Some time ago I did a post (possibly more than one) dealing with the subject of women’s headcoverings at Mass—a practice that was required by the 1917 Code of Canon Law but that then fell into desuetude after the Second Vatican Council and was abolished by the release of the 1983 Code of Canon Law.
I have no problem with women wearing head coverings. In fact, I’m rather partial to the practice, and I fully support any woman’s right to wear one.
But I’m not going to falsify what the law requires concerning them.
My post was occasioned by queries I got from time to time about whether the former practice of women wearing some form of headcovering at Mass is still required.
Some of these queries were prompted by a maker of headcoverings who was trying to gin up business by running ads that quoted the old law as if it was still in effect.
Others, including canonist Dr. Edward Peters and Fr. John Zulhsdorf, also wrote on the subject, pointing out the same thing: The law requiring head coverings ceased no later than the release of the 1983 Code of Canon Law, which abrogated the prior law requiring this (found in the 1917 Code).
Yet that hasn’t stopped people from making spurious arguments to the contrary.
Now Ed Peters has a post in which (after noting Fr. Z’s and my replies and saying some extremely kind things about us) he reports Cardinal Raymond Burke has weighed in on the subject as well.
For those who may not be aware, Cardinal Burke is the prefect of the Supreme Tribunal of the Apostolic Signatura, which “functions as the supreme tribunal [in the Roman Curia] and also ensures that justice in the Church is correctly administered” (John Paul II, Pastor Bonus 121). That means: He heads the highest Church court.
In a letter to an inquirer, Cardinal Burke writes:
The wearing of a chapel veil for women is not required when women assist at the Holy Mass according to Ordinary Form of the Roman Rite. It is, however, the expectation that women who assist at the Mass according to the Extraordinary Form cover their heads, as was the practice at the time that the 1962 Missale Romanum was in force. It is not, however a sin to participate in the Holy Mass according to the Extraordinary Form without a veil.
Ed notes:
Burke’s note is not an “authentic interpretation” nor a formal sentence from the Signatura: It’s simply a calm observation by the world’s leading canonist (not to mention a man deeply in love with the Church and her liturgy) about whether women have to, as a matter of law or moral obligation, wear veils at Mass. Any Mass. And the answer is No.
I’d like to add a couple of remarks to Ed’s concerning Cardinal Burke’s reply. I think it is extraordinarily balanced and well phrased.
His first statement—that the use of chapel veils is not required when women assist at (i.e., attend) the ordinary form of the Mass—is quite true. The 1983 Code abolished the requirement established by the 1917 Code. That much is absolutely clear and straight forward. But what about the celebration of the extraordinary form of Mass according to the Missal of 1962 (i.e., the approved form of the traditional Latin Mass)? Here is where Cardinal Burke’s statement is remarkably well crafted.
He makes two points: First, it is “the expectation” that women attending this form of Mass will wear a head covering, but “it is not ... a sin” to refrain from doing so.
Note that Cardinal Burke does not say that the use of a chapel veil is required under the 1962 Missal. This is because it wasn’t the 1962 Missal that contained the requirement. It was the 1917 Code of Canon Law, and that requirement has been abolished. Thus there is no clear legal obligation to do so. The degree to which an obligation that existed in 1962 but that is not mentioned in the Missal would be applicable to the celebration of the Mass according to this Missal today would be, at the least, debatable. According to the 1983 Code,
Can. 14 Laws, even invalidating and disqualifying ones, do not oblige when there is a doubt about the law.
Because of the debatability of such a requirement in the extraordinary form of the Mass today, the law concerning head coverings does not bind (at least until such time as we get further clarification from Rome on the matter).
Thus a woman attending the extraordinary form of the Mass could not be accused of violating the law, much less of sinning.
Nevertheless, it is clear that those who participate in the extraordinary form of the Mass are intending to celebrate it as it was celebrated in 1962, to the extent provided by present law, and that included head coverings. Those regularly celebrating this form of the Roman Rite thus have an expectation that head coverings will be used. Failure to use them could be cause for puzzlement, even if it is not legally required. And the expectation (without legal requirement) may extend higher up the hierarchical chain, though Cardinal Burke does not make this clear.
In any event, it strikes me that Cardinal Burke’s statement is exceptionally well crafted. It acknowledges the clear lack of legal requirement for the use of head coverings (at both the ordinary and extraordinary forms of Mass) while acknowledging the practical expectation but not-legally-required use of them at the extraordinary form of Mass, together with the non-sinfulness of their non-use.
It’s a difficult set of points to make in a short space, but Cardinal Burke’s statement navigates these difficulties well.
If only everyone were so careful on this issue.
What do you think?
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I agree Jimmy. And I think it is better that this practice be a Tradition to be passed on than a requirement under the law. Those who advocate for the practice are best suited to explain biblically and historically the advantages of this custom as opposed to sending in the lawyers.
Clear thinking, Jimmy. Thanks!
I do have a query, though. Like you, I’d love to see head coverings for women come back into wider use. If even 10% or our parish wore them, I’d be all over it. As it is currently, I’m not comfortable with wearing a veil because in a parish where maybe two other families do so, I feel like it would draw too much attention to myself, and that’s not what Mass should be about. What do you think?
I say they should wear them. I went to my first Latin Mass and the Priestly Fraternity of St. Peter had a box of them at the door when people entered the church. It was so wonderful to see.
I think its antiquated and distracting.
As a woman, this subject frustrates the heck out of me! I love to wear the chapel veil—the feeling is one of reverence and protection—It feels like one is hidden under the “shadow of His wing.” We do not make ourselves holy—but it is the Lord who makes us holy! And “hiding” under the veil reminds me—staying under His protection, He makes me holy.
Why does it then frustrate me? Because, wearing a veil—I stick out from the crowd—people notice. And I’m the kind of person who likes to blend into the background. The last time I wore a veil, one man, one of the “good” Catholics, married with five daughters, remarked to me, “oh, I see you have joined the harem club.” His wife, in fact, asked my friend who also loves to wear the veil, “Do you think the veil makes you more holy than the rest of us?” It’s the harrassement, and the rolled eyes, that stops me from wearing the veil. Most people just don’t get it :(
Judy, wear it anyway! I’m pretty much the only one in our parish that wears a veil. I’ve been wearing it since I was 36 years old (ten years now) and it took a little awhile for people (including my husband & four kids) to get used to it. Sure a couple of people looked a little confused and kids ask me why I wear one (I’m the DRE in my parish) but it’s not too bad. My veils are black as I have dark brown hair so it’s not as noticeable. The white one is used for special occasions. No, I don’t attend a Latin Mass; I just wear it to weekday and weekend liturgies.
If women do not want to cover their heads, I do not care. Just don’t give me crazy looks because I choose to do so.
Tara, why do you let them intimidate you? Can you imagine the reaction if you treated them the same way for not wearing a veil? Put that veil on, woman!!
No, it doesn’t make me more holy. Does it make you more holy not wearing one? It is the Catholic version of a scarlet letter. Just letting everyone know what a wretched sinner I am. So the next time you see a woman with a veiled head, just think of it as the updated version of sackcloth and ashes and add to yourself silently “Thank God I am not like the rest of these sinners!”.
Tara, you’ve expressed *exactly* what my hesitation is. I wouldn’t be trying to be “holier than thou”, and I also prefer to blend in to the crowd. Since the very sight of a veil makes some people go nonlinear, and since I’m not the “in your face” type, I haven’t been brave enough to attempt it. At this point, I think it’d distract me, and Heaven knows that’s the last thing I need!
Mr. Akin,
I would change the wording of the first paragraph since it currently states (at least suggests) that “the practice” of wearing a veil was “abolished” by the 1983 Code. The canonical/legal obligation was abolished but the practice was not abolished…it is what it is and can always be done by any woman, anywhere. Otherwise, good post.
Thank You Jimmy. Wish THIS would stop the dirty looks thought.
Cheers!
Danielle
Judy- This is also precisely the reason I don’t have any interest in wearing one. If it is me and at the most two other ladies doing it, then it would be calling a lot of attention to myself. The last thing I need is distraction as well! I think its a nice practice, but not worth the attention or misunderstanding, at least for me.
