There are some who, through envy [...] belittle and slander others, especially those in the same business or profession as their own, in order to draw business to themselves. [...]
A great many people slander others because of pride. They think that by depreciating others they will increase their own worth. They want to make the most of their own alleged good qualities. Everything they say and do will be good, and everything that others say and do will be wrong.
But the bulk of malicious talk is done by people who are simply irresponsible, who have an itch to chatter about others without feeling any need to discover whether what they are saying is true or false. They just have to talk. [...]
Yes, my dear brethren, one scandelmonger poisons all the virtues and engenders all the vices. It is from that malicious tongue that a stain is spread so many times through a whole family, a stain which passes from fathers to children, from one generation to the next, and which perhaps is never effaced. The malicious tongue will follow the dead into the grave. [...]
[W]here is your charity?
Excerpts from this sermon was taken from Una Morrissy, trans.
The Sermons of the Curé of Ars (Rockford, IL: Tan Books and Publishers, 1995), 29-31.
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