Being Modest and Mass

[James924]

You can very, very easily get pants that are made of out material that is more similar to skirt material than denim, and this problem goes away.

This is total garbage. I am a male, and I do not feel drawn to look at women’s butts during Mass ever, or even outside of Mass ever. I am hardly representative, but the idea that men are totally incorrigible and primitive is as offensive as it is untrue. To this claim I say only one thing – it is easy to look away or shut one’s eyes.

Also untrue. I think that this is an enormous myth that creates reality. If people stopped having this mentality, maybe the hypersexualization of the male would cease because there is no longer a societal force driving them to a particular form of behavior.

First of all, don’t make straw-men. Secondly, stop calling people’s words "garbage’ and try instead to act like a mature civil adult. Thirdly you have no authority to run around saying declaring things “untrue”. Especially, the idea that you would tell a woman that it is a myth that young men’s minds wander when seeing certain attire is absolutley laughable. I’m not sure what planet you live on, or what species you belong to, or what biological properties you lack, but I know no one in their right mind who would so easily dismiss the degree to which your average man (young and old) is tempted to impure thoughts or, at the least, distracted by immodest dress. Let me just say that you should count yourself blessed for your…er… uniqueness, yes thats it, uniqueness with regard to sexual impurity and temptation. For the other 99% of us who have been conditioned since childhood to be this weak (prior to internet pornography, immodest dress everywhere, lude advertisements and highly sexualized themes in entertainment I think men were much stronger) its a bit harder than that. That you would call this garbage is complete idiocy and every adult, man and woman, who has normal human biological faculties knows that you are …again…unique… in your apparent immunity.

Anyway, Vatican guidelines should be adhered to. To claim otherwise is to pick the wrong side, plain and simple.

I’ll call it quits here for now and unsubscribe. In the meantime, since you’re such a saint, pray for me, eh?

 

[Walking_Home]

Ah now you show your true colors. You know better than the vatican code of modesty. And I always thought it was Trads who get accused of being "more Catholic than the pope’.

Anyway, after that comment i think I’ll ignore everything you say from this point out.

---

The “true colors” — is that some people have taken on a puritanical view of “modesty”.

 

[anp1215]

Ah now you show your true colors. You know better than the vatican code of modesty. And I always thought it was Trads who get accused of being "more Catholic than the pope’.

Anyway, after that comment i think I’ll ignore everything you say from this point out.

There is no such thing as a “vatican code of modesty.”

“The Church has made no pronouncements about what women can or cannot, must or should not wear.”

forums.catholic-questions.org/showthread.php?t=400112&highlight=modesty

-Apologist Michelle Arnold’s answer

 

[MrsATurner]

Wow I didn’t expect this to blow up as much as it did. The reason I posted this is not because I want to bend the rules or anything. I just recently returned to the church and I never really have dressed modestly. I am trying to learn how to dress according to what should be done in the church. I would think that the dress I have where the straps are 6 inches thick but not sleeves would be appropriate since the neckline went just below my collar bone and the skirt part was long but according to what I have read now the sleeves have to go to my elbows.

Also my husband and I are short of money at the moment and I was trying to see what I can use from my closet because I can’t buy new clothes at the moment,.

 

[James924]

There is no such thing as a “vatican code of modesty.”

“The Church has made no pronouncements about what women can or cannot, must or should not wear.”

forums.catholic-questions.org/showthread.php?t=400112&highlight=modesty

-Apologist Michelle Arnold’s answer

Lol, then I guess my FSSP priests were lying from the pulpit. Michelle Arnold is wrong and has been in the past.

 

[Walking_Home]

Wow I didn’t expect this to blow up as much as it did. The reason I posted this is not because I want to bend the rules or anything. I just recently returned to the church and I never really have dressed modestly. I am trying to learn how to dress according to what should be done in the church. I would think that the dress I have where the straps are 6 inches thick but not sleeves would be appropriate since the neckline went just below my collar bone and the skirt part was long but according to what I have read now the sleeves have to go to my elbows.

Also my husband and I are short of money at the moment and I was trying to see what I can use from my closet because I can’t buy new clothes at the moment,.

---

Don’t let the puritanical “modesty” extremist get to you.