I will give credence to Cardinal Burke that it is not a sin but I contend that there are many graces that come from wearing a veil. A year ago I began attending Extraordinary Mass. At first I didn’t understand the practice of wearing head coverings so I met with a Priest to gain understanding. At first it felt strange but I now wear a veil whenever I enter a church regardless of whether it is an Ordinary Mass, Extraordinary, or for any other reason. It has been a great source of grace - which a pray more women come to benefit from. I wear it for God - as a sign of reverence. Thus, I do not care what anybody thinks or whether I draw attention. Personally, though, I see head coverings as less distracting because women and especially girls, who wear veils are not playing with their hair – which is a distraction to themselves and to others. I have also observed how they encourage modesty.
Frankly I don’t believe that a woman covering her head for the Liturgy is required but I do believe that it is a decision that each woman is free to make. In years past, woman covered her head in Church but a man uncovered his. Neither of these practices seems to be in accordance w/St. Paul as Jewish men covered their heads for Services, while women in those days always covered theirs everywhere. Seems to me that it is an outdated practice. Our Creator fashioned us during these times, not during other times, for a reason. As w/all of creation
Our Maker expected us to evolve, and change in many ways which are good and acceptable to His plan. Secular woman wearing veils seem to be mini imitators of Religious women whose lifestyle emphasizes a totally different manner of being. However, heads covered or uncovered, what please God is a humble and contrite heart as He Himself as said.
I have noticed that women (girls) who wear head coverings also dress modestly. I have never seen a woman with a head cover and immodest clothes.
I picked up the practice while assisting at Mass in the Extraordinary Form, but I wear a covering at regular Masses (unless I forget it!). If others harass or roll their eyes, what joy to be mildly persecuted for simply trying to show reverence for Our Lord! Yes, I feel like a sore thumb when I am the only one wearing a veil—but I sit down front anyway. I figure there may be one or two other women who would like to cover their heads, but lack the courage; maybe my veil will be an encouragement to them. It has nothing to do with my “holiness.” It’s more about humility—even if that means humiliation.
I think is a beautiful act of reverence to see women wearing the veil at Mass. I was wondering if the veil was returning for recently I’ve noticed more women wearing the veil at one of my local parishes (Immaculate Conception Jax FL). Reminiscent of my childhood memories growing up in Central America- quite normal to see this.
It’s too bad that a woman has to be criticized for wearing a veil. Remember at Pope John Paul’s funeral Mass , dignataries’ wives were wearing them whether Catholic or not. I figure if it’s good enough for our beloved Pope it’s good enough for Our Lord. I think it should be a choice in this case, but I don’t like to be a distraction from the Mass either…if people would only understand.
My fiance once asked the Vicar General of our Diocese whether or not women were required to wear head veils because my fiance was unaware of any documentation that no longer required the practice (thank you for answering a question, by the way). My fiance did a lot of research and spent several days studying and pondering the practice.
The Vicar General’s response - “Have you ever thought about converting and becoming a Jew?”
The Vicar General’s point was that while we ought to obey the law of God, we ought not to put more energy in determining WHAT the law says on traditions with a small “t” instead of our prayer and sacramental life.
I respect those women who chose to wear the veil, just as I equally respect those who do not.
I love the veil! And like many of the other women here, it took me a long time to get the courage to wear one to mass on a regular basis. I was also worried that it would be counterproductive, in that it would make me stand out more than not wearing one would. I also didn’t want people to think that I fancied myself as “holier” than them. In the end, though, I realized that I was going to adopt the practice because it was right for me; in not adopting one because I was worried about what other people would think, I was not relying on the inspiration I was apparently getting to wear one. However, since I’ve started wearing a veil, I’ve had other women come up to me to express their happiness at seeing it, and their interest in wearing one as well. Indeed, in the last few months, three more women have adopted the practice! I think in our culture, many women want to adopt a more modest and humble appearance—especially at mass. The veil is merely one (of many ways) to do this.
Judy and Claire,another voice for you go go ahead and cover if you feel called to do so. I veiled off an on when at an OF parish where some women did veil. When I began attending the EF mass two years ago I began veiling, but that was also when I took a hard look at my clothing choices and modesty issues since we had a daughter. I also veil at OF masses which I attend during the week. Though veils are quick and readily available, there are other women who cover at the masses, in hats and scarves. You might try that route and there are very sheer veils available at could look almost invisible.
I don’t veil to bring attention to myself and if anyone is paying attention to me and my veil they are missing the point of going to mass. I am old enough that people have paid attention to me for many reasons from the thick glasses braces in junior high to my ethnicity. I just focus on me and my house and our worship of God.
I do think it is important for women to try to look at this issue objectively and without some of the post Vatican II baggage. Really, given the state of the church and attitudes about our traditions and Catholic heritage where the 1983 code was promulgated there was no way veils were going to be included even if those responsible felt it should still be in the code. Women were largely ignoring the law and it was left out of the code. Aside from that, there is value in it especially in our current culture. Think I am wrong, go to the girls clothing department of any store.
I appreciate seeing this practice as these women are setting an example for my two daughters. When I see a woman wearing a veil, not only are they usually dressed appropriately for the Mass, but they are also very reverent before, during, and after Mass. Other parishioners, having noticed these women during the Mass, seem to realize they are still kneeling in prayer after the Mass and refrain from the open discussion while still in the Church out of respect.
This is similar to the holding of hands during the Lord’s Prayer. I remember when I worried about being a distraction to others while I stood, head bowed and hands pressed together but decided to do it anyway. Now, the hand holding seems to be the exception!
Ladies, please continue to set the example!
Also, I have not been able to find guidelines on the wearing of the veil. Is there something on-line?
I remember as a child wearing what I called a doily on my head for mass. Then when we would forget it at home or lose it we would fasten a kleenex on our heads. I never saw or was taught the significance of wearing the veil. Now that I am older I am finding that there were a lot of things that I wasnt taught about my faith and my knowledge is severely lacking. As a result, we were unable to instill in our own daughters the love of their faith. Sadly neither of them have anything but contempt for the Catholic church. If wearing the veil would keep women from dressing immodestly in church then I am all for it. Having said that I too would feel very uncomfortable wearing it because of the attention it would draw to myself.
Wearing the veil adds a great reverence, not only to the woman wearing it, but also to those around her. I’m a bit conflicted here how cannon law disagrees with 1 Corinthians 11. A bit of further clarification would be much appreciated!
The Blessed Virgin would wear a veil, of her own volition.
Jimmy, I do have one question for you (and Ed): I always thought that what was not explicitly treated in the promulgation of a new CIC was presumed to remain in effect. Is that not the case?See More
38 minutes ago
I have been contemplating wearing a veil too and struggle with many of the things everyone here struggled with. I feel that this is another thing God himself calls us to and when it is time it will happen. But often it is not our choice but His request and how humbling and heroic to follow this call at the risk of persecution (no matter how small). I also feel like if you feel things need to change and would like to see more women covering their heads then set the example, I can’t complain if I myself won’t change. Thank you all for your posts. I am going to try and take me out of it and see what He wants. God bless you all on your journey to holiness and sainthood.
Anyone who wants to wear a veil should feel free to do so. Those who don’t want to wear a veil should feel free not to, “for neither circumcision nor uncircumsicion counts for anything, but a new creation.” (Galatians 6:15) i don’t see why I or anyone else should feel free to criticize the spiritual choices of other Catholics, when the Church allows both options.
The women that I know who wear a veil are making a statement - that has become apparent in conversations. That just doesn’t seem appropriate for Mass. So, no, I’m not a fan of women covering their heads in Church.
A lady wore a head covering at the Holy Thursday mass I atteneded. I don’t think it really drew much attention to her. Don’t hair styles draw attention as well?
Also, if your hair is a little scraggly for some reason that day and it won’t comb straight and you have to get to church quick, isn’t a veil a good thing? ;)
Forget about Canon Law. What about what scripture says. As in what Paul says in 1 Corinthians 11:2-16. Or is this “suggestion” by Paul just another thing the Church can change like fasting from meat on Fridays? Let us remember that fasting from meat on Fridays is not biblical, but head coverings is.
Women covering their head at mass is an Apostolic Tradition and ought to be supported by canon law.
If you are worried about standing out, a hat, scarf or bandanna is MUCH less likely to draw attention in North America. A bandanna in particular—no one but you has to know that it isn’t just a fashion statement.
