www.byzcath.org Forums Faith & Christian Life Faith & Theology Headscarves

Recently on the "Relations with Islam' thread, referring to a linked article about a Muslim mother who cleverly made a little hajib (veil, etc.) for her daughter's new Barbie, Dan Lauffer suggested:

Let us create a Barbie who wears a veil (scarf) for modesty and stop conforming to the immodesty of this world.

As a healthy young(ish) man who, though living semimonastically, is not a tonsured monk nor living in community, I enjoy seeing a lot of today's fashions for everybody, including beautiful women. Fifty years ago, people my age looked old; women over a certain age seemed compelled to wear frumpy clothes and silly hats most of the time. Clothing changes, as well as greater fitness consciousness (which though in itself good can turn to something un-Christian, a kind of narcissism, if not understood and used properly), mean that people appear vibrant and attractive into their senior years, which IMO is great!

Back to women's fashion... Having said the above — I'm no prude, and it weren't for lovely gals staying fit and wearing flattering hairstyles and becoming clothes, we wouldn't have a next generation of Orthodox Christians and Byzantine Catholics* — I think Dan and indeed the Muslims** have a point! Because our human nature is damaged by sin, we need to practise ascesis with all the senses, not totally depriving them but controlling them. With sexuality this includes modesty and custody of the eyes.

[*Unless we want to depend entirely on conversions like the Shakers. Met any Shakers lately?]

[**Worldview-wise and culturally our Eastern kin in many ways, even though they may hate us.]

Which brings me to my point: like nuns Eastern and Western and like devout Muslim women, in the Russian Orthodox tradition we have a wonderful custom, enforced in different places with varying degrees of strictness, of women not only coming to church in sleeves and long skirts but also wearing headscarves. Like a lovely nun or Muslim, there is a chaste beauty about this that I think is spiritual. Some of our clergy saints, like the archbishop St John Maximovich, used to enforce a ban on lipstick in church so icons and the priest's blessing crucifix wouldn't get smudged. There is a place in life for noticing members of the other sex (in our church life, that would be festivals, etc.) but the middle of Liturgy, for example, isn't one of them!

In my church none of this is rigidly enforced (try ordering Russians around — I dare you) but most women, young and old, will at least put on a hat or a headscarf to go to Communion. (We also informally follow the custom of women on the left side of the church, men on the right.)

As you can see, I think this is wonderful and should be promoted, but of course not pharisaically.

I wonder: how many among Byzantine Catholics (with our devoted, Orthodox-oriented forum as a sample population) do this?

http://oldworldrus.com/

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[ 11-24-2001: Message edited by: Serge ]

Serge,

I will respond as I think the phone line has another 4 hours to go !

I have to admit that I am in agreement with most [ 99.9% ] of your post.

I would not dream of wearing 'immodest' dress to Church. It is not seemly and when I am on the Altar [You know what I mean, as I am an Eucharistic Minister] I see plenty. However when I am in Portugal I always have my head covered. Normally I do not cover, as after wearing a starched cap for so many years I heaved a sigh of relief when I could go round bare-headed and I'm afraid the practice stuck - it is very rare to see head covering in Scotland now. Having said that there are still occasions when I will and do.
Where I do disagree, as you would expect, it is on the subject of the separation of the sexes. It seems to me this particular topic has come up before Who am I to say that in my humble opinion you are wrong - we all have our own opinions and must respect those of others.

May Our Blessed Lady, Mother of us all, My Mistress keep us all safe in Her tender care.