 

[anp1215]

Wow I didn’t expect this to blow up as much as it did. The reason I posted this is not because I want to bend the rules or anything. I just recently returned to the church and I never really have dressed modestly. I am trying to learn how to dress according to what should be done in the church. I would think that the dress I have where the straps are 6 inches thick but not sleeves would be appropriate since the neckline went just below my collar bone and the skirt part was long but according to what I have read now the sleeves have to go to my elbows.

Also my husband and I are short of money at the moment and I was trying to see what I can use from my closet because I can’t buy new clothes at the moment,.

Don’t feel bad, all modesty threads end up like this. It’s not your fault. God bless you and don’t let anyone sour your return to the Church. What you have is fine.

 

[anp1215]

Lol, then I guess my FSSP priests were lying from the pulpit. Michelle Arnold is wrong and has been in the past.

I’m waiting for your source that the dress code you posted is an infallible teaching from the Church. But then again, I thought you left the thread.

 

[James924]

I’m waiting for your source that the dress code you posted is an infallible teaching from the Church. But then again, I thought you left the thread.

Your right I should have left, but I can’t resist the urge to his “refresh” each time before I do.

But since you’re talking about sources, please cite where anyone in this thread said anthing about “infallible teachings from the church” as you just accused me of.

In the meantime, the guidelines were published On behalf of Pope Pius the XII in 1956, by his apostolic vicar I believe. To my knowledeg they have never been rejected, abrogated, superceded, etc. And practically speaking, it seems a bit damning to one’s catholic character to reject such guidelines on the basis of their being “old”.

I’ll be waiting for that quote by me or anyone else here about infallible teachings, btw. Goodness, I hate strawman arguments…they’re so common it makes me sick.

 

[anp1215]

Your right I should have left, but I can’t resist the urge to his “refresh” each time before I do.

But since you’re talking about sources, please cite where anyone in this thread said anthing about “infallible teachings from the church” as you just accused me of.

In the meantime, the guidelines were published On behalf of Pope Pius the XII in 1956, by his apostolic vicar I believe. To my knowledeg they have never been rejected, abrogated, superceded, etc. And practically speaking, it seems a bit damning to one’s catholic character to reject such guidelines on the basis of their being “old”.

I’ll be waiting for that quote by me or anyone else here about infallible teachings, btw. Goodness, I hate strawman arguments…they’re so common it makes me sick.

Anyway, Vatican guidelines should be adhered to. To claim otherwise is to pick the wrong side, plain and simple.

I’ll call it quits here for now and unsubscribe. In the meantime, since you’re such a saint, pray for me, eh?

We don’t have to adhere to any “guidelines” unless they’re an infallible teaching of the Church, i.e., a dogma. I never said that you used the term “infallible,” but by posting a list of rules and then saying that they should be adhered to, you’re implying that they are.

Goodbye.

 

[LightBound]

Whats wrong with the conversation that is being said? I see nothing wrong with it, honestly. Each person has his or her own opinion and is allowed to express it. You don’t have to agree with anything thats said, nor do you have to read or respond to it.

Ah-ha! You are pretty new around these parts. As a long-term lurker and rather new member myself, I will say that threads on modesty and what constitutes “modest” apparel are probably one of the topics that get removed or locked more than any other. Opinions are one thing, as I have stated mine on the post you chose to respond to. It’s when opinions are attempted to be passed off as infallible Church teachings that the problems really begin.

 

[Baelor]

First, exploitation requires intent. Second, the “weakness” is an illusion.

First of all, don’t make straw-men.

Which straw men would those be, exactly?

Secondly, stop calling people’s words "garbage’ and try instead to act like a mature civil adult.

The two are not mutually exclusive.

Thirdly you have no authority to run around saying declaring things “untrue”.

I have as much authority as you do when you simply assert things are true.

Especially, the idea that you would tell a woman that it is a myth that young men’s minds wander when seeing certain attire is absolutley laughable.

That is not what I said, and so I will not respond to this statement.

I’m not sure what planet you live on, or what species you belong to, or what biological properties you lack, but I know no one in their right mind who would so easily dismiss the degree to which your average man (young and old) is tempted to impure thoughts or, at the least, distracted by immodest dress.