If you are wearing a hat anyway because it’s cold or sunny out, just don’t take it off when you come inside the church. Very discreet.
It seems to me this is much ado about nothing. Styles come and go in the Church, just as everywhere else. When I go to a Latin Mass, I notice that a lot of the women do use veils, or hats. I don’t wear one because in Arab and Indian cultures women are required to wear head coverings, in my estimation because they are considered 2nd class citizens, and “unclean”. I refuse to put myself in that category.
I don’t understand why some are worried about standing out.
A woman dressed in shorty shorts in the summer stands out too. Or a tank top. Or a mini dress.
Why then should anyone be worried about standing out on account of wearing a modest head covering?
I think it is a beautiful tradition. I have always loved the tradition of wearing the mantilla(veil) but most of all I think it shows respect. I am in my 30’s and ever since I can remember I felt the urge to wear the veil to Mass. One time I weared it to mass and a lady put me down! For her it was attracting attention and she didnt like it when women weared such things. She didnt want for me to get into such nonsence…that is what she refered to it… I honestly felt so bad that I never weared it again. But I do have my collection of mantillas..beautiful Lourdes blue and ivory ones. I want to wear them with all my heart but I am always being judged! For me the veil shows respect…covering of the womens hair. By not covering..to me attracts more attention because everybody is just checking out womens hair and styles instead of focusing on the holy mass. Please bring back this beautiful tradition!
I wear a veil during Mass because it helps me to humble myself and focus more on worshiping the Lord. I first started covering my head with a hat after my husband passed away. Then I was at a church function(a yearly yard sale) helping sort through donations and I was looking through a box of scarfs to see if there was one appropriate for Mass because it was summer and I didn’t have a hat that was cool enough. I rummaged through the box but found none….a few minutes later, after feeling sad about not finding one and saying a little prayer about the whole thing, I looked down towards where the box was and there on the floor was a lace scarf…or so I thought…when I picked it up I saw it was not a scarf but a chapel veil. I took this as an answer to the prayer, that Mary would like me to wear it, and have worn one ever since (have also found more in years since). I read in one of the comments that the woman wouldn’t want to bring attention to herself…yes, I too felt that way at first but as I searched my heart on why I was doing so I realized I was doing it for the Lord and it didn’t matter what anyone else thought. Everyone is now so used to me wearing one that I would probably bring more attention to myself if I didn’t.
To: All women that want to wear a veil but are chicken…
BE A MAN! For goodness sakes, strap on the veil. I bet you a couple of courageous ladies doing just that would give some others the confidence they need to pin one on!
It’s no different than when you go to the parish down the road and all the blue haired folk want to link arms and dosey doe during the Our Father… just keep your hands folded, eyes closed and damn the torpedoes, full speed ahead.
Who cares what they think! You don’t go to Mass for anyone but Jesus and if you think Jesus wants you to wear a veil… you better wear a veil!
NO DOILIES THOUGH!!! If your going to wear a veil, wear a veil not a napkin!
This is a good example of why Jimmy Akin is not my go to guy for apologetics. This piece was so dripping with PRIDE I could hardy get the gist of what he was trying to so proudly not say “don’t say I didn’t tell you so, BUT…” The truth is those of us who veil care less about whether the law was abrogated or not than those who, like Mr. Akin, want to tell us we don’t have to.
I dont think apologetics is supposed to be an occasion for pride.
So if I get it right…when one enters a church where the EF Mass is being celebrated we would do well to act as if anything that happened - in church or world - has not yet happened. So women put those veils - or even kleenex for goodness sake - over your heads and don’t forget that when you pray for the president is is not Obama but it is still JFK! Oh and don’t forget to pray for the collapse of the USSR regime and for (or against since its “still” 1962 after all) segregation.
A balanced decision from Cardinal Burke? Really?
head covering?????
Wouldn’t it be nice not to see cleavage in Church?
Well Phil, women who cover their heads for the correct reason, I would hope, wouldn’t be showing cleavage….and that is where we have come to.
@Dante: To me, it’s more like “when in Rome.” Head covering is the rule at EF Masses, so it’s more charitable to do likewise. I don’t think any of those who assist at traditional Masses are unaware of the past 40 years. ;-)
I was one who said I didn’t want to do it because I would stand out earlier in the thread. I never said I felt called to wear one, only that it was a nice tradition (lower case t) and that if it was more common I would gladly participate.
Coming from protestant churches where individualism is so common, I bristle against doing these to set myself apart or “be an example”. I come to mass to focus on the amazing miracle that happens there, and to receive Jesus with a community in unison, not to focus on outward appearance. I have been working on modesty, but for me that means not calling attention to myself in my appearance.
Again, I appreciate the tradition and like veils, but there are much more important things in my walk of faith and soul to work on.
As “sam” said so perfectly further upthread, “heads covered or uncovered, what please God is a humble and contrite heart”. If a veil helps you be more contrite or humble, than by all means, do it! But it is certainly not a necessary means to get there and for some of us could be quite unhelpful.
Thank you for a balanced post on this topic! I’m a Catholic who attends - at different times - the ordinary form, the extraordinary form, and the Catholic Eastern rites. Our Church is rich not only in Sacraments and grace, but also in culture and heritage.
I usually wear a headcovering at the extraordinary form because “when in Rome do as the Romans do.” I really appreciate you sharing with us the way Cardinal Burke expressed it. I believe it clarifies the topic beautifully.
Thanks folks, especially you women who are’nt afraid to wear them. I’ve been wanting to but couldn’t decide. I’m not worried about what other religions do. To me it is like a wedding veil, or some sort of way of showing how special this occasion is. Last Saturday I was shocked to see how some young women dress for their Confirmation much less Holy Saturday Easter Vigil. I’m not a prude, you want to wear a bikini at the beach fine. But church is church. I don’t have fancy close so I dress a little casual for some but you won’t see any skin other than my face and hands. That’s it , I’m doing it.
Oh, one question can you get them blessed?
Dear Clare, I hope I didn’t make it sound as if I was wanting you to wear one…I like the use of calling…I feel it is in a way…God does speak to each of us and asks(calls) each of us to our own walk with and towards Him. You are correct in what you have stated. I just don’t want women to not do it for that reason and hope that anyone thinking of covering their heads to do it for the correct reasons also. We are to please God and that is the bottom line…each in the way He asks or calls us. God continue to bless you.
This article had one glaring ommission: the fact that most of the women I know (self included) choose to wear a head covering not because they feel obliged to, but because they WANT to. It has tremendous theological, spiritual and practical arguments in its favor. The only things that could NOT be in its favor are that 1)A woman doesn’t particularly like to veil. And 2)It’s not common.
Neither arguments weighed very well against the other side of the issue when I was discerning and researching it.
And if considered “holier than thou” it’s a problem in the eye of the beholder. (Better than to be considered “more worldly than thou” or “sexier than thou” or “nicer hair-do than thou”) I’ve a One Man audience with whom I need to concern myself with at Mass.
Right on, Ellie, on all counts!
Oh, this issue again. Glad to see the clear statement that the practice simply is not required.
Ladies, joye, above, has a very practical and common sense suggestion for those who want to cover their heads out of respect but not draw attention to themselves. There is nothing especially holy or virtuous about a few yards of lace, after all; different head coverings were used in different ages and in different countries, and back when lace couldn’t be machine-made and was consequently extremely expensive, a lace veil was more a status symbol of the rich than a humble head covering. Most women wore either the prevailing style of inexpensive hat or bonnet, or a mere swath of ordinary fabric over the head; one’s “Sunday” hat or “Sunday” scarf/wrap/babushka was simply one’s newest and least faded one.
You will do reverence to the Lord just as well with an attractive hat or an unobtrusive cap or bandana, and nobody needs to know what you’re up to. A soft beret might work especially well, since it can be tucked into the purse just as easily as a lace veil for those unscheduled visits to a church.
