Attn. Christians of Various Traditions: Women & Head Covering ?

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I saw the sign in 1993 at holy Trinity Church at the Alexander Nevsky monestery.

In the same year when I went to the Pskov cave monestery, we were asked for the men not to wear shorts and the women to wear skirts and head covering before entering the grounds of the monestery.

Needless to say, no one in our group wore robes.
Yes, yes. I don’t doubt there was the sign there. It is currently a requirement at Orthodox monasteries for women to wear long dresses/skirts, long sleeves, cover head, cover entire legth of legs with stockings or pants under the dress/skirt & to have the feet & toes fully covered.

I just was pointing out that I don’t personally understand the observance of a dress/skirt as, I’ve not found that to be in the ancient Christian tradition of the Holy Bible, the Church Fathers, etc., while the complete covering of a woman and head cover IS found.

I’m not by any means pro-dress or pro-skirt. I’ve heard too much about sinful men who see a woman in a dress or skirt, no matter how long or non-form-fitting, who think “easy access”. As one of millions of women who have been raped, I don’t want to send that message to any man. While, I don’t like that I have to do it at a monastery of all places, I do honor this current custom while visiting monasteries - but I wear pants to & from 🙂 Also, with prostrations in Church, it is much more modest, in my opinion, for women to wear dressy pants which at the most may pull up to expose an ankle or part of the lower calf not covered by the socks, while in a dress or a skirt, some women when prostrating can unwantedly expose so much more! 😊
 
Portrait, thanks for the informative post. I knew that the old canon of 1917 was abrogated by the one in 1983, but you gave good information.

I think it is up to the woman, and parishioners should not assume she is trying to stand out or think herself holier than thou.
👍
 
Its the upbringing and the catechesis, Church became big quick WWII, the 60’s came and like just about everything else from that period… went into the American Storm. Vocations went down, Sisters became scare and couldn’t be as involved in education. And America decided to follow the likes of Jimmy Swaggart., no required knee bending either. We don’t have to do all that, become the “motto” :rotfl:

We need to get back to missionary work here. This country is all but lost. The only thing saving us is the Orthodoxy influx from everywhere else, Blessing. I take em where I can get them. Pope Francis, huh, talk about in the nick of time. 😛

Have a peaceful Holy Week… Everyone.
Dear GaryTaylor,

Cordial greetings and a very good day. Jolly well said and my sentiments entirely.

The permissive Sixties had a phenomenal negative impact and some of the misguided and zany thinking of radical feminists infiltrated the Church, sadly changing the way that many Catholics think, especially the youth. This surely admits of no serious doubt, dear friend. There was certainly a rejection of the more rigorous approach to the faith that was normal prior to the Sixties and an embracing of a more free and easy type of religion, less deferential and more dismissing of Tradition. Western Catholicism today is in a very sorry state and there is evidence of a widespread worldly conformity that refuses to face up to the Church’s call to personal sanctity. Yes, I firmly believe that Orthodoxy is a blessed influence for good upon Holy Mother Church, especially given the difficult days in which our lot is cast.

Women covering their heads in divine worship, dear friend, is an immemorial custom which has perpetual validity and therefore continues to be applicable today, contrary to what some contend. Here is what the ‘radio priests’, Fathers Rumble & Carty, have to say upon the matter:

“That women should cover their heads when in church is a Christian custom based on the words of St. Paul in I Corinthians 11: 6. There he definitely gives instruction that Catholic women must cover their heads in divine worship. He gives two reasons for this decree, one theological and one moral. The theological reason is as follows: Every beings true glory and honour is to keep the place assigned to him or her by God. Now God Himself differentiated between the sexes, and that difference should be manifested during our public religious acknowledgement of Him. Man was first created, and women dependently upon the man. The covering upon a woman’s head was to be a sign of this dependence. Both men and women are created, of course, for God; their souls are equally precious to Him. But secondarily, women were created as helpmates for men, so that secondarily women were created for men, rather than men for women”.

