Let her cover her head
I am off to get a mantilla to cover my head in church. Some of my girl friends and I have talked about this before, but this wonderful little essay by Andree Seu at World Mag has just sealed the deal:
"My personal great awakening involves "a more determined quest for Him who is the sole object of it all." This means trying "to discern what is pleasing to the Lord " (Ephesians 5:10), even when it's baffling.
It means launching out and putting a symbol of "glory" on my head at church because I think 1 Corinthians 11 tells me to, even if I may turn out in the end to be wrong. That's because I will definitely be wrong if I don't do what I think God is commanding. To disobey what I think God is telling me is to disobey God. There is nothing more a man can do at any given moment than say yes to God as he hears Him. It is God Himself who gently steers our boats, and corrects their course, but only as we're moving toward Him (Philippians 3:15-16).
Granted, "Let her cover her head" (1 Corinthians 11:6) may not be as important as "pour yourself out for the hungry" (Isaiah 58:10)—if you can call any part of God's Word unimportant. But I figure if the king tells you to go conquer the hinterlands one day, and tells you to shoe his horse the next day, you should do them both without slacking. He is the king.
There's a lot more than mantillas at stake for me personally. I want to stop putting filters between me and the Word of God. I appreciate scholarship, but it is rarely conclusive. The question is this: When push comes to shove, do I go with Christian peer pressure or with God's Word as I see it? All my obediences to received practice are suspect when I balk at the one point where conscience makes a contrary demand. It's when there is disjunction that my true allegiance shows.
I read in 1 Corinthians 11 that the woman's head is to be covered in worship. The modern Christian consensus tells me that is a relative and obsolete command, dealing with some first-century problem in the city of Corinth. My high-school literary skills tell me otherwise: The command is rooted in creation (verses 7-9) and in nature (verse 14). And if that weren't ironclad enough, I am to cover my head "because of the angels."
The angel detail is so cryptic, so off the wall, so without explanation, that it becomes the strongest argument of all. Where is the "cultural relativity" case now, where angels transcend all historical agitations?"
posted by MM at 5:31 PM
10 Comments:
Assuming that you share the question: "When push comes to shove, do I go with Christian peer pressure or with God's Word as I see it?", I believe the Catholic Church's answer is that "all that has been said about the manner of interpreting Scripture is ultimately subject to the judgment of the Church which exercises the divinely conferred commission and ministry of watching over and interpreting the Word of God" (Catechism, paragraph 119) Likewise, in paragraph 110 the Catechism teaches that the proper interpretation of Scripture requires us to "take into account the conditions of their time and culture..."
So the answer to the question is that Catholics do not go with "God's word as they see it" (Luther's approach) nor do they give in to Christian peer pressure (whatever that is). Instead they look to the church for guidance on this.
And since the requirement to cover one's head was removed from canon law in 1983, it would seem that the Catholic Church has decided that the command was a local tradition, rather than a universal one -- after all, we know they wouldn't try and abrogate an obvious universal command.
Obviously there is no command against it, either, so it would seem to me that in wearing the mantilla one would have to search one's heart for the motivations -- is it an act of obedience (can it even be an act of obedience if the Church doesn't require it?)and humility, or is it a subtly prideful act meant to indicate a perceived holiness?
MM,
I applaud your adoption of such holy garb and take at face value your reason for doing so: a desire to manifest your spiritual purity and humility before the Most Blessed Sacrament. As St. Paul teaches, the exigence for the chapel veil stems from the notion that the source of a woman's majesty and beauty is her hair, and that out of pious deference, women should cover their heads in the presence of something so much more beautiful than even God's gift to Adam.
Do you ever feel as I do, that we were born in the wrong era? Though I can't remember my grandmother wearing a mantilla, I can clearly remember going to church with her as a young boy and seeing many other ladies wearing theirs. It is sad that that number is dwindling into seeming antiquity. Your timely post is a reminder to all of us of the importance of safeguarding our Catholic traditions.
We have a choice in deciding whether or not to slack off by wearing jeans and tennis shoes to mass. We can choose to refrain from socializing in the nave before and after mass while people are trying to pray. We can choose to seek the confessional every week before receiving the Eucharistic Christ into ourselves. In all but the diocese of Orange (http://romancatholicblog.typepad.com
/roman_catholic_blog/2007/01/
new_video_more_.html), we have the choice to piously receive the M.B.S. while kneeling; though it's a wonder they haven't banned chapel veils there, too. MM, your decision is a perfect one, doubtlessly inspired by the Holy Spirit who has chosen you to be a witness for an increase in holiness among all women with whom you attend mass. Dominus tecum.
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M,
I agree with the reasoning of Lux, and I also expect that this is the way that you feel called to practice your fatih rather than some way to show off your piety. Given that, kudos to you on your choice! Frequently we need a little more rather than a little less tradition.
Lux,
You know, I think there is something oddly humble about scruples... observing them seems to me to indicate that we have given up on mental gymnstics and are willing to look ridiculous just to be on the safe side. I've always thought that mantillas and other gestures refer the outside world to the holiness and the otherness of Christ and Christian worship. I thought that the author's own reasons here were right on the money- she is tired of inserting scholarship and cultural criteria between herself and the plain sense of Scripture. I heaved a small sigh of relief when I read that.
And Jackie O. does look beautiful in hers...;)
Thanks for your kind words, Brandon and CMK.
Where do you plan on getting your mantilla?
Anonymous,
I dont know! - any suggestions?
Dear MM,
Try Catholic Art and Gifts in Farmers Branch, that's where I found mine.
Thanks Genie!
...I ended up purchasing a medium, simple black lace mantilla from Halo.com for the sake of efficiency... each and every of their veils is a handmade replica of an antique version, which I like, and the price was really affordable. And they have little girls' veils too :)
MM
I agree with you. The magisterium has not always been so perfect in interpreting scripture and canon law is not always infallible in its implications.
It veers back and forth like the proverbial pendulum. Read an extended piece on slavery in the Church (two of the bulls against same predated Trent's catechism which accepts it in the section on manstealing) or on usury and one will see the Church of the past erring through fundamentalism (please don't post me that the usury error never happened...Calvin had our present answer in 1545 so let's stop with the Church wisely changed as economies changed). And the Galileo dilemna revolved partly around fundamentalism.
We forget this since our current pendulum swing is far to the other side with husband headship as paralleling mutual subjection being crystal clear in scripture and now undermined by theology so that it is no where in the catechism yet Casti Cannubii in section 74 linked the undermining of same to false prophets.
In short there is a place for individual conscience even within Catholicism as long as Rome can err outside the purview of the infallible documents. She can and has if one reads books rather than apologetics sites.
Lux is correct that no one need follow you especially if they don't have the time to research the issue within their own searching time. But Lux errs in seeing all such dissent as subtle pride. If we had more conscientious dissent, husband headship would be in the catechism per Pius XI rather than out of it per the modern vacating of too many NT scriptures on cultural grounds.
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