Again, I never claimed that men’s minds are not turned by immodest dress, nor did I claim that women’s minds were not turned by immodest dress either.

You first claim that I am constructing straw men with absolutely no mention of how I am doing so, and then proceed to respond to statements I never made. Please help me understand why anyone should take you seriously.

For the other 99% of us who have been conditioned since childhood to be this weak (prior to internet pornography, immodest dress everywhere, lude advertisements and highly sexualized themes in entertainment I think men were much stronger) its a bit harder than that.

Conditioned since birth. Exactly. Why are you attacking me by agreeing with me? I agree that cultural pressures produce concrete psychological effects. We should be actively working against those pressures – which can be as simply as acknowledging the presence of something as “innate” when it is not, which you yourself are doing right now – instead of assuming that they are irreversible and unquestionable. I watch pornography exactly never. It is not “harder than that,” barring psychological addiction (not to be attributed lightly). People are clearly capable of not having sex in the middle of the street, and that is only a number of discrete steps away from not looking at porn, and so forth.

That you would call this garbage is complete idiocy and every adult, man and woman, who has normal human biological faculties knows that you are …again…unique… in your apparent immunity.

Let this be on the record:

James:

**stop calling people’s words "garbage’ **

and try instead to act like a mature civil adult

You have just said this:

That you would call this garbage

is complete idiocy

I turn to the Bible for guidance:
Isiah 32:12:

For the vile person will speak villany, and his heart will work iniquity, to practise hypocrisy

I still stand by my statement that men (and women) should not be considered sentient animals that leap upon their sexual prey on sight.

 

[catholicmomx5]

Let me just say that I hate wearind skirts and dresses…I know, weird.

BUT, I NEVER enter into my parish w/out wearing a skirt and a veil (even if I am just there for confession or time before the Blessed Sacrament). I am the only one who veils at my parish, and when I first started attending I felt so out of place. But I offer up my uncomfort to Our Lord.

We came from a Traditional Parish where there was a dress code, and when we first moved here my boys (teenagers) were shocked at the way some of the girls dressed. They turned to me and both said “are they really dressing like that for Mass??” My daughter now gets upset that she has to “dress up” for Mass since other girls don’t have to. Even at the Traditional Mass in my area I am shocked at what the teenagers wear. I tell my kids, at least they are attending Mass, it would be a greater sin to stay home.

My mom attends with me and my children and people have come up to her and told her how wonderful it is to see me and my girls veiling and dressing “like they did in the old days”. I pray that the veiling will catch on as I believe it is a sign of due respect for Our Lord. I attended a distribution of Ashes with the literagy on Ash Weds and knowing that we were not going to be infront of the Tabernacle I did not veil before entering (it was held at the Student Union at the Campus our Parish is minister to) and half way through the readings I ended up veiling as I felt naked w/out it.

 

[severus68]

This is total garbage. I am a male, and I do not feel drawn to look at women’s butts during Mass ever, or even outside of Mass ever. I am hardly representative, but the idea that men are totally incorrigible and primitive is as offensive as it is untrue. To this claim I say only one thing – it is easy to look away or shut one’s eyes.

Also untrue. I think that this is an enormous myth that creates reality. If people stopped having this mentality, maybe the hypersexualization of the male would cease because there is no longer a societal force driving them to a particular form of behavior.

Well said. It is offensive to make men out to having no control,led by their hormones and with only one thing on their minds when seeing a woman.

 

[severus68]

“More souls will go to hell for sins of the flesh than for any other reason”

Now, that, is without a doubt, something Our Lady DID say at Fatima!!!

No, sorry she did not. Check the Vatican site on Fatima please.

 

[severus68]

There IS a Vatican Code of Modesty that has been recommended for a very long time, I think, possibly 50 years or longer. Women’s fashions started becoming immodest on a grand scale after WWI. In essence it consists of these directives, especially in church:

1. Clothing should not follow closely the contours of the body. A few inches of ease is best. If your clothing outlines your bosom, bottom, or hips, it is too tight. (Neither should a woman outline her pregnant figure with stretchy tops). Slacks or pants are best avoided completely.
2. Fabrics should be opaque, not see-through, nor skin-colored as to appear transparent.
3. Necklines should be no deeper than two-fingers’ breadth below the pit of the throat.
4. Hemlines should be long enough to cover the knees generously when sitting or standing.
5. Garments must have sleeves, and, minimally, reach to the middle of the upper arm. Sleeveless blouses, tank tops, and cap sleeves are unacceptable.
6. In the presence of the Blessed Sacrament a woman’s head should be covered.
   While there is no mention of footwear, I suggest that
7. Beach-type shoes, “hardly there” sandals or flip-flops, are for the beach or backyard.
   and
8. Clothing that looks like lingerie, even though it is sold as outerwear, should not show as it is still suggestive.