"The moral reason given by St. Paul deals with Christian modesty. Loose women of ill-repute went to their temples without any head covering, not veiling their beauty, but bent on a vain display of their attractions. St. Paul would have none of this in a Christian church: “Therefore ought a women to have power (i.e. a veil) over her head, he writes, “because of the angels” (I Cor. 11: 10). He mentions these pure spirits to bring home the fact that spiritual considerations alone should prevail in the worship of God, and not sensual vanity. A woman’s hair is the object of her vanity and earthly glory - and she knows it. Let her at least veil it in church, giving her attention to higher things, and allowing others to do so also. Thus you have the legislation of St. Paul and the reason for it”.

(Radio Replies, Vol. 2, question 1053, Fathers Rumble & Carty, Tan Books, 1979)

As can clearly be seen, dear friend, the teaching of these renowned ‘radio priests’ has perpetual validity and is not culturally bound, as some like to assert. If the angels would be offended then by the sight of a woman’s uncovered head in church, who are we to say that they would not be offended now? To contend that they would not be so offended is to contradict the unequivocal teaching of St. Paul, who said what he wrote was “the commandments of the Lord” (I Cor. 14: 37). To date, no man has been able to show where Holy Mother Church has repudiated or disowned the sound teaching on this topic by those ‘radio priests’, showing that St. Paul’s teaching is culturally conditioned. What is problematic for many contemporary Catholics is that St. Paul’s teaching does not sit comfortably with their misguided egalitarian views of the sexes and so must be written off as either ‘sexist’ or culturally bound and thus no longer relevant.

Fathers Rumble and Carty were simply giving the consistent teaching of the Church on this matter and were not preaching novel ideas. Moreover, would these well-read and learned apologists have really so misunderstood Scripture and their own Church’s teaching, making so fundamental a mistake concerning the obligation of women being covered in divine worship?

God bless and a very Blessed and peaceful Easter to all contributors to this thread.

Warmest good wishes,

Portrait

Pax:tiphat:
 
Yes, yes. I don’t doubt there was the sign there. It is currently a requirement at Orthodox monasteries for women to wear long dresses/skirts, long sleeves, cover head, cover entire legth of legs with stockings or pants under the dress/skirt & to have the feet & toes fully covered.

I just was pointing out that I don’t personally understand the observance of a dress/skirt as, I’ve not found that to be in the ancient Christian tradition of the Holy Bible, the Church Fathers, etc., while the complete covering of a woman and head cover IS found.

I’m not by any means pro-dress or pro-skirt. I’ve heard too much about sinful men who see a woman in a dress or skirt, no matter how long or non-form-fitting, who think “easy access”. As one of millions of women who have been raped, I don’t want to send that message to any man. While, I don’t like that I have to do it at a monastery of all places, I do honor this current custom while visiting monasteries - but I wear pants to & from 🙂 Also, with prostrations in Church, it is much more modest, in my opinion, for women to wear dressy pants which at the most may pull up to expose an ankle or part of the lower calf not covered by the socks, while in a dress or a skirt, some women when prostrating can unwantedly expose so much more! 😊
I get your point. Mrs. Jhow also favors pants and suits, and I stay away from advising women on how to dress. As to biblical times, I suppose if anybody wore pants it was maybe roman soldiers?
 
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Portrait:

Holy Mother Church has not, as far as I am aware, issued any official magisterial teaching stating that the biblical teaching is no longer perpetually valid or morally binding, being supposedly culturally conditioned. This, of course, is a very popular approach to the bible by liberal exegetes, who are always desirous to negate the teaching of Scripture because it is at variance with their progressive opinions. They resort to this sort of thing to nulify the ‘unpalatable’ teaching of God’s word relating to the role of men and women, as well as homosexual aberrant acts of depravity.​