@ “Those who advocate for the practice are best suited to explain biblically…” -when I here sentences start like this I cringe. Sounds so, well, protestant. Like in order for something to be valid in the Catholic church, there has to be a biblcal precedence. The practice of wearing a veil in my opinion, adds to the diginity of the woman. One time, a woman I know asked me when I was attending the Tridentine Mass, “why don’t men wear veils”? I couldn’t give her a reason that satisfied her question…
Thank you ALL! I will not be afraid anymore. I will go to Mass and wear my veil and praise our Lord and Savior without being afraid of people judging me..afterall…God alone judges. I feel much better and feel free about this subject because for years I struggeled with this. You all have encourged me! God Bless you all.
I think if we would think about why our churches are half empty instead of women wearing veils??? I think we would all be better off.
Laura, we are commenting on an article entitled “Women’s Head Coverings at Mass”.
After the giant, global implosion and chastisement that is just around the corner (Call hundreds of saints liars, not me), the Church will have a new council, but this council will be real, and won’t be hijacked by a radical minority. This council will restore all the former disciplines of the Church and you can bet your rear that the veil will be lawfully mandated at that time. Sorry to all the gals that want to traipse up to the altar with locks flowing, shoulders and cleavage showing.
Look at the fruits that the loosie goosie nonsense of Vatican 2 have/has wrought: Apostasy globally, despair, homosexual marriage, complete ignorance of the catechism, despair, suicide, false teachings, zero or negative birth rate in formerly Catholic countries, priest homosexual abuse scandal. The list goes ON and ON. Can a Catholic who believes themselves to be grounded in the tenets of the faith disagree with this statement?
Change is a comin’ folks, we can repent and do it the easy way or do it God’s way which also happens to be the hard way.
I agree with Phil, I find immodest dress far more distracting. And while head covering is not directed or outlawed, there are moral grounds to dress modestly. I am also distracted when I see (or hear) people praying their rosary during Mass. Men (children) wearing shorts and t-shirts are also distracting.
I get the feeling that people are more worried about the letter of the “law” than what gives honor to God. Wear a veil, don’t wear a veil; just participate in the Mass.
This blog inspired me to do some online shopping and I found this site:
http://www.artfire.com/modules.php?name=Shop&seller_id=64134
I like the idea of hand crochet and affordable and helping out a home schooling mom.
God Bless
Women didn’t traditionally “wear veils”. They traditionally wore hats, or scarves, or stolas, or linen headrails, or shawls, or hoods… and then wayyyyyyy down there, they also wore chapel veils. People who equate the tradition with chapel veils are equating it with the equivalent of poodle skirts or bustles—a short-lived fashion—just because it happened to have been in fashion in the years right before Vatican II.
Love tradition, yes. Follow the traditions you love, yes. But don’t tell everyone that St. Thomas Aquinas ate ye olde turkeye legges for dinner, and don’t turn Catholicism into some kind of Early Sixties equivalent of a “renaissance faire” where everyone everywhere always wore those dinky little chapel veils. Theme park history isn’t history.
Women come to mass wearing skin tight jeans, 3-inch heals and spandex tops. Guys wear dirty t-shirts, sneakers and baseball caps.
Now there is something to be concerned about. Not chapel veils.
Why do some people get so hostile at the thought of women veiling their heads?
Those who say that immodest dress is a greater problem than wearing or not wearing veils: You are right—but have you ever seen an immodestly dressed woman wearing a veil? There is something about covering one’s head that makes one aware of EVERYTHING one is wearing into church.
Likewise, if more women wore veils (and were correspondingly focused and reverent), perhaps more Catholics WOULD be in church. We all need to be reminded of the great privilege and responsibility of being Catholic, and the best way to teach is by example.
I agree that a veil needn’t be fancy—it needn’t even be a veil. I used to wear a scarf and occasionally wear a hat. I like my mantillas because they are beautiful, but a bandanna would do as well.
I will readily agree that we all need more of a sense of a sacred occasion that requires the whole person to worship including by how one dresses.
That being said I remember my mother’s beautiful mantillas that said she was a LADY, not just a woman, showing reverence for her Lord. We need to remember that mass is first of all about God and honoring Him.
To all the ladies who want to wear a veil but are afraid of taunts and false accusations, to Terrey, and to all others who do not wear a veil because of what others might think or say, please do not give into lukewarm and Sunday Catholics. Please wear your veil. When I see a lady wearing a veil and conducting herself in reverence of the Holy Mass, I think of our Holy Mother. Who wouldn’t want to imitate our Holy Mother? If anyone calls you names or taunts you or gives you so much as a hint of a hostile look, remember Mathew 5:11-12 “Blessed are you when they revile and persecute you, and say all kinds of evil against you falsely for My sake. 12 Rejoice and be exceedingly glad, for great is your reward in heaven, for so they persecuted the prophets who were before you.”
Would it make a difference if the woman is serving at mass as a Eucharistic Minister?
Terrye- Paying attention to how others are dressed I think is precisely what we should be avoiding…
Rease- I think you should rethink suggesting we imitate Our Lady in dress. I’m pretty sure she didn’t wear chapel veils, that she wore robes and that her head was always covered in public. If by being modest like her, then I agree with you. But modesty does not require veils according to the Church. One can be perfectly modest without covering one’s head.
In response to the questions about St. Paul’s statement:
“Any man who prays or prophesies with his head covered brings shame upon his head. But any woman who prays or prophesies with her head unveiled brings shame upon her head, for it is one and the same thing as if she had had her head shaved. For if a woman does not have her head veiled, she may as well have her hair cut off. But if it is shameful for a woman to have her hair cut off or her head shaved, then she should wear a veil.” (1 Cor 11:4-6)
The CDF has stated that this was a discipline based on customs of the time, not a permanent moral obligation:
“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.” (Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, Inter Insigniores: Declaration on the Question of Admission of Women to the Ministerial Priesthood, 1976, n. 4, http://www.vatican.va/roman_curia/congregations/cfaith/documents/rc_con_cfaith_doc_19761015_inter-insigniores_en.html)
For heaven’s sake, peole! Wear a veil or don’t wear a veil! It makes no difference, if we’re full of ugliness on the inside!
It needs to be put back in the law. As many women have posted here, it should not be something people feel they are calling attention to themselves for doing… that is the exact opposite of the reasons for wearing one! It needs to be a rule for everyone.
David Meyer- Why should it be the rule everywhre? Why do you feel you know more than the church? Do you also want men to cover their heads while they pray?
David- sorry if it came off rudely…I mean why do you think your conclusion is better than the Church’s conclusion? Maybe there just isn’t a nice way to put that. I am curious though…
I have never met a woman who said she loved God so much that she did not want to wear a head covering.
@Claire, it’s not just David’s opinion. Head covering is the immemorial custom in the Church and remains the usual practice in most countries other than the U.S.—as do kneeling and receiving Communion on the tongue. I think often we think that American customs are normative; they’re not. Communion in the hand is an INDULT, i.e., a permitted departure from the norm of the universal Church. In Europe, notably in the Vatican, women are told “no knees, no shoulders” when they want to enter a church; appropriate, modest dress is required. Perhaps we should strive to hold ourselves to this higher standard in all things?
That’s cox.net. Never met a man who said he loved God so much that he wanted to wear his ball cap for that matter.
Terrye- Totally agree we should hold ourselves to a higher standard. Not sure how this translates to veils though and making it a rule when the Church has clearly said it is not required, this is my confusion. And this whole post is based on what Cardinal Burke, the prefect of the Supreme Tribunal of the Apostolic Signatura, has said on the matter. So when people say “well it should be the rule”, I would really like to hear their argument for it. I am totally curious. I can think of a lot of reasons why it is a nice tradition, not a lot of reasons why it ought to be required. A lot of it is interest in my part.
For the record I do not think mass in the US is how mass is everywhere else. I have lived in West Africa, another place where head coverings were not normative at the masses I went to, (although some married women of various different faiths frequently wore elaborate headdresses as a rule out in public) but the norms of mass there are a conversation for another day. :)
Nothing fills up a combox faster than the topics of (a)veils, (b)Father Corapi, and (c)whether dogs go to heaven.
Philothea: Lighten up. I think you are confusing pride and humor. Ellie: Veils have a “tremendous theological argument”? Seriously?