I hope this is helpful. Women need to bear in mind that what they wear can have an effect, for good or evil, on those who look upon them. We have an obligation to protect others from temptation, especially men, who are very visual creatures, bless them. I know that for years it has been a help to me to have had these guidelines. Ideally, we should be dressing modestly wherever we happen to be, though these days it is very difficult to purchase lovely, yet modest clothes. Even the pattern companies have let us down. But it is not an impossible task if one is determined to dress according to standards pleasing to Our Lord and His Blessed Mother. We will be held accountable for everything we do. +JMJ+

Well, I would think that your advice should apply to men too.

 

[severus68]

Ah now you show your true colors. You know better than the vatican code of modesty. And I always thought it was Trads who get accused of being "more Catholic than the pope’.

The “men should be responsible argument” is an old one, and a silly one. No, no, lets do some catholicism 101 here, if one gender knows of another gender’s weakness, then they should not do things that exploit it and then just say, well thats their problem. That type of thinking is about as uncatholic as you can get. We’re supposed to help each other down here, believe it or not. Its called mutual sanctification. The thought of a woman immodestly dressed sitting there with a smirk on her face saying “sorry, its your problem” is the epitome of evil.

Also, don’t insult church instructions or guidelines. Its not okay and it exposes you as a bad catholic.

After that comment i think I’ll ignore everything you ever say from this point out. Yes, yes, I know, I’m sure the feeling’s mutual.

@MsMW, she said “barely there” sandals which I think are the type designed to make you look like you’re walking around with no shoes on. Not that I think beach sandals are ideal anyway…

Please do not make personal comments towards anyone like valling someone a bad Catholic.

Tell me where in our Cathechism is this Vatican Code of Modesty and if not there, where doe the Vatican publish it?

 

[severus68]

Don’t feel bad, all modesty threads end up like this. It’s not your fault. God bless you and don’t let anyone sour your return to the Church. What you have is fine.

I will second that.

 

[burningheart]

It’s a shame that your former parish didn’t also remind men and teen boys to dress modestly, too. Guys in tank tops with underarm hair hanging out and males in gangsta shorts are far from modest, too. The topic of modesty and women in pants has been beaten to death ad nauseam here on CAF, so here’s my bottom line:

Men, keep custody of your eyes. Women, don’t dress like hoochies. Men, control yourself at all costs, offer up “tempting” situations, and remember even the scantily dressed women is STILL your sister in Christ! Women, don’t wear short shorts or short dresses/skirts, tight trousers, or low-cut shirts. There’s no reason for it and it can cause your brothers in Christ to be tempted. Let’s help each other out, here, without throwing blame at the other gender. Let’s offer a quick prayer this thread will die out and no one start a new one!

I don’t recall the attire of the men in that parish being a problem, hence it was not addressed.

 

[burningheart]

Okay Thanks! I have a super cute dress I wanna wear to Mass tomorrow but I wanted to make sure that it was modest enough.

How about adding a sweater? Wouldn’t that solve the problem?

If you are truly pursuing a relationship with Christ, eventually you will come to see that honoring him surpasses the “super cuteness” of the dress you would like to wear. All in good time, as you come humbly to him and give him your heart. Maybe there is nothing wrong with the dress, maybe He is calling you to a little self-denial.

Evidently, as you considered the dress you thought or felt that it might be questionable, perhaps you came here seeking “permission” to wear it. It doesn’t matter what any of us say here, including myself. What matters is what the Holy Spirit confirms to you when you honestly pray about it. Honestly, meaning having no opinion of your own in the matter but willing to submit to “whatever” he tells you. Always remember that He loves you and desires the best for you so that you will be joyful in your faith.