Liza, honestly, do it for whatever reason you like
And you would not have any problem whatsoever walking into Mass with your head covered next to me. To me, it’s no different than pulling up your hair in a tight bun because you hadnt washed it yet. Just another way for a woman to wear their hair, nothing more to me. All that I ask is that those of you who choose to cover your head do not insist that
I do the same. Not saying
you do, just saying in general. And that’s really not too much to ask
IMOHO, a Catholic woman wearing a head covering is no different that an Amish, Mennonite, or Jewish (or even Muslim) woman wearing a head covering. The important thing IMOHO is that you cover it of your own free will.
With respect, Rence, the last sentence shows you have it absolutely backward.
“Free will” is here basically a synonym meaning, ‘you should always be making your own choice’. . .and that is a kind of deadly poison today that has taken a good thing in itself (the idea that one can choose, with the hope that in doing so one chooses wisely and well, not poorly) and turned it into a god.
"Choice, choice, choice’. The only thing important to most people today is that **they get to do what they want. **
It’s the 11th commandment. . .“Thou shalt choose to do as thou wilt, for that is the law and the prophets and more important than any stuffy stinking law or any kind of obedience to an authority.’”
As has been said by wiser voices than mine, the call to cover/veil (or use of hats) is not something that I do ‘for myself’ or because I ‘freely choose’ it as though it is 'just another in a large ‘menu’ of choices that I can ‘pick and choose’ from in the great Catholic cafeteria.
NEITHER is it some
oppression imposed upon me which I cannot ‘fight’ or which I am coerced into, unhappily and ‘against my will’ under pain of sin, death, and damnation.
It is what it is. . . a pious practice yes, something which I ‘choose’ but neither from being ‘forced’ nor as a 'gee, what thing will I do today to show I’m Catholic" POV. . . it is a tradition through which we humbly submit ourselves in obedience to both Scriptural and Traditional practice to God’s greater glory, FOR God’s greater glory.
Too often things like veiling as presented as extremes. . .either the ‘quaint’ or the ‘modern’, the ‘male symbol of oppression’ or the ‘freedom to be equals with men’, the ‘tired medievalist’ or the ‘21st century’, the ‘burden’ or the ‘choice’ --and those both denigrate the practice and trivialize it into nothing ‘more’ than one of several thousand petty little ‘choices’, no more or less than whether one wants to grab the morning coffee at Dunkin Donuts or Starbucks because while there are proponents who are ‘fanatics’ about one or the other, in the end, it’s
only coffee so what does it really matter to most?
Whether consciously or not, the thrust of the topic of ‘covering’ by many has been, 'it’s only a (stupid) petty little gesture, so what does it matter, ‘choose’ what you LIKE, but don’t try to tell me it’s any more than some archaic practice with no other meaning.
But it is not. . .and that’s the problem.
I understand that for a lot of women who don’t like how they ‘look’ in a hat, or who feel acutely uncomfortable, it is certainly a sacrifice to consider covering, and I sympathize, I really do.
And I understand that for even more women, who have been conditioned to feel that covering is DEMEANING and represents ‘oppression’ and all the worst and most vile anti-woman feelings, it would be even MORE of a sacrifice to cover. These women would have to fight all those negative feelings and attitudes and ingrained cultural and indeed academic teachings. . .basically they’d be having to admit those were ‘wrong’ (in time). Nobody likes finding out they’ve been wrong, especially when they have been zealously attempting to do the right thing all their lives!
But we really need to explore not just how we get the knee jerk ‘feelings’ but what–and why–we have been taught what we have been taught about the practice of women covering throughout history, and in Scripture, and in Tradition. . .
And not to fall into the trap of “If things were wrong they’d be changed by now.” I refer any of that mind to a study of Christian history. Years, even decades, would go by of people engaging in ‘wrongs’ of various types before the problem became so widespread that it received official ‘attention.’
I urge you to read
both sides of the question and to pay particular attention to the ‘side’ with which you** do not agree** in order that you can make a more impartial evaluation.
I know the pastor who brought on the dancing girls was!