Peterman: It’s attitudes like yours that are exactly why I do NOT wear a veil. I think they are lovely and feminine (although as someone pointed out, they are NOT traditional for American women, who mostly wore hats). But the RadTrad crowd, who think women unveiled commit mortal sin by violating Scripture and distracting the menfolk into sexual fantasies during Mass—now there’s a problem. Based on actual statements I have heard and read from veil advocates, it is clear some of them believe all women should acknowledge their Biblical submission to men by wearing a veil to church. Whoa! That’s too close to Islam for me.I don’t want to run the slightest risk of anyone thinking I support that kind of theology, so with regrets, I will not wear a veil anytime soon.
Claire, I am of mixed feelings about “requiring” head coverings. I don’t know that that would be advisable in today’s Church, although I would not oppose it either. But I do favor veiling, voluntarily, just because it IS an immemorial custom that shows honor and respect to Our Lord. I wish everyone would do it, but people have the strangest habit of NOT always doing as I wish! ;-)
Lucy S, your comments show a lot of hostility. I hope you will try to be a little more forgiving of your fellow Catholics, even if you don’t agree with them. Interestingly, Islamic women COPIED the Christian practice of veiling. It had nothing (then) to do with submission to men. Nor has it now, among Christians. The submission is to God alone. I trust you do support THAT theology. ;-)
This is sort of in the same boat at kneeling for Holy Communion. I recognize that women do not need to wear a veil. But like not kneeling for Communion and receiving it on the tongue, a generation of women and men have lost a beautiful significance of such acts and the true reality and beauty that is before them.
When we go to Mass, we are participating in the Mass alongside the great saints and angels and heavenly beings who are also present alongside us, in that great vision that John tells us about in Revelation. Because women are created with great beauty, it is necessary to wear a veil, which reminds men not to be distracted and place their focus on God. The Angels are also distracted from the beauty of women and so out of consideration for them, a veil is necessary just as it is for men. The focus should always be on God. Wearing a veil reminds us of where our focus should be during Mass, it reminds us about the dignity of women, and it reminds us of the presense of the angelic hosts that are with us celebrating the mass together. Also Women are holy and to be respected and holy things are always vieled; from the Tabernacle, to the Pillar of cloud in the desert that came down above the Ark of the Covenant veiling God’s glory, to the Virgin Mary etc. A woman veils her God-given beauty as an act of humility so as not to take away from the glory of God who we worship and is presented to us in the Eucharist. Something that I fully believe the practice of receiving on the hands as many do without proper reverence has led to a triviliazing of its importance and the lack of belief in the Real Presense.
So there are a good many reasons to return to the old practice, and it is good that others who see you doing so, ask, so that those wearing veils or receiving the Eucharist on their knees may inform them of these truths, for once I fully grasped the proper understanding and belief in the Eucharist, how could I not kneel of my own volition?
Little ways like this by even a small number of men and women can lead to a transformation and encourage proper worship and educate others about Catholic truths. I agree that it should not be forced, but be voluntary and we can encourage others by example. What others see as archaic and foolish is oftentimes the wisest thing you can do and God will bless you for it.
LucyS -
Comparing this practice of wearing a viel (that too only for a hour in mass, being free to remove it once you leave) to Islam makes you sound just as bad as those so called ‘RadTrads’ you speak of.
Those who encouraged viels might just be confused as to whether Church canon Law required it. If it did then it would’ve been a sin not to wear one if one was aware of the requirement, but if the law was changed as Jimmy Akin says here, then there is no sin and it is permissible.
One thing I wonder about is whether the change in law happened as a true development, or was it just something the Church changed because women were already disobeying the requirement? Much like how widespread abuse of receiving Communion standing and in the hand persisted when there was no extraordinary reason for doing so long before permission was inevitably given by Rome.
Given how many people show a lack of reverence for the mass, I think encouraging returns to old practices would be greatly beneficial to teach others the realities they disregard when they attend Mass. You are free to do as you like, but consider how a little sacrifical effort on your part might help to teach others about the roles of women and men and the realities and significance of the Mass. Would it be so hard a thing for you to do for an hour at Mass? I’m not looking down on you if you don’t want to, but make certain that it is not an arrogant pride that is leading you to dismiss those who wish to wear veils and would like to encourage others to do likewise.
Furthermore I worry if your comments about submission to men do not come from some ultra feminist outlook, for one cannot ignore that God did set up a patriarch heirarchy in the family to represent symbolically the divine roles of the members of the Trinity and the relationship between amnkind and God and has given roles to men and women that are specifically theirs. So that the mirroring of women in humble submission to men should mirror that of man humbly submitting to God who loves us and provides for our every need in return and thus men should likewise do so for women in imitation of God, just as the Son submits to the Father’s will. Granted men are fallen creatures and can fail in their duty to be patriarhs, but the patriarchy also cannot work without the free consent of women who in their humility and livliness can turn the heart of men to rise and become better and productive for their sake.
All these things are intertwined together, and I submit that the veiling of women’s heads, and the uncovering of men’s heads be a symbolic gesture that people must be reminded of in order to grasp greater truths. And these symbolic things and outward displays are necessary also that others who see these examples will inquire about them and thus you now have an easy opening topic of conversation to teach others the magnificent theological mysteries that God has given through His Church and witness to others.
So I would ask you to please consider it for the sake of others and for the sake of the Church if you think it well.
To all the women that wear a chapel veil (no, doilies don’t count, those are a cop out), thank you for having the courage and reverence for our Lord truly present, and thank you for being a beautiful Catholic woman!
Years ago I knew women that felt that having to wear the veil oppressed them. That’s not the case now, at least at my parish. At my parish, there are several professional women who range from doctors to business managers who wear the veil. They do it because they love their Catholic faith and anything they can do for the dignity of their faith, they practice. They feel empowered by that.
My mom had different approach. She wouldn’t wear a veil, but she did wear a tasteful simple hat.
The justification for the veil wearing is the warning of St paul contained in his letter to Corinthians. I do not know whether it was officially introduced by the Church as compulsory any time. Also why it was discontinued as per 1983 Code of canon law My daughters have been opposing the wearing I am unable to understand St Paul and so kept mum
We have a handful of women who wear chapel veils. However, if they go up to be Eucharistic Ministers, our Pastor told them that they must remove their veils before distributing Holy Communion! What!!!!!?????? So much for the “tolerance” we hear about during the sermons!
So does the code of canon law abrogate Saint Paul’s scriptural writing that says it is shameful for women to pray with head uncovered or men to pray with head covered?
I know several women who cover their heads in my Church… and the funny thing is that they are all young women, less than 30 years old! You’d expect them to be old grannies… but I guess some young women are actracted to the traditional devotions as well.
We must reflect on the evidence of nature of God: Antrhopomorohic and Antropopathic reoresentations of God :( has human features and members) asI quote Genesis 32:30 : ” And Jacob called the name of the place Peniel: for I have seen God face to face, and my life is preserved”
The outward man : scripture revealed to us on faith objectives ( hair) the hair of the head : as I quote 1 corintians: 11:14-15
” Doth not even nature itself teach you , that, if a man have long hair , it is a shame unto him? But if a woman have long hair , it is a glory to her: for her hair is given to her for a covering . ( cross reference the hair of the head : Leviticus 13:40, Judges 16:22, Jeremiah 8:29)
For actual verse cross reference 1 Corinthian 11:14:( Christisn Liberty not to be misused , women to be veiled)
Nature : Galatisn 2:15
Instruction: Isaish 54:13
hair : 2 Samuel 14:26
The perfection of God is revealed : Saint Jerome says ( EP. ad Damasum, Xv) that Godis the only one who has no beginning . Now whatever has a beginning , is not eternal .Therefore God is the only one eternal.
Necessary means a certain mode if truth , according to the philosopher ( Metaphysic vi) is in the mind. Therefore in this sense the true and necessary are eternal, because they are in the eternal mind, which is the divine elect alone; hence it does not follow that anything beside God is eternal ( summa theology)
Peace to all !!!!!!
I think it’s fine if there are women out there who feel the need to wear a veil when attending either the EF or OF mass. I admire them for their convictions.
My conviction is not to wear a veil at either form of mass. Yes, I do get strange looks whenever I attend an EF mass. Judgmental persons can be found during the worship of either forms of the Roman Rite.
Other body parts are more in need of cover. I feel sorry for both men and women who come to church so ill prepared to receive the body and blood of Christ that they don’t prepare themselves for the occasion by not dressing more appropriately to meet their King.
I started covering my head during Mass about a year ago. I followed my young daughter’s lead. She started covering her head when we were still attending the Ordinary rite. She had started attending the Extraordinary rite while at school and the reasons for covering ones head made perfect sense to her. We are in the presence of God during mass are we not? She got looks, glares, and non-encouraging words from our home parish priest. I watched this and I was humbled by her. I weighed this decision for myself very heavily. I knew once I started covering there would be no going back. I’ve worn my covering at Ordinary rites and endured comments, glares but there are also people who have had positive things to say. When women attend the Latin rite at our parish we do not judge them if they do not cover. This a very personal decision and one that will probably last a life time. It isn’t up to us to force them or peer pressure them into anything.
This is really a too-long blog about covering the head with a veil. Why are the “good” Catholics [attending Mass} being critical of what one wears at Mass? If it were short, shorts, I could understand it. I remember in my last Parish a lady from the Islands came to church with a hat that matched her dress, in bright Island colors and she looked beautiful, and we told her so. Different, yes—but no one was critical. Some people can be so ‘frustrating’.
I’m glad the Cardinal clarified the issue. I do not own a veil as yet and only attend the Latin Mass about 3 or 4 times a year. I think with the Cardinal’s clarification, I feel better about purchasing one.
Amazing - women feel embarrassed to wear a veil, but not embarrassed to show cleavage and wear tight jeans and such to mass (as an EMHC, I get so tired of the “view” down women’s shirts when passing them the Chalice). What a sad comment on how our society has degraded Catholic women.
women with veils, women with hats, women with scarves, women without a thing on their heads…
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nothing disturbed me more than a priest who watched a woman stump to communion, right arm using a cane, left arm hanging uselessly and then force her (try to… unsuccessfully) to take the communion in hand rather than offering it to her… and then shoving it at her…
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the priest in question is more worried about how he looks than whether or not someone should receive communion by hand… he touched his collar 30 times, he straightened his stole a dozen times or more… his behavior, not what he looked like, were distressing to me…
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im supposed to be able to concentrate on seeing JESUS in front of me, not a priest… all i could do was to pray very much for him to be able to relax and give those that can the ability to worship as they should…
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the same goes for everybody else… hands going up to hair and make sure its still in place or veil is precisely in place equally disturbing, no matter which way they are coming to MASS… once or twice doesnt disturb me in the least… but repeatedly in the case of father gave me an hour of praying for him instead of an hour listenig and praying to JESUS….
The reverence of the Mass must come back for people to understand WHO is actually present. The removal of these “requirements” was a mistrake on so many levels and is the reason for the lack of reverence in Mass. I was watching the Lifetime show “Kate and William.” I noted several instances where they are taught to be reverent to the Queen in ways that WE are not taught to be reverent to the KING OF KINGS!! (bowing, not touching her, only certain people can meet with her, etc) It’s disgraceful that this woman of the earth has more reverence shown to her than the KING OF KINGS. What is the arguement and why does there have to be a debate? HE IS THE KING. We were created by HIM. We need to stop this debate and get back to basics so that we can see a return of TRUTH and REVERENCE for HIM. That is, after all, the goal…
I get frustrated with a lack of modest clothing from women and girls at church. Flip flops on girls AND boys, are expecially hard for me to swallow. I am against veiling being required, and I’m glad it isn’t. My question, because I’m too lazy to look for myself is this: Is the reason women should veil because she should humble herself, or is it to “hide” her hair because of how distracting the raw sexuality of hair might be to men? In the first case, fine. go for it, if it makes you happy. If it’s the latter, ain’t no way! If you are distracted by a woman’s hair, you need therapy. Modesty can be acheived with a simple hairstyle. It’s funny to me that the woman pictured at the top of this blog piece is dripping with the vanity and pride of her appearance. caked on makeup, painted nails manicured within an inch of their lives and big tacky jewelry…. kind of the antithesis of the veil. She only looks ridiculous and no one could convince me that she’s not trying to draw attention with that veil, when all other aspects of her appearance are shouting, “look at me!”
I was born in 1934 and grew up wearing a head covering in church. Girls and women could not enter a Catholic Church without some kind of head covering. This was very disturbing to me as sometimes when I passed by my parish church I had the desire to go and pray in front of the tabernacle. Then I would remember that I didn’t have a head covering and was not allowed in the church. I agree that head coverings should be elective. For me the only time I wish I had a head covering is after communion, and then I want it not so much on my head but over my face. I remember our Franciscan nuns who would take their black veils and place them over their faces after communion so they could be completely private with the Lord. I thought it was such an intimate way of being with God while in public.
My parish has a small basket with a number of “loaner” veils for women to wear if they feel so compelled. I think it’s a beautiful tradition.
I am suprised to learn that the practice was only canonical (is that the right word) as of 1917. Why so late? Was it always the discipline before then or had the veil become subject to fashion trends?
It always surprises and saddens me to read about women who want to wear a covering but are intimidated into not doing so. Jesus said that those who deny him before man will be denied by him before the Father. Peter was intimidated into denying he knew Jesus for fear of his life. It seems such a little thing to be intimidated by an ignorant, rude comment. Those who are faithful in the little things will be entrusted with greater. If you must, consider this a little cross to bear. Your faith will grow.
Laura, I agree. Wouldn’t it be better if spend the time we’re taking to debate the veil issue praying for fallen away Catholics, conversions, the Church and the world? Having said that, here I am commenting. You’re right Maureen. I was born pre-1950 and grew up pre-Vatican II. Women did NOT wear veils at Mass. They wore HATS. We never saw veils. Head covering was a requirement for Church, but hats were also the fashion of the day. Catholic and non-Catholic women alike “dressed up” and wore hats and gloves when they went out - to their place of worship, shopping, lunch, visiting, etc. Around 1960, hairstyles changed. “Big hair”, teased and lacquered, became fashionable. Ladies didn’t want to “muss” or crush their hair by cramming a hat on it. Women were no longer putting on hats for shopping or social things. “Whimsy veils” quickly showed up in stores(I believe these came from secular fashion hat designers who were afraid of losing business from the general public - they were usually a very light weight silly concoction of a single large flower and a little poof of netting that perched on top of the hairdo). Ads for the triangular lace “Chapel Veils” started appearing in the Catholic magazines we subscribed to and were being seen in churches because they also sat lightly on the hair, didn’t crush the “do” for the short time they had to be worn and could be easily whipped on and off before and after they were needed. Yes, family, friends, myself switched from hats to the “Chapel veil” to no hat at all, just as our skirts went from floor to knee to ankle to calf to knee to wherever they are at the moment. If what we’re wearing on our head affects the depth of our Faith or love and respect for God, then we have a much bigger problem that we need to pray about.
To each, her own. Please, let’s none of us be critical or make judgments when a woman wears the veil. Each one wearing it has her own reasons and motivations, and we should all respect that.
“If what we’re wearing on our head affects the depth of our Faith or love and respect for God, then we have a much bigger problem that we need to pray about.”
I think it is the other way around. Most women veil their heads out of a deep love and reverence for Our Lord in the Most Blessed Sacrament. Possibly some hope that if they “bring the body, the mind will follow”, but I would say that a woman that veils her head is expressing outwardly what she is experiencing inwardly.
There is a sign in the vestibule of the Eastern Orthodox parish I go to on a fairly regular basis in order to venerate the holy icons that says, “Women must cover their heads to honor the Holy Angels,” and I should add that the parish graciously provides headscarves for women who may have forgotten to bring their own veil.
Whether to wear a veil or not….is a good topic for parish women groups.
Many would like to return…it is the stereotyping or standing out…in time people get used to seeing certain ones wearing them, and making nothing of it.
It is when nobody is wearing them at Mass that make one hesitate to wear one.
I think I am going to pass this article to our women’s group discussion board….
This has been very informative for me. I become a Catholic three years ago and not long after that I noticed a lady and her little daughters wearing the Chapel Veil on a couple of occasions during Sunday Mass. I’m sure she noticed me looking at them far more than I should have. But I was not intentionally staring, but wondering why they were the only ones wearing these. Why didn’t the other females in our parish wear them. Gee, I think I would like to wear the Chapel Veil! But what if I did, people would stare at me and I really don’t like that kind of attention. So I never looked further.
