Quebecois tabernacle and the 2nd commandment

[Digitnomy]

I recently discovered that the Canadian French slang for “tabernacle” is used as a curse word. Does this use violate the second commandment?

I tend to think not. Any curse word is meant to offend someone, so if used at all great care should be taken. This is especially true of a curse word meant to offend the Church, and I can’t think of any good reason to use it (if I ever spoke French).

However I would argue this is not taking the Lord’s name in vain. Pre-Christian Jews and the early Church had a little bit of an obsession with names (and numbers for that matter). Using the structure where the Lord resides in the Eucharist as a curse word may be sinful in a variety of ways, but I don’t think early Christians would have seen it as violating the Holy Name.

I’d like to hear what others think about this, as I’ve never seen it discussed and I could be missing something.

 

[JulianN]

I’ll just add that “chalice” is also a swear word in Québécois.

 

[Phemie]

I’ll just add that “chalice” is also a swear word in Québécois.

And ciborium, and sacrament, and Host, etc., etc. My father would call it “playing with the priest’s dishes” and it was a no-no in our home. Nowadays with the abysmal Church attendance few of the younger people even know what those words mean. In 2006 the Archbishop of Montreal undertook a billboard campaign to teach them the meanings of words they learned in their highchair.

 

[HomeschoolDad]

I am familiar with “sacre” and the phenomenon of using religious terms as curse words. I have to think it is at least mildly sacrilegious. It strikes us as odd in American culture, but one has to keep in mind that this comes from a culture that was Catholic down to its bone and marrow — a blueprint for what all cultures should be (minus the very real oppression that took place in the name of religion). It is not surprising that liturgical swear words could emerge from such a culture. Also, the name of the Virgin was used as a swear word (I won’t rewrite it here).

 

[Phemie]

Also, the name of the Virgin was used as a swear word (I won’t rewrite it here).

Yeah, that’s covered under my etc., etc.

There’s a joke from my much younger days where a guy is “sacre-ing” and ends a whole string of words with “smoke” because he didn’t know the word “thurible” and didn’t want to omit anything.