The tongue and the heart

I recently took part in a discussion as to whether or not cursing is a sin. When I think of curse words and the use of profanity, I immediately want to know the context in which they are spoken. For example, if I exclaim in anger, “Oh, S**t!” then I would say that is wrong. Not because of the actual word, but because of the context: I am saying something in anger. It becomes not a matter of the tongue but of the heart. However, if I say, “Wow, that is a large pile of horse S***t,” I don’t necessarily see that as wrong since I am not using the word as a euphemism for something else. Is it wrong to call a female dog a bitch? The term “bitch” literally means a female dog. There are some “curse” words, such as the infamous “F” word, that are clearly crude. In my experience, that word is always used negatively or crudely. The Bible says that no unwholesome talk should come from our mouths and that we are to avoid crude and profane talk. I don’t use the “F” word for the above noted reasons. I don’t often use the “S” word because frankly, I have no use for it and would rather use a different word. Not because I think it’s a sin to say it, especially if I am using it in it’s proper context, but because other people can be offended by it. In my conversation, I was told that we should be more concerned with offending God than we are other people and that’s the reason why we shouldn’t curse. I completely agree. But I think as Christians we need to be careful what we label as “sin.” We can easily say that sex is wrong but in it’s proper context, marriage, sex is a gift from God. Sex in and of itself isn’t wrong, it’s when we take it out of it’s proper context. So my belief about cursing is that yes, some words are just plain crude and should be avoided. However, why should a word like “shit”, when used in it’s proper context, be considered “crude” or “profane” and therefore a sin?