Now, I believe I will invest in a couple of Chapel Veils and wear them because this was and still is a part of our Catholic heritage.
Johnno, your argument for the veil is in fact the same argument used to justify the burqua amongst Moslems. Since the veil covers very little of the “beauty” of women and indeed may enhance that beauty, may I suggest that you campaign that the use of the burqua be mandated at mass. Then, no man will be distracted by the beauty of a woman, though I imagine looking at columns of color and imagining what’s underneath the column might also distract.
Men are responsible for keeping their minds on the things of God. Women are not.
Also, the veil does very neatly track the role of women in culture. That is one reason why it is no longer mandated. We may use different arguments for its use now, but unless we determine that individuals of both genders should cover their heads in respect for the Lord, we are advancing one argument out loud while promoting a second one in secret.
Yours always in Christ.
The Bible is quite clear on ladies having to cover their head when in church or in prayer.
If for centuries the Church had valid reasons to require ladies to cover their heads when in church, when and why did those reasons cease being valid?
How can something, be it not wearing a head cover or anything else, be a sin one day, and not a sin the next? If something is against God, then it’s against God always, not just during the time a Canon lawyers wants it to be against God.
If Canon Law is based on God’s laws, tradition, and biblical authority then ladies would continue to have to cover their head when in church. Or is it that Canon Law is based on the arbitrary, capricious and whimsical likes or dislikes of Canon lawyers?
One day Catholic ladies are subjected to the penalties of sin for not covering their head as mandated by tradition and the Bible, the next day, they’re informed covering their head was all needless, capricious and non-objectionable.
Certainly, this type of behavior and thinking is what leads so many people today to view religion as just a big joke. No wonder millions have left the Church in confusion, scandal or disgust! It’s very sad, when people realize they have been “had.”
Michelle Rios: I appreciate your frustration concerning changes in what the Church has allowed or forbidden over the years, but I must question your confident assertion that “f something is against God then it’s against God always…” You are rightly concerned that mere human whim not be substituted for divine authority. But God has indeed spoken through His chosen representatives from time to time and changed the precise nature of the requirements. An obvious example is the difference between what God required under the Law of Moses and what He revealed to the apostolic Church in the New Testament. Martin Luther presumed to reject the authority of the apostles’ successors because some had abused that authority. Catholics continue to recognize the authority of those in apostolic succession.
Paula Murray
Often when I go for adoration to the Holy Sacrament, I and others will prostrate ourselves before it in adoration of Our Lord. Are you next going to say that I closely imitate the Muslims by doing this and that we might as well start praying facing Mecca 5 times a day? Your decision to draw a parallel between women wearing a veil for 1 hour during Mass, to the loaded argument about Muslims making women wear burqua 24/7, carries no merit here. Please understand the difference rather than jumping ahead to extrapolated conclusions that this is somehow a slippery slope into treating women the same way they are treated under Islam.
We, men and women are indeed responsible for where we place our minds individually, but at the same time we also share a responsiblity to each other to help make the process easier. Men should not lust after women, and at the same time women should make it a point to dress modestly so as not to tempt men into wickedness. In any case I do not say the veil is a distraction from women’s hair, I for my part am not distracted by women’s hair. But oftentimes I might be distracted by something else altogether that has nothing to do with women during Mass. But if I were to glance at a woman beside me who just so happens to be wearing a veil, it is always a reminder about the importance and focus of the Mass and helps me get back on track again. And it also reminds me about the fact that the angels and heaven is present alongside us participating in worship of the Lord and that we are there in communion with them, and that it is another reminder of the modesty and dignity of women and the sacredness of our bodies and of the Blessed Sacrament, and also it reminds us about the distinct roles of men and women as God created us to be and serve our functions together in harmony, and it a great witnessing tool to those who are not aware of these beautiful mysteries of our faith when they inquire about them puzzled by the sight of a veil.
I am not saying that the veil should be forced upon women. But rather I point out the virtues that wearing one brings. We always lament about our Catholics being uneducated about many things and missing the beauty of many things in our faith. Our actions and conduct during Mass together can all help to indirectly instruct people about our dignity and about the Faith. Catholics have many distractions in the world. God forbid that for an hour on Sunday we make it a point to be more reverent and remind ourselves of things that are in sharp contrast to what the world promotes.
In summary, a veil teaches us many things. What does a woman’s head uncovered teach us? Well nothing much you must admit. It is not a bad thing nor a sin to not wear a veil, but I feel we should use every means necessary to remind others about the faith as they participate in it. I’m open to hearing other substitutions for the veil that can get the exact same ideas across. And if you have a better idea I’m all ears. I am not so much concerned with the veil as I am about all the other important things that it signifies.
Billy Bean: I understand when you write that “God has indeed spoken through His chosen representatives from time to time and changed the precise nature of the requirements.”
But my questions remain unanswered:
Is Canon Law based on the arbitrary, capricious and whimsical likes or dislikes of Canon lawyers? And if not, how can something, be it not wearing a head cover or anything else, be sinful one day, and not sinful the next?
If for centuries the Church had good, valid reasons to require ladies to cover their heads when in church, when and why did those reasons cease being good and valid?
That’s what I would like answered. Otherwise, religion begins to look like a big joke to many Catholics and non-Catholics alike. Thank you.
Last year I read this article and it best explained why wear the veil. I began wearing it after I read this: http://mantillawithme.blogspot.com/2010/04/why-wear-veil.html
When I was young, women would wear a clean unused Kleenex on their heads if they were caught unexpectedly going into a Church without a hat. One year I had a lovely straw hat that I filled with apricots at the invitation of a generous farmer in Washington state when he spotted our family car stopped for their very first view of an orchard. (We lived on the prairies, where there were no fruit trees.) He invited us to take as many apricots as we wanted. My hat was the only container I had, and so I filled it. Later in the car, my baby brother sat on the hat and mashed the apricots that were in them so badly that the hat had to be thrown out. So I was stuck wearing an unused Kleenex on my head until we got to California. My mother was able to buy a mantilla small and thin enough to fold up and keep in a pocket. A few years later, the law was changed, and we never had to go through our purses seeking an unused kleenex for our heads ever again! It was such a relief. I would never want to go back to that old rigid system.
Rachel, didn’t you own a kerchief?
I never left the Church but I was gone for a time.Upon returning to the mass I used one and still do . I saw 4 women with veils.I’d like to see more women wear one .Tie it in the back ,that’s not distracting. As I understand it hair is a womens “crowning glory” Its to show respect like men taking off their hats.And it’s a humbling gesture that is also pleasing to God. However anything can be a distraction if you focus enough. God bless you :)
As a child, I wore a head covering in church because I ‘had to’. I didn’t then, and don’t now, see ANY connection between being reverent/irreverant and having something on my head. It’s a nuisance, and nothing else, to me. By all means, wear one if you want, and I don’t think you’re silly if it means something to you, but the practice (not the person) seems silly to me.
I think that my mother’s generation (she is 64) still carry the evils of the LIBERAL mentality and won’t allow us, the next generation to find holiness. In their view, EVERYTHING has to be “equal”, no one of the female side can show reverence or we are sliding back into servidude. This is just such a disgrace and so sad. I’m feel grateful that my own daughter is an example for me of the incredible reverence and modisty that her generation has embraced. Her love for her husband and her unending kindness and humility toward him is also so refreshing. There are no barriers or roadblocks for their generation. They just love and don’t care who gets the credit. THAT is what I pray the older generation start to embrace because they are just becoming a thorn in our side!! God rules!
“By all means, wear one if you want, and I don’t think you’re silly if it means something to you, but the practice (not the person) seems silly to me.”
Silly? Being authentically Catholic is silly??
It has always been Catholic tradition to veil what is sacred.
We veil the tabernacle (or at least it was veiled all the time prior to VCII); we veil the Blessed Sacrament when it transferred from the tabernacle for any reason. The sacred vessels used at Mass are veiled. The priest used to veil the sacred actions at the altar until church leaders unthinkingly turned everything around.
To veil something is to recognize that it is sacred, and meant to be set apart and honored. For a woman to wear a chapel veil is a recognition that she, because she is a woman, is uniquely sacred, set apart from men, and ought to be honored. As a woman she represents the awesome mystery of the incarnation and the motherhood of the Mother of God.
Of course, to the feminist who sees the value women only in as much as the woman can be like a man, the sacredness and dignity of the female sex is bemoaned as “silly”. It’s such a shame that this has been lost to our modern world, and berated as “silly” even among Catholics who would have known better, only if authentic Catholicism hadn’t been so obscured in our post-VCII Church.
scragsma,
You can not call something that someone practices “silly” without calling the person who practices it “silly”. The act and the subject are intrinsically connected, so whether you wanted to insult or not, calling the practice silly is still an insult to those who practice it.
www.arsorandi.blogspot.com
I haven’t read through all the comments, so maybe this was already mentioned, but what about wearing a hat? I remember that women could wear veils or hats, and for those who wish to wear a head covering, wouldn’t this accomplish that while still not drawing attention to yourself in an inordinate way? I know women at our Tridentine Mass that do that instead of the veil.
I have no problem with chapel veils, but in our culture, lace is very much associated with lingeree and undergarments, so I always think,“Oh, underwearheads!” Lets find a truly modest, quiet, simple scarf.
I know a woman who wears a veil and makes her daughters wear one. I used to help her out with her children when she broke her thumb. I do not wear a veil. She made it abundantly clear to her girls that if you want to honor our Lord and show Him respect you will never enter a church without a veil on your head. Hmmm…. what does that say about me? I am sure she was trying to “gently” evangelize to me. I don’t wear a veil and have no desire to do so, but I don’t begrudge a woman if she wants to. However, a lot of people who wear veils seem to think that it is a moral obligation to wear one. One time a guy showed me an article in a paper that said that veils were required. When he showed it to me, I pointed out to him that the article was written in 1962 and knew then that the law didn’t apply now. It seems that a lot of the pro veil people think one is sinning when they don’t wear a veil. That to me, is a minor thing, not to mention the fact they are wrong. People like that seem to need prayers because they seem to have more problems to deal with than focusing on others who do not wear a veil.
I completely support a woman’s right to wear a veil at mass if she wants, but please look at the following quote from your post: “It is not, however a sin to participate in the Holy Mass according to the Extraordinary Form without a veil.”
The mere notion that it would be a sin not to wear a veil at mass is madness. Who is thinking like that? What are poor soul!
I attended the EFM at St.Anne’s in San Diego on the Sunday the Pastor chose to teach the “why” of women wearing veils at Mass. It’s not only traditional but scriptural as well. Now if that teaching were given in every parish we’d see alot more women wearing headwear voluntarily.
@JMJ2in1 Go to Saudi Arabia.
“I have no problem with chapel veils, but in our culture, lace is very much associated with lingeree and undergarments, so I always think,‘Oh, underwearheads!’”
You’ve got to be kidding, right? If not, either you are completely unfamiliar with chapel veils or completely unfamiliar with lingerie.
This thread is going off the deep end.
@Terrye: “but have you ever seen an immodestly dressed woman wearing a veil?”
Yes… almost every bride I’ve seen in the last several years.
At Easter Sunday Mass in the Bronx, NY, 75% of the adults wore t-shirts, and 2 sizes too small expensive “distressed” jeans; a number of the teenagers had obscene slogans on their t-shirts. I like hats and mantillas, but in that crowd I felt like an elephant in the bath-tub, just because I wore a very plain, frankly cheap (my budget!) dress!
Jeans are fine for weekdays, and even for Mass in bad weather—we had 11 snowstorms this winter! But for Easter? A little more effort when we worship God isn’t going to kill anyone.
It’s not just about hats and veils, or feminism—I have been called a RABID feminist! It is about respect, solemnity, and our attitude towards the mystery of the Mass. It is also about witnessing. The Protestants who leave their churches dressed as if for a wedding witness their awe at Sunday services; they wear jeans all week, but Sunday is all suits and ties, dresses and hats, “looking good for God.” They proudly hold up their Bibles like shields of the Lord.
@Veronica: if we had had kerchiefs on hand, would we have settled for unused Kleenex held in place by bobby pins? In those days, kerchiefs were not the accessory they are now. Oh what a quandary we were in, not being able to enter Church, even to light a candle or say a rosary, without something on our heads. And being humiliated by what we had to improvise when we had not foreseen that the day might include a stop at Church. Today’s system of freedom is better. Even those ladies that like wearing veils are not barred from entry if they forget them. They are not hung up by externals, but free to manifest their devotion any way they choose.
The laxity on the wearing of veils in the Roman Church is the new Latinization afflicting many of the Eastern Catholic Churches. Whenever Rome comes down with a cold the Eastern Catholic Churches are bound to catch it eventually.
Again with the pitying observations that those ignorant Trads don’t realize that American women in the ‘60’s wore hats more often than veils.
Here’s what’s wrong with that:
1. It’s catty. Is the Church really better off with women making comtemptuous remarks about how other women just don’t know how to dress? Please, sisters, wear your hats if you find those more authentic; but please lay off the sniffy “Don’t you know your history?” comments.
2. It’s false. Okay, maybe not in the Northeast; but here in the Southwest, where you’ll still see plenty of head coverings, the mantilla was always the custom, not the hat. Women, as much as men, refrained from wearing a sombrero at Mass; and after once having been blocked by an usher from entering Mass until I removed my hat, I learned my lesson and chose the customary mantilla ever since.
3. It’s an argument that comes back to bite itself. What makes you think women are trying to recreate a “theme park” 1960’s world? The fact is that, now, today, in the United States, the chapel veil or mantilla is far more common than the hat among women who choose to wear a head covering. I’m not interested in looking like I live in 1950’s Boston; I’d much rather continue living in 2010’s Texas.
A lot of bad costume history here! Catholic school-teachers discouraged girls from wearing backwards, peasant-style “head-rags” (kerchiefs) until defeated by Mrs. Kennedy’s tacky tiny kerchiefs. Those perched awkwardly, like her pillbox hats, on her bubble-gum hairstyle.
Yes, until the 60s most American women outside of the Southwest and California didn’t know what a mantilla was! Veils were for First Communions and weddings! “Hats” ranged from a spray of fake flowers to perfectly gorgeous creations. But even working-class women wore hats to church, to community meetings, to special events from picnics to funerals. We also wore gloves, but no one is complaining gloves are bizarre, anti-feminist, harem wear, etc.
What on earth was “humiliating” about using a couple of hairpins and a handkerchief or tissue as a very tiny symbol of respect for God’s presence? True, chapel caps were cuter. But the purpose was humility and awe, not fashion. Anyone who feels her ego was destroyed by showing respect to God was/is a narcissist, not a feminist.
And if it is “catty” to be offended when someone in the pew in front of my bends over in her without underwear, low-riding jeans and “moons” me—MIAOOOW! I really don’t care that she’s picking up her 6 year old who’s thoroughly enjoying a tantrum!
I am neither “fer” nor “agin” veils. However, don’t make blanket statements such as “veils make women dress modestly.” Because I have in fact seen veils on short wearing women and mini-skirt wearing women. I have also seen bare headed modestly dressed women. There is no magic key to turn to get everything to fall into place. There just isn’t. We have to work out our salvation with groaning.
“I think its antiquated and distracting.” - Laura
How many other things from the Bible do you consider antiquated and distracting?
1 Corinthians 11:5-6
5 But every woman who has her head uncovered while praying or prophesying disgraces her head, for she is one and the same as the woman whose head is shaved.
6 For if a woman does not cover her head, let her also have her hair cut off; but if it is disgraceful for a woman to have her hair cut off or her head shaved, let her cover her head.
If this from the Bible is antiquated an no longer applies, what else from the Bible falls into the same situation?
Women should have to cover their heads. And when they’re menstruating, they shouldn’t be allowed in church.
I’m not a frequent commenter, and I haven’t read through most of the comments here, but I thought I’d add my voice to the din since it’s been a rough day.
I have worn a mantilla twice, both times to the EF. I hated it. I can’t function with stuff hanging in my peripheral vision-it makes me feel crazy. I also had my little daughter with me, who, being one at the time, was in love with playing with it, chewing on it, and using it as a dust rag. I have a feeling that, even before the law was changed, I would never have worn a mantilla, hats being more becoming, more practical and less irritating. Modesty does not equal having a covered head. It can be far more seemly to be bareