Gossip!

[Martin Cohen]

though this had nothing to do with me, a recent post on this forum by a member seemed to be conveying second-hand experience, questioning the integrity of another. These posts usually start with something like "I heard somewhere..."

This reminded me of the movie "Doubt", specifically the sermon at Mass by Father Flynn (played by Philip Seymour Hoffman). Father Flynn's sermon:

"A woman was gossiping with a friend about a man she hardly knew, I know none of you have ever done this. That night she had a dream, a great hand appeared over her, and pointed down at her. She was immediately seized with an overwhelming sense of guilt. The next day she went to confession, she got the old parish priest, Father O'Rourke. She told him the whole thing.

"Is gossiping a sin?" she asked the old man. "Was that the hand of God almighty pointing the finger at me? Should I be asking your absolution Father? Tell me, have I done something wrong?"

"Yes!" Father O'Rourke answered her. "Yes, you ignorant badly brought up female. You've borne false witness against your neighbor. You've played fast and loose with his reputation, and you should be heartily ashamed."

So, the woman said she was sorry, and asked for forgiveness.

"Not so fast" says O'Rourke. "I want you to go home, take a pillow up on your roof, cut it open with a knife, and return here to me."

So the woman went home, took a pillow off her bed, a knife from the drawer, went up the fire escape to her roof and stabbed the pillow. Then she went back to the old parish priest as instructed.

"Did you gut the pillow with your knife?" he says.

"Yes father"

"and what was the result?"

"Feathers" she said

"Feathers" he repeated

"Feathers everywhere, Father"

The priest instructed her "Now, I want you to go back and gather up every last feather that flew out on the wind."

"Well" she said "it can't be done, I don't know where they went, the wind took them all over"

"And that," said Father O'Rourke "IS GOSSIP!"

The story is wonderfully conveyed in a clip from DOUBT at: