You shall not spread a false report. You shall not join hands with a wicked man to be a malicious witness… Keep far from a false charge, and do not kill the innocent and righteous, for I will not acquit the wicked.—Ex 23:1, 7.
This is a made up story, but imagine a Catholic woman named Nancy is flanked in her condo to the west by a married woman named Sandy and to the east by a married man named Steve. Imagine she sees Sandy leaving Steve’s condo at 10pm one night.
The next day, Nancy puts on the Next Door app: “Very interesting that a certain Sandy is leaving Steve’s place with big smile on her face at 10pm. Guess marriage vows mean nothing in the Anthem Condo complex!” Because she is a Catholic, she thinks she has technically avoided any sin of calumny if she’s wrong, but somehow gets first dibs on the gossip if she is correct. At least she gets the dopamine hit to make up for her insecurity.
Now imagine the truth of this whole situation was really that Steve was bringing cookies to Sandy’s husband who was dying of cancer. But Nancy implied to the entire neighborhood that Sandy was committing adultery against Steve. It would have simply been the mortal sin of detraction if she had been correct. But being wrong, it was doubly-evil. This way, it was the mortal sin of calumny (lying about another.) Such is the truth, even if she said it implicitly, not explicitly.
Some might say at this point: “No, she didn’t technically say Sandy committed adultery with Steve, so she is good according to moral theology.” But you would be wrong in that assertion. The Holy Spirit says through the Apostle Paul: God will not be mocked. (Gal 6:7.) You see, God is not a computer-program who you can hack with word-games or loopholes. The fact is that we will answer to God not only for what we say, but also for what people take away from our words. We will answer to God not only for what we say of others via denotation, but also via connotation.
Or, if that is too theoretical, ask yourself a practical question: What do you think Sandy’s particular judgment will look like? What if Sandy committed no other sins her whole life except that one Next Door app post? Well, the answer is that her judgment will be lightning-quick just moments after cardiac arrest.
There, she will see Jesus Christ in all of His glory, and He will judge her not only for the words of that Next Door post intention, but even for all the unintended outcomes. Or rather, I should say, the outcomes she feigned to be unintended. Of course Nancy wanted people to believe Sandy and Steve were committing adultery. Otherwise she wouldn’t have posted it. But we can’t fool God. That’s why I wrote above: God will not be mocked.
The saints are clear: We will go naked before God in our particular judgment and there will be no opportunity to argue or make excuses. Every one of our words, with all of their echos into eternity, will be exposed and amplified to the point where we will have no more chance to beg for mercy. We will not have time as we stand before the Truth Himself to explain we only posted something implicitly, not explicitly.
Rather, we know from the Bible, the Saints and the Magisterium that we will answer to God not only for the denotation of words that we speak against others, but even the connotation. (English refresher: Denotation is defined as the literal or primary meaning of a word where connotation is defined as an idea or feeling that a word invokes.)
We will answer to God for any implications or insinuations that we say or write against other people. Yet still, most Catholics I see on social media (including those with huge followings) somehow believe they can imply things against others.
For example, I see Catholics accusing other Catholics of “schism” (which is an accusation of mortal sin. If the accuser is wrong, the accuser will go to hell for that.) Or another example: One new Catholic convert is even telling millions of her followers that another Christian woman murdered her own husband. Yet she has provided no real evidence for any of this.
I don’t know their intentions for such insinuations, but I believe that most Catholics have come to the erroneous conclusion that they can play word-games around the eighth commandment as long as they don’t cross an imaginary literal line. But God obviously exacts common-sense from His sons and daughters, not word-games as if we were lawyers.
Also, remember your confessions on the 8th commandment will be invalid until you make public reparation for any sins against the 8th commandment (implicit or explicit.) This is what the infallible Roman Catechism of Trent says about reparation being tied to a good confession:
Furthermore, these are conditions to which man is bound to yield obedience; for the law to which man is subject, be it natural, divine, or human, he is bound to obey. If, therefore, by force or fraud, the penitent has taken anything from his neighbor, he is bound to restitution. Likewise if, by word or deed he has injured his neighbor’s honor or reputation, he is under an obligation of repairing the injury by procuring him some advantage or rendering him some service. Well known to all is the maxim of St. Augustine: The sin is not forgiven unless what has been taken away is restored.
St. Thomas Aquinas writes in the Summa Theologiae II-II Q 111 about dissimulation (pretending) and hypocrisy: “It belongs to the virtue of truth to show oneself outwardly by outward signs to be such as one is. Now outward signs are not only words, but also deeds. Accordingly just as it is contrary to truth to signify by words something different from that which is in one’s mind, so also is it contrary to truth to employ signs of deeds or things to signify the contrary of what is in oneself, and this is what is properly denoted by dissimulation. Consequently dissimulation is properly a lie told by the signs of outward deeds.”
St. Thomas Aquinas then continues in that same section on the need for simplicity in our speech: “Wherefore it belongs directly to simplicity to guard oneself from deception, and in this way the virtue of simplicity is the same as the virtue of truth as stated above. There is, however, a mere logical difference between them, because by truth we mean the concordance between sign and thing signified, while simplicity indicates that one does not tend to different things, by intending one thing inwardly, and pretending another outwardly.”
Finally, we get to the topic of repeating another’s gossip, be it orally or digitally. What is so wrong about repeating a false-accusation? How can you be responsible for that? Because the Catholic Church has always taught that you are an accomplice to sin by one of nine ways:
1. By counsel
2. By command
3. By consent
4. By provocation
5. By praise or flattery
6. By concealment
7. By partaking
8. By silence
9. By defense of the ill done.
Looking at the above list, I can write with confidence that simply repeating (or retweeting) another’s lie against another is sinning mortally by 3) consent and by 4) provocation and by 7) partaking and by 9) defense of the ill done.
I failed at this myself at least once since I got on social media. Several years ago, when I was new to social media, I briefly retweeted something of that Covington Catholic high-school kid being a racist against a Native American at the March for Life in Wash DC. However, when I realized it was a trap set by a leftist agitator, I quickly deleted my post or repost. Even though it was only up for a short time, I still brought this to confession. I also made public reparation (including this article) in admitting I was wrong. (Nick, if you ever see this, I’m very sorry for repeating a lie against you, even though I had relatively few followers at the time. Also, I’m glad you won all your lawsuits against mainstream media outlets like CNN.)
So you must ask, as I did: Is it worth playing Russian Roulette with your soul on social media by making implications against others on social media? Is your soul worth the balancing act between direct accusation and implicit insinuation when it comes the eighth commandment? Is it worth even a 50-50 chance you might be wrong on retweets or reposts you make? What if you’re only 90% sure a person be guilty? Maybe a 10% chance of hell is still worth texting a few friends a questionable video with an enormous claim?
Or, do you think God will be mocked by things like “Well yeah I only said it implicitly, but not explicitly…so I think I’m good in my last confession where I left it out.” It is certainly worth contemplating the fact that at the end of time during the General Judgment we will see everything written and hear everything spoken both by denotation and connotation and all their effects in everyone else’s lives, even those we have never met.
No, you’re not “good to go” if you’re making insinuations of mortal sin against others without solid evidence. If social media is endangering your salvation, you better quit it. God will not be mocked by your word-games, whether you have five followers or five million.
Thank you to donors.