There are going to be certain sayings that are developed in any culture and they are understood by the majority. They are things that may not be known by those on the outside but if you are inside the community, you understand what is being said.
It is difficult when you find yourself in a new community and you don’t understand the language.
It might not even be that they are speaking a different language, it’s just something they are saying that is understood by most.
That was the experience of the new priest in the following joke. They ended up in the right place but they should have studied a little before they jumped right into the middle of it.
There was this old priest who got sick of all the people in his parish who kept confessing to adultery.
One Sunday, in the pulpit, he said, “If I hear one more person confess to adultery, I’ll quit!”
Well, everyone liked him, so they came up with a code word. Someone who had committed adultery would say they had “fallen”.
This seemed to satisfy the old priest and things went well, until the priest died at a ripe old age.
About a week after the new priest arrived, he visited the mayor of the town and seemed very concerned.
The priest said, “You have to do something about the sidewalks in town. When people come into the confessional, they keep talking about having fallen.”
The mayor started to laugh, realizing that no one had told the new priest about the code word.
Before the mayor could explain, the priest shook an accusing finger at the mayor and said, “I don’t know what you’re laughing about. Your wife fell three times this week.”
