Previously, we discussed St. Thomas Aquinas’ article on ‘whether it is lawful to curse anyone?’  We went step by step with St. Thomas to better understand his manner of debate throughout his Summa Theologica.  Some complained that the plodding, and the scarcity of practical examples, put them to sleep.  Others, however, were able to take something home. 

One man summed it, “so Father, basically, I can curse anyone just so long as he deserves it.”

This is true, but one must be certain a curse is truly deserved and is truly good and not simply a way to get even.  We may NEVER desire evil under the aspect of evil, but only under the aspect of the good.  The Church curses with “anathema sit” (let him be accursed) in order to draw a heretic back to God and His Church; the prophets cursed to inspire sinners to repent; the virtuous man may curse a sinner with sickness or some inconvenience so that he return to God or at least cease from harming the common good. 

So suppose a certain pro-abort politician runs for office.  We may desire he get laryngitis before his next debate.  We may curse him with this physical evil; we may not hand him a poison drink. Cursing wills some physical evil to another; results of that evil are left to God.      

Now we present, in brief, St. Thomas Aquinas’ three last articles on cursing.

Whether it is lawful to curse an irrational creature?
St. Thomas first presents that our Lord cursed the fig tree (Mt 21:19); and Job cursed the day he was born. (Job 3:1)

Next, St. Thomas observes that blessing (bene dicere) and cursing (male dicere), properly speaking, regard things to which good or evil may happen, namely, to rational creatures, while good or evil are said to happen to things (irrational creatures) in so far as they affect a rational creature.

St. Thomas lists three ways that cursing irrational creatures may relate to rational creatures.
First, by way of ministration, wherein things relate to the service mankind, as when the Lord told Adam, “Cursed is the earth in thy labor,”so that its barrenness would be a punishment for Adam’s sin. 

Second, by way of signification, wherein things represent something else, as when our Lord cursed the fig tree to signify the cursing of Judea.
 
Third, by way of time or place, wherein these relate to some misfortune, as when Job cursed the day of his birth on account of original sin which he contracted in birth and consequent suffering. 

However, to curse irrational creatures considered as creatures of God is a sin of blasphemy; and to curse them considered in themselves is idle and vain and, therefore, unlawful.

Whether cursing is a mortal sin?   
St. Thomas says here we only consider the evil words as uttered against someone by way of command or desire.

 To wish or to command evil to another for evil’s sake is against charity wherein we ought to will good to all men.  Consequently, cursing in the strict sense is a mortal sin; it is also a greater mortal sin to curse someone who is owed more love and respect, “He that curses his father or his mother, dying let him die.” (Lv 20:9).

Sometimes cursing is only venial sin because of the slightness of the evil invoked, or because the sentiments of the curser reduce the crime as when someone curses in a heated moment, in jest, in hastiness, in thoughtlessness, or other cause which diminishes the intention to curse strictly. 

Whether cursing is a graver sin than backbiting?
St. Thomas reminds us that evil is divided two ways, there is evil of fault and evil of punishment.    To speak evil of fault is worse than to speak evil of punishment.  Reviling, backbiting, and derision all speak evil of fault whereas he who curses does so to punish someone or something.  Moreover, the way of speaking is not the same.  Evil of fault is asserted as being present whereas with cursing the evil is commanded or merely wished.  

Speaking of someone’s fault is a sin in as much as it inflicts an injury to him; and it is more injurious to inflict an injury than to wish to inflict it, other things being equal.

Hence, backbiting is more grievous than cursing which expresses only desire; BUT cursing by way of command, since it has an aspect of a cause, will be more or less grievous than backbiting according as it injures more or less than backbiting or the blackening of a man’s good name. 

Of course, what has been said regards things in their essential aspects; there may be other incidental points which make more or less grave the differences between these vices i.e., scandal.

Now that finishes St. Thomas’s tract on cursing.

Now here are some practical applications.
If we curse people, it will be unlikely that we do so in the formal sense.  Likely, we are simply blowing off steam.  And although this be perhaps only a venial sin, it is still unworthy of heaven.

It is never licit to desire evil under the aspect of evil. Even in a heated moment we must ultimately desire heaven for our adversary whom, at that moment, may even be our spouse..  Even now, before any heated moment should arrive, we should prepare our response, “Oh, go to heaven! And the quicker the better,” and not that other phrase which may too easily come mind.  

If we curse things, it will be unlikely that we do so because we hate the things that God has made, but rather because these things are not serving us in the manner we want them to and so we curse them in themselves. 
When I was a young boy there lived next door a neighbor who was a great curser of things.  Often he piddled around his back yard doing this and that, mowing, tree clipping, reading a newspaper.  If it was too hot, he’d curse the sun; if the rain was unwanted, he’d curse the rain; if the garden was weedy, the greenery got cursed; and if a bee decided to sting him, he’d sting the bee with a string of curses.  (If there had been fire ants I am sure he would have cursed them too.)  And so, in this way, a litany of curses flowed over the fence and into our small backyard.  This is the vain and idle cursing which St. Thomas calls unlawful.

To avoid this same pitfall, before the time comes when some creature of God sours our day, we may plan our response,  “Oh, rue the day, that sin entered the world!... and which now finds me sunburned, shivering wet, and stung by a bee!”
Such an exercise should leave us longing more and more for heaven where curses never resound as being both unnecessary and not even possible in that most happy place.