Angela

[ 11-24-2001: Message edited by: Our Lady's slave of love ]

Dear Angela,

Thanks. I hope you can read this while your phone line still works. In this thread I didn't intend to push separation of the sexes in church, but I think it is a nice custom that goes along with the modesty and custody-of-the-eyes aspects of headscarves, sleeves and long skirts.

http://oldworldrus.com

Dear Serge,
Please forgive me but I sincerely don't know how wearing a headscarf can equate with modesty.I have seen women in church with their heads covered in a long flowing veil but the rest of their attire was quite questionable!Have you ever seen a woman with short-shorts,high heels and then also wearing a chapel veil? How about those hats with the veils attached and the fluttering plumes of feathers. I do agree with you and others that a women's head should be covered in church but lets not say that just because she covers her head men won't be tempted. I have seen some women who look very handsome sporting a hat or veil. It gives them a look of mystery.

Glory to Jesus Christ!

I believe that Tibubut missed the point from Serge that modesty in dress accompanies the use of the scarf or veil. In the Antiochian Orthodox Church I attend there is a distinct difference to be found in veiled /scarfed and no scarfed/veil women. Inevitably those who choose a modernist attire of pants or mini skirt and sleeveless shirt, and no scarf are among those who talk during the Divine Litugy, are more distracive acting in church and outside. Where as the girls and women who choose (voluntarily) to wear longer skirts, Pant suits with Jackets, sleeved shirts, and the veil or scarf tend to be more reverent and observant of the faith during the Divine Liturgy and outside after Church. Perhaps it is in this bow to tradition that helps them to identify as Orthodox Christians when in the world.

My parish does not preach covered heads for women and asks only modesty in dress but the scarf tends to divide the parish spirituality well when it comes to the women of the Parish. I too agree that there is something special about the modest woman who wears the scarf, a mystery and a spirituality that many Orthodox men find more attractive that blatant sexuality.

Your brother in Christ,
Thomas

[ 11-24-2001: Message edited by: Thomas ]

Tibibut,

Well....Isn't "mystery" what we want?

Just kidding.

[ 11-24-2001: Message edited by: Dan Lauffer ]

Serge,

"There is a place in life for noticing members of the other sex (in our church life, that would be festivals, etc.) but the middle of Liturgy, for example, isn't one of them!"

As a single 22 year old guy in the OCA, who is not the most extroverted person out there, I find that there aren't even many other places to meet the other sex!

Even more bugging than headscarves, is, IMHO, the lack of formal clothing among men. While t-shirts and jeans are my normal clothing, I try to avoid them during the Divine Services, and it annoys me that it is common, not only in the Orthodox world, but from what I've seen also in the American Roman Catholic scene.

God Bless,

Michael

Dear All,
I also believe that we all should return to the pratice of wearing our "Sunday Best" when attending any liturgical function as well as dressing modestly & conservatively (sp) at other times.We are Christian people and our outer demeaner should reflect what we are inside.This is only my meager opinion but I think both men and women could improve on their style of dress. It doesn't have to be expensive to be in good taste.

P.S. - Yes..we crave mystery, that's one of the reasons we love God.

Isn't it a shame that our employers give us a stricter dress code than the Churches (especially the Romans ones?)?

I agree that we all need to do our best to look at our best, because after all, Divine Liturgy is indeed a wedding feast!

Blessings,

SPDundas
Deaf Byzantine

Whilst on the subject of distracting attire let me share one absolute horror - here we have boys and girls as servers [ sorry to offend some but we do, and it has to be admitted that the girls are better - they are keen and continue in their service for longer, with the boys the enthusiasm wears off rapidly! ]
Their albs are usually spotless but their shoes [ all too clearly visible] frequently leave a lot to be desired. We have one boy who below his spotless alb [ washed by Mum] wears equally spotless white trainers with flashing red diodes in their heels !! The first Sunday this was spotted an audible gasp went up from the pews. Now we are used to it , to some extent , but we haven't managed to get him to wear different ones - they are his Sunday best along with his football top in Fluorescent green and white stripes.

Oh yes let's return to the idea of Sunday best clothes for Church - they don't need to be new just sensible and acceptable to all - even us oldies

May Our Blessed Lady, Mother of us all ,my Mistress, keep us all in Her tender care

Angela

PS, Serge, the phone line stays functional, just, till my new ones go in hopefully on Tuesday. Roll on respectable connection speeds etc.

