1. “Sex is sacred within the ‘confines’ of marriage.”

Ugh. Yuck! Like seriously, who came up with this? “Confines”? Really? This kind of language is a veritable invitation to encourage exploration outside of those “confines”! It paints the whole conversation about sexuality and marriage in terms of what is right and wrong and black and white rather than what is good and healthy and life-giving and AWESOME! Sex is awesome, my friends. At least mine is. Please don’t use the word “confines” to describe it.

Alternative: “there is something about sex that is irrevocably connected to covenant and intimacy, the kind of intimacy that only results from loving, committed faithfulness, the kind that Jesus demonstrated to us in his pursuit of his bride, and that we as Jesus people should also pursue in our romantic and sexual experiences. Sex really can’t be casual, even if you try to make it so. It was designed to be deeply intimate. Be intimate with the one you want to spend forever with. It’s how sex was designed, and where it results in the most lasting joy and sexual fulfillment.”

2. “Love the sinner, hate the sin.”

Yeah, we all get the concept, and I guess originally it was supposed to be a reminder that was supposed to encourage us to love broken people without judgment. It’s not heard that way anymore. The problem is, with language like this, we are still directing our “hatred” in the direction of the “sinner.” Further, sometimes “the sin” that is being spoken of is profoundly personal in nature, as when someone holds a religious position or sexual orientation that you might consider out of God’s will for their lives… i.e., “sinful.” Of course we should have a certain hatred toward the “sins” that destroy us all, but it comes off as deeply patronizing to say it that way, and the phrase has often been used as an excuse, particularly with our LGBTQ brothers and sisters, to batter them over the head while not really applying the same “hate the sin” ethos to our own failures and shortcomings. “Love Jesus and hate the sin” has been a mantra for generations of preachers gone by, but the phrase as such does not appear in the Bible. Perhaps our mission should be characterized more by fighting for what we love than it is fighting against what we hate (shameless paraphrase of Rose’s last words in The Last Jedi)].

Alternative: “love people, all people, because we are all sinners, and we all need grace and mercy from God. We recognize ‘sin’ as a system in the world as something to be hated, and ‘sins’ in one another as our own flawed ways of coping with our own deep brokenness. We don’t aim to be the morality cop in everyone else’s life, but hope to lead one another to Jesus and let him restore us all together in community, in his image, and on his schedule.”

3. “Their sin is no different than yours or mine.”

Again, usually directed at the LGBTQ community. And I get it — this is a giant step forward from the near-unison chorus of most evangelical churches just a few decades ago that usually presented homosexuality as near the very top of the “sinfulness spectrum.” Here’s my question: why are we so obsessed with defining and naming “their sin”? “They,” in sweeping majorities, aren’t even coming in the front door of our churches, so perhaps we should talk more about how to deal with our judgmental attitudes that keep the gay community feeling profoundly unwelcome in our worship gatherings, and less about “how to deal with their sin.” How about like this… love your gay friend just like you would literally anybody else. Be Jesus to them. Serve them and don’t judge them. Ask questions and seek understanding. Honor the spark of God in them. Don’t belittle their faith because they disagree with you about sexuality.

Alternative: “we all sin. Often we don’t even realize that our sin is sin. I’m here for you no matter what to help point you to Jesus. I’m willing to be wrong and to engage questions and conversations that are awkward and uncomfortable for me. I will love you always with the love of Jesus, regardless of if you ever change your mind or your sexual choices to match my view of the subject.”

4. “The Judeo-Christian principles our nation was founded upon.”

This one is my personal (least) favorite. It’s tired, horribly cliche, cringingly patronizing toward Jews (couldn’t you say Judeo-Christian-Islamic-Deist principles just as easily?), and most importantly, patently untrue. Even if it were, winning a culture war rarely results in winning a soul. Far too often our friends, neighbors, co-workers, and social media followers know about our political stances on issues before they know what we love about Jesus, or even than who we are as people.

America was founded upon the principles of religious liberty for all, certainly, freedom from an oppressive monarchy, and, frankly, no taxation without representation, none of which are particularly Biblical or Christian ideas. Certainly many, many of the founding fathers’ convictions were informed by their Christian faith, but if anything, America was founded on the principles of the Enlightenment more than anything else. It’s not like the founders were even considering 95% of the issues that are considered major moral issues today: gay marriage, abortion, prayer in schools, transgender bathrooms, civil rights, women’s rights… there was literally no such thing as a modern discussion about any of this 250 years ago. There were plenty of those first generations that were neither Jewish nor Christian and besides… why do we care so much what the founding fathers wanted anyway? The most “enlightened” of them were still in sweeping majority slave-holding, bigoted chauvinists, by any modern standard. The goal as either Americans or Christians should never be to restore some mythical “golden age” (that the founders never claimed to have achieved), but rather, especially as people of faith, that “justice would roll down like waters, and righteousness as a mighty stream” (Amos 5:24).

Or, to put it in non-Biblical, America-specific vernacular:

“liberty and justice for all.”

5. “I’m voting for the pro-life candidate.”

Are you, though? Real talk — if you want to immediately paint yourself as a close-minded Christian to friends and neighbors you are trying to share your faith with, go ahead and lead with this line. We have to be better at first thinking through, then in articulating, why we vote for the people and policies we vote for, or we risk losing our integrity as people of faith worth giving the time of day to.

Alternative: “the abortion issue is a big deal to me. I can’t fathom voting for someone that thinks abortion should be legal because, from my point of view, abortion seems tantamount to infanticide. Sometimes I even vote for politicians I personally find distasteful because I’m hopeful that their policies will help reduce the overall abortion rate in America. What is it about liberal policies that makes you so passionate about voting for those politicians?”

Maybe even a better approach: leave politics out of your conversations about God altogether. Why do the two have to involve one another at all?

Catchphrases may have worked well in the past — I can’t speak to that — but that age, if it ever existed, is quickly passing away. We as people of faith need to be better about listening, about building relationships with people — because it’s not about the relationship, not religion, right?

In our world of 140 character tweets, high-speed internet, and dating via “swipe right,” people still crave connection, deep friendships, and real relationships. No one wants to be a number, or viewed as just one indistinguishable “they” of “the gay community” or “brainwashed liberals” or “non-Christians” or “all Muslims.” None of these groups are homogenous, as much as we humans like to box people into manageable groups to understand them better. People are people are people, and we need language that is including and welcoming, not exclusive and marginalizing. Even if these phrases describe how you feel, they aren’t helpful, and rather than soundbite your entire worldview toward an entire group of people into 3-second snippets, let’s take a step back, ask questions, and listen for a change.