[Redway]

Originally Posted by Redway

A theme that I keep coming back to, because a lot of people seem to have these experiences. Gossip is not a Christian value. Engaging in indiscreet talk about people you barely know in a public capacity for the sake of spiritual chastisement makes you every bit as bad as the people you’re criticising for having gone the wrong way spiritually (as you believe). Y’all are both sinners in the eyes of God. And on a personal level, adding to collective gaslighting and smear-campaigning of someone is a bigger evil than … whatever petty thing you’re accusing them of from your pharisaically hypocritical point of view. We don’t call out religious hypocrisy and one-sided, super-judgemental dogmatism enough in this life.

Until you have the respect for the person to go to them themselves and tell them your corners, you are not innocently adding to the spitfire of sole spiritual concern. You are gossiping. And church-gossips are hardly any better than regular gossips. Commenting on situations and people you don’t have full knowledge of or about is … really not the one. But if you’re going to do it, say it in a discreet, closed bubble that can dissipate beyond the planes of the Earth faster than a maprotilene-balloon powered by tranylcypromine-hydrazine and aero-rocket fuel. Say it and let it go into thin air. Don’t broadcast it on Zoom or to anyone who’ll listen. What you think you know might not even be true. You might be very sure of what you think but it might just be a delusion, myth or grotesquely-exaggerated half-truth of the time.

Like, Proverbs 20:19. Unbridled gossip is a sin.