A call to put down our weapons… of words
The Catholic Church has just launched a message that resonates like a bell ringing amidst the noise. It does not speak about doctrine, but about the air we breathe every day: our language. Through his editorial Desde la Fe, he makes an urgent call to “disarm” the vocabulary we use. His diagnosis is clear: we have turned the public square into a battlefield where words are projectiles.
“Public discussion is a sterile battlefield. It is discredited before listening, it is labeled before understanding, it is shouted more than there is dialogue,” the text points out.
Imagine for a second that alternate scenario they propose. What would happen if we stopped insulting people in politics? What if someone who thinks differently were not automatically an enemy, but rather an interlocutor? The question is not rhetorical; It is an invitation to a radical change of script.
Language creates trenches
The most powerful thing about his reflection is to remind us that language is not harmless. Create atmospheres. And in that rarefied atmosphere, any space—home, work, the stands—can become a trench from which we fire phrases to hurt.
The message goes straight to the heart of the problem: our inability to listen. The editorial staff, made up of priests and lay journalists, insists that true progress begins with everyday gestures:
“Speak honestly, treat with dignity, do not lie to win, do not humiliate to prevail.”
It is a profound claim at a time where the debate seems reduced to shouting and disqualifications. They do not ask for legal reform, but for personal conversion. Listen to the one who suffers in silence. Listen before responding. Observe a moment of silence before replying angrily.
Its conclusion is hopeful, but requires effort: if political leaders lowered their tone and chose dialogue, our coexistence would be different. The call is made. Now it remains to be seen if anyone is willing to leave verbal weapons on the table.