To date, no man has been able to show where Holy Mother Church has repudiated or disowned the sound teaching on this topic by those ‘radio priests’, showing that St. Paul’s teaching is culturally conditioned. What is problematic for many contemporary Catholics is that St. Paul’s teaching does not sit comfortably with their misguided egalitarian views of the sexes and so must be written off as either ‘sexist’ or culturally bound and thus no longer relevant.
First, you acknowledge that wearing a veil in church is purely optional. Then you suggest that the Church never said that wearing a veil is something culturally conditioned, which is false. And then you go further and insinuate that not wearing a veil is a bad thing, linked with “zany feminism” and with the influence of those who want “to nulify the ‘unpalatable’ teaching of God’s word relating to the role of men and women, as well as homosexual aberrant acts of depravity”. So what should a honest reader understand from your subtle posts? That the women who don’t wear a veil should reconsider, because in your eyes the 1983 Code of Canon Law simply doesn’t matter? That only those who wear veils are Real Catholics and the rest are to be despised as ignorant or suspect of feminist and pro-gay sympathies?
Another objection [against the ordination of women as priests] is based upon the transitory character that one claims to see today in some of the prescriptions of Saint Paul concerning women, and upon the difficulties that some aspects of his teaching raise in this regard. But it must be noted that these ordinances, probably inspired by the customs of the period, concern scarcely more than disciplinary practices of minor importance, such as the obligation imposed upon women to wear a veil on their head (1 Cor 11:2-16); such requirements no longer have a normative value.
vatican.va/roman_curia/congregations/cfaith/documents/rc_con_cfaith_doc_19761015_inter-insigniores_en.html

Or perhaps Cardinal Burke is a Modernist?
ewtn.com/expert/answers/head_coverings_in_church.htm
 
First, you acknowledge that wearing a veil in church is purely optional. Then you suggest that the Church never said that wearing a veil is something culturally conditioned, which is false. And then you go further and insinuate that not wearing a veil is a bad thing, linked with “zany feminism” and with the influence of those who want “to nulify the ‘unpalatable’ teaching of God’s word relating to the role of men and women, as well as homosexual aberrant acts of depravity”. So what should a honest reader understand from your subtle posts? That the women who don’t wear a veil should reconsider, because in your eyes the 1983 Code of Canon Law simply doesn’t matter? That only those who wear veils are Real Catholics and the rest are to be despised as ignorant or suspect of feminist and pro-gay sympathies?

vatican.va/roman_curia/congregations/cfaith/documents/rc_con_cfaith_doc_19761015_inter-insigniores_en.html

Or perhaps Cardinal Burke is a Modernist?
ewtn.com/expert/answers/head_coverings_in_church.htm
I take it your not keen on veils?
 
I take it your not keen on veils?
These are the things I’m not keen on - in no particular order:
  • Ordering men or women to cover or not to cover their heads 24/7
  • Ordering women to cover their heads in church under dishonest reasons (i.e. “women are guilty of tempting angels”)
  • Ordering women to cover their heads in church under honest, but morally wrong reasons (i.e. “snare to men”)
  • Disrespecting the “rules of the house” in monasteries or Orthodox churches, by wearing inappropriate attire (this includes the refusal of women to cover their heads while they are there)
  • The self-righteous attitude of men and women who blame women for choosing to cover their heads in a Catholic church
  • The self-righteous attitude of men and women who blame women for choosing not to cover their heads in a Catholic church.
 
These are the things I’m not keen on - in no particular order:
  • Ordering men or women to cover or not to cover their heads 24/7
  • Ordering women to cover their heads in church under dishonest reasons (i.e. “women are guilty of tempting angels”)
  • Ordering women to cover their heads in church under honest, but morally wrong reasons (i.e. “snare to men”)
  • Disrespecting the “rules of the house” in monasteries or Orthodox churches, by wearing inappropriate attire (this includes the refusal of women to cover their heads while they are there)
  • The self-righteous attitude of men and women who blame women for choosing to cover their heads in a Catholic church
  • The self-righteous attitude of men and women who blame women for choosing not to cover their heads in a Catholic church.
Lets just disregard the Sacred Scripture, the Consensus Patrum, and the old teachings of the Church.
*- The self-righteous attitude of men and women who blame women for choosing to cover their heads in a Catholic church
*
Modernists?
 