[ 11-25-2001: Message edited by: Our Lady's slave of love ]

Dear Angela,

I remember from living in Britain a hybrid of the romanticized, formal Old World style, like jacket-and-tie school uniforms, and the trainers (sneakers to Yanks) and jeans imported from here. I agree the flashing diodes are a distraction that needs toning down!

When it comes to layfolks' attire I'm actually a moderate. Like I said, I enjoy the clean lines, bold colors and even healthy sexiness of much of today's comfortable style. A little modesty, with a nod to the past in the form of headscarves, is all I ask. The church is not a fashion show nor a place to show off status. I'm for the clergy dressing "high' — for example, birettas and fiddlebacks or beards and highbacks, etc., reflecting the objective, heavenly-beautiful aspects of liturgy, which transcend secular fashions — while on principle the Church is for all and open to all, saints and sinners, and should literally open its doors to all, including the fashion-challenged.

On another thread I have described my yearly Christmas visit to a traditional Latin Mass (the midnight Mass) at which the congregation includes everyone from dignified senior citizens who look like they stepped out of the '50s and the urban black and Hispanic poor to black-leather-and-denim-wearing women with little children. I have also been to New York's Russian Catholic church, St Michael's, for Sunday Liturgy. Here, right in a bohemian, secular section of the city, the doors of this little church are open to the ripped-jeans-wearing and body-pierced to "come and see' the traditional Russian Orthodox liturgy taking place.

Wonderful.

http://oldworldrus.com

GLORY TO JESUS CHRIST!
GLORY TO HIM FOREVER!

Serge wrote: "...in the Russian Orthodox tradition we have a wonderful custom, enforced in different places with varying degrees of strictness, of women not only coming to church in sleeves and long skirts but also wearing headscarves..."

This custom is a holdover of the Tartar occupation of Russia. It was against the law for women to leave the house without some kind of headcovering on their heads. They would be beaten just as in Afghanistan. This was also true of the Balkans where the Ottoman Muslim Occupation not only forced women to cover their hair but also forbade the use of color in embroidery in some areas and forbade the use of church bells in other areas (Romania and Bulgaria).

I recently had the opportunity to attend a Divine Liturgy at a church in suburban Pittsburgh. There was a young woman in congregation who was wearing a long flowing headscarf. If she tied it into place once during the Divine Liturgy, she tied it 1,000 times. She was so distracting flinging the ends of the scarf over her shoulders, I was ready to tie the scarf around her throat.

What's the sense of being "modest" if you're going to distract people by flinging clothing all over the place???

This custom is a holdover of the Tartar occupation of Russia.

Thanks. I thought it was generically Old World. (The practice has a scriptural reference and so was/is done by Western Catholics too.) If this is so, it's another example of how the Muslims culturally are our Eastern kin (like the Mormons are an offshoot from Western Christianity), even though historically they may hate us and vice versa. Salaam.

http://oldworldrus.com

Dear Friends,

I just wanted to give my two cents to this revealing discussion . . .

I discussed this very subject with one of my religion classes.

And, guess what?

The girls all came to class the next time wearing headscarves.

I thought they were joking, but they were serious. Soon everyone was wearing them.

But what about all lay-people wearing a white (baptismal) robe or something like that (embroidered shirt and belt in the Slavic tradition) in Church?

Are we too cosmopolitan for that?

Alex

Speaking of head coverings, I believe Salvador Dali ( another fellow with a Lethal Weapon personality ) had the right idea.

He was known, on occasion, to wear a hollowed out loaf of bread as his...well...hat.

Come to think of it, what could be more practical? A little cheese....a little wine?

Now! I wonder if I can convince the women of our parish to do the 'Carmen Miranda' thing?

"Chick-chicka-boom...chicka-boom-boom...ole."

Grapes,anyone?

Bill

[ 11-27-2001: Message edited by: Psalm 46 ]