks draw the line in different places.
 
It’s such a struggle when they are little because they mimic not just their parents, but all the other people they are exposed to! It’s been a while, but I think I had a fairly short list of words that got DD in trouble. Stupid, Idiot, and using God’s name when not talking to him were the biggies. She used to use replacement words when she got frustrated…I remember hearing “rattlesnakes” a lot…
 
ShowersofRoses said:
I agree with you, Janet. I don’t mind gosh or goodness. I don’t let my kids say “jeez” though, because they drag it out and it is just too close to the name of Jesus for my personal comfort level.
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Me too. All these words though are so close to the curse word or using “God.” When I say, “O my goodness,” (never really say gosh), I know that I am deliberately avoiding, “O my God.” It’s in my mind though. That goes for all substitute words. Gosh and goodness are only one letter away from God. Like I said before, it seems that most substitute words are so close the the “real” word. I could list a number of substitute words here and everyone will know what that word is a substitute for. Not to sound like a saint here, far from it! Just adding my 2 cents for what it’s worth.
 
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The question wasn’t whether it’s prudent or a good idea or whether you’re comfortable with it - the question was whether it is the sin of blasphemy.

I’ve yet to see a convincing argument as to why it might be.
 
The majority of posters replying to this topic have told the OP quite firmly that saying words similar to gosh and goodness is not blasphemy.
 
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