Perfect! Thank you 🙂 This is exactly the type of thing I was looking for:
“SACRED CONGREGATION FOR THE DOCTRINE OF THE FAITH
DECLARATION
INTER INSIGNIORES
ON THE QUESTION OF ADMISSION OF WOMEN
TO THE MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD
Section 4: Another objection is based upon the transitory character that one claims to see today in some of the prescriptions of Saint Paul concerning women, and upon the difficulties that some aspects of his teaching raise in this regard. But it must be noted that these ordinances, probably inspired by the customs of the period, concern scarcely more than disciplinary practices of minor importance, such as the obligation imposed upon women to wear a veil on their head (1 Cor 11:2-16); such requirements no longer have a normative value. However, the Apostle’s forbidding of women to speak in the assemblies (1 Cor 14:34-35; 1 Ti 2:12) is of a different nature, and exegetes define its meaning in this way: Paul in no way opposes the right, which he elsewhere recognises as possessed by women, to prophesy in the assembly (1 Cor 11:15); the prohibition solely concerns the official function of teaching in the Christian assembly.** For Saint Paul this prescription is bound up with the divine plan of creation** (1 Cor 11:7; Gen 2:18-24): it would be difficult to see in it the expression of a cultural fact.”
  • my bolding for emphasis
This is the “Why” the ancient head covering of women was stopped for Catholics because “probably” St. Paul was inspired (not by the Holy Spirit, but) by the customs of the period.

What I would have asked the authors of this document, should I have been able to, is: If that is the case then why did all of the early Church Fathers who wrote on the culture of St. Paul’s day specifically stated that it was NOT the culture for men to pray uncovered & for women to be covered? And why did the early Church Father universally understand St. Paul to have related women covering their heads with “the divine plan”. How is it that men coming about 1900 years after St. Paul could understand him better than the men who came less than a hundred years later - 500 years later?

In your research have you seen documented by the Catholic Church any earlier documents that ended the tradition of women head covering or documents that cite other reasons for ending the practice that would hold up to the early tradition written about in the Church Fathers?

Thank you again as this is exactly the type of thing I was looking for 🙂
 
This is the “Why” the ancient head covering of women was stopped for Catholics because “probably” St. Paul was inspired (not by the Holy Spirit, but) by the customs of the period.
Yeah. The “probably” explanation does not hold water with me. 🤷
 
As a former Catholic, I will add that in Marian Apparitions, Mary has expressed her disdain for how immodest the fashion had become for women…in the early 1917!!!..Our Lady of Fatima…when full-time head coverings on women were still the norm.
This incorrect. Please check the Vatican site on the Revelations at Fatima.
 
That makes no sense in light that there’s no Biblical, no Church Fathers, no Icons or Saint practice that shows a tradition of women in dresses & men in pants. Robes used to be universal for everyone.
So what about about cultures where women wear trousers as their national dress - Chinese, Vietnamese etc?
 
From I’ve found so far, a vast majority of Orthodox women in the U.S. do Not cover. While, in other countries it is still common.

When?..when they or their immigrant ancestors came to the U.S., they threw off their head coverings (many also had their names shortened) to fit into American society.

In Greece, women seem to have thrown off their head coverings outside of Church along with Islamic rule when they defeated the Turks and became independent- during the 400 yrs of Islamic rule, they seemed to have forgotten the original Christian roots of head covering.

Because I’ve Not been able to find a Christian reason, only a secular one, did I make the OP to see if there was Ever a Christian reason or if it was only rebellion which began the domino effect of uncovered women’s hair in society & in Churches. If it is found to be the former, then I, a woman, can breathe a sign of relief, if the latter, then I, in good conscious must being wearing a head covering full-time because I do Not want to rebel against God.
What other countries other than for Russian, Greek grandmothers and the like? In a few countries where a head covering is worn in church or outside, it is about the culture not about Christianity.
 
This is the “Why” the ancient head covering of women was stopped for Catholics because “probably” St. Paul was inspired (not by the Holy Spirit, but) by the customs of the period.
The authors of the document made a general reference about the various cultural customs of the period, keeping in mind that St Paul addressed mainly Greeks and Romans and that the nascent Christianity was still fighting to find her own individuality, by promoting new practices and disciplines capable of strongly diferentiating it from all the other religions. At that time, Roman men and women mostly worshipped with the head covered, Greek men and women mostly worshipped bareheaded, while Jewish men and women worshipped exclusively with the head covered (some say that women covered even their faces, like they were required to do in everyday life, while others say that they use to take off their veils and show their faces). The influence of Pagan cults, where women could “pray and prophesize” bareheaded, was strong. So St Paul had to promote something different, as a new unifying rule for everybody.

