What’s your LEAST favorite expression?

Two of my least favorite expressions:

1) “Holy Crap!”

This really disturbs me. My kids say it all the time and I never fail to object to it when I hear it. It is such a disintegration of value and failure of perception. What could one possibly meaningfully intend by such language? The two terms have nothing in common in terms of function. What is “holy” is what is set aside for special use, what is valuable, what we cherish, even that which defines our purpose and gives us meaning. How “crap” can be thought of in such terms is beyond me. But that’s part of the problem. It’s not “thought” of.

2) “The art of war”

This hurts to hear as well. We hear it all the time. But in my view “art” is about the aesthetic drive, a striving passionately for beauty, a putting together and healing of what is broken. “War” is about breaking and fracturing the world.

I honestly don’t know how to apply this to the “Warfare” Worldview. I have to admit that in a fallen and conflicted world, there are conceivably (I suppose) conditions under which the “least ugly” thing to do is to “engage in war” (with a Hitler for example). And if that’s the best thing to do, then there’s a certain beauty to it. But at least from God’s point of view the conflict is more a struggle FOR than it is a struggle against. If that’s all one means by “Warfare” Worldview, OK. It might escape the distaste I have for the phrase “the art of war.” I don’t know.

What are some of your least favorite expressions?

Tom