I was recently asked on Twitter:

As a Christian and and a writer, what are your thoughts on depicting characters using the Lord’s name in vain? I’m curious because in Chesterton’s The Man Who Was Thursday someone exclaims “God blast it!”

Here was my reply:

The first thing is to get straight the meanings of taking the Lord’s name in vain. One major division:

1. Invoking God’s name to support a lie in court^†
2. Invoking God’s name to support a lie elsewhere
3. Invoking God’s name irreverently
4. Invoking God’s name trivially

In court is generally the worst because of the effect that it has; it is using God’s name in order to support a lie to wreak injustice. This is not to say similar things can’t be achieved out of court, but usually court has the greater effect and thus is worst.

Invoking God’s name irreverantly, I’m hesitant to give an example of, but to sketch it out, attributing some sort of vice to God, such as, say, lust, would qualify. Bad, but not so bad as is using God’s name to convince people of a lie.

The example you gave is of the forth kind. The thing is, properly speaking, a prayer, but one that is not, in fact, meant. It’s invoking God trivially, since it’s done without thought. (The idea behind it, which is only being invoked by repetition and without intent, is that the “it” is some injustice, and so God is being petitioned to right this injustice.)

The morality of portraying this in fiction will depend very greatly on exactly how it’s done. If it’s portrayed in such a way as to portray it as good, that is, as something for the reader to aspire to, this would be to tempt people into sin and is bad.

If it is portrayed neutrally, it is likely to be harmless or so close to harmless that there are almost certainly bigger pieces of wood to worry about removing from one’s eye before the delicate operation of getting this mote out.

If it is portrayed in a negative way, e.g. as a habit of the villain or a moment of weakness in a hero, then it could even be positive, since there is benefit to be gained from error being shown to be wrong in fiction.

(The same basic analysis will apply to recognizable modifications, such as “gol-durn” or “dagnabbit,” skewing more toward harmless than in the originals.)

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† This would consist of things like “I swear to God that I saw this man stab the victim,” or, “as God is my witness, I saw this man stab the victim” or “I saw this man stab the victim and may God strike me down if I’m lying,” where the man invoking God to support the truth of what he was saying was lying. In so doing he is making God a party to his lie, or at least trying to.