But he couldn’t do it without coming up with new reasons, different from the Pagan or Jewish ones. So he develops his theological arguments for the new Christian practices, invoking Genesis and “the angels”. Now the Genesis is a text susceptible to multiple interpretations. Ancient Rabbis justified veiling by saying that women must be ashamed of Eve’s sin and mourn it by covering themselves; or that Eve was created from the rib, which is a hidden place within man’s body, so women must hid themselves and be silent. And that “the man shall rule over you” should be interpreted as “the distress of woman, who desires intercourse only in her heart, while the man can explicitly demand it”.

Taken as a text interpretation, St Paul’s theory was exactly as speculative as the Rabbinical ones. And this kind of speculation was flourishing among the Early Fathers, because they felt the need to use various Biblical texts as arguments against or in favor of a particular cultural custom. A good example is their effort to discourage the Pagan custom of wearing wreaths/crowns of flowers and leaves, part of the same fight of Christianity to find and promote her own individuality.
Here’s Tertullian in “De Corona”; he addresses both men and women, but when he speaks about women, he uses the Book of Revelation to invent an additional reason to forbid them to wear wreaths: “with a crown on [her head] will she offend those (24 elders) who perhaps are then wearing crowns above”. As if only women could offend the 24 elders by wearing wreaths. And then he adds his usual warning about sexual temptation: “For what is a crown on the head of a woman, but beauty made seductive, but mark of utter wantonness—a notable casting away of modesty, a setting temptation on fire?”. As if only women could physically tempt the opposite sex (or perhaps these Fathers didn’t know or care that a woman can be tempted too).
newadvent.org/fathers/0304.htm

Note that this obsession about women who “tempt” is common among ancient people, so yes it has to do with cultural customs. The Talmud stated that is indecent for a married woman to walk bareheaded. The theologian Albrecht Oepke, quoted in this article, says that “etiquette as regards the veil becomes stricter the more one moves east. This rule is brought out clearly by the provisions of an old Assyrian code. Married women and widows must be veiled when in public places. On the other hand, the head of the harlot, here equated with the slave, must remain unveiled under threat of severe penalties. When a man wishes to make one of these his legitimate wife, a special act of veiling is demanded”.

Re other Catholic texts: There is no other magisterial document about the obligation for women to cover their heads or any reasons for affirming or rejecting it. Before the 1917 Code there was only one reference - in 1876, a cleric from Ravenna asked the Sacred Congregation of Rites about such an obligation for “women assisting at sacred functions” and received this short answer: “Affirmative”.
 
Both of these Catholic Saints came over 800 years after the Catholic Church left Orthodoxy and a few hundred years after Catholic Saint St. Thomas Aquinas wrote FOR full-time head covering of women.

So back to the original post? When did women of your denomination Stop head covering full time? At some point between St. Thomas Aquinas’ time & St, Gemma Galgani’s time. Do you know exactly when? And what reason(s) were given for the new unveiled practice?
Reasons for unveiling: warmer climate (mostly Italy and Spain) and fashion. Here’s an illustrated history - note the evolution towards purely ornamental headgear or not wearing headgear at all:
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1100%E2%80%931200_in_fashion#Hairstyles_and_headdresses
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1200%E2%80%931300_in_fashion#Headdresses_and_hairstyles
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1300%E2%80%931400_in_fashion#Headdresses
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1400%E2%80%931500_in_European_fashion#Hairstyles_and_headdresses
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1500%E2%80%931550_in_fashion#Hats_and_headgear
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1550%E2%80%931600_in_fashion#Hairstyles_and_headgear
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1600%E2%80%931650_in_fashion#Hairstyles_and_Headgear
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1650%E2%80%931700_in_fashion#Hairstyles_and_headgear
 
Modernists?
I’m not sure. Some fear that the practice of wearing veils could become the unwritten norm if enough women chose to wear them in church. But one doesn’t have to be a Modernist to have such fears - there are, for example, Traditionalists who badmouth the practice of using lay ministers to distribute Communion, because they don’t want it to become the norm.
 
I think it is sad this reverent practice fell off due to cultural changes in the 60s, I have found since noticing women with chapel veils that the practice is a powerful witness indeed. I’m glad there is at least a small revitilzation in the Western Church, I pray it grows.
 
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