Expletive Awe
“Holy Fuck!” is quite possibly one of the strangest, most expressive expletives I know. I usually hear it in my head with a British accent, I am guessing because I’ve never heard an American say it. This probably, also, is in part due to a scene in “Notting Hill” when the muppety red head sister meets Anna Scott (Julia Roberts) for the first time in the midst of telling some random story why she is late to her own birthday party, looks up and sees Anna Scott and says, “Holy Fuck!” followed by tender praise and adoration of her.
It is the combination of the two words together that make it so perfect for me.
“Holy” - representing that which is dedicated or consecrated to God, something that has no other place but in the realm of the Divine.
“Fuck” - mostly having its origins as a shortening of the phrase “For Unlawful Carnal Knowledge,” but carrying with it all the taboo, dirty, harsh, negative connotations we’ve come to associate with it; also, a raw if not uncomfortable way of describing sex that has intimacy that lacks knowing.
Bring these two ideas together and you get the weight of the phrase. The sacred divine smashing into the utterly raw human, the purest form of being known with the intimate state of unknowing, when bent humanity meshes with the Divine extraordinary. It says it all. And it is usually why I only find myself saying out loud or in my head alone in the quiet morning or late nights before God. Not exactly what most people would consider “prayer” but then again, most people aren’t sure what they consider prayer in the first place. Regardless, it’s become more and more a phrase that slips out when I encounter the Divine in a manner that is utterly beyond any expectation or perception, and is simply, profoundly down to earth tangible… human.
"Indeed, Every event that occasions reverence also participates in ultimate truth. Reverence is the beginning and the end of everything." Kushner
It is the combination of the two words together that make it so perfect for me.
“Holy” - representing that which is dedicated or consecrated to God, something that has no other place but in the realm of the Divine.
“Fuck” - mostly having its origins as a shortening of the phrase “For Unlawful Carnal Knowledge,” but carrying with it all the taboo, dirty, harsh, negative connotations we’ve come to associate with it; also, a raw if not uncomfortable way of describing sex that has intimacy that lacks knowing.
Bring these two ideas together and you get the weight of the phrase. The sacred divine smashing into the utterly raw human, the purest form of being known with the intimate state of unknowing, when bent humanity meshes with the Divine extraordinary. It says it all. And it is usually why I only find myself saying out loud or in my head alone in the quiet morning or late nights before God. Not exactly what most people would consider “prayer” but then again, most people aren’t sure what they consider prayer in the first place. Regardless, it’s become more and more a phrase that slips out when I encounter the Divine in a manner that is utterly beyond any expectation or perception, and is simply, profoundly down to earth tangible… human.
"Indeed, Every event that occasions reverence also participates in ultimate truth. Reverence is the beginning and the end of everything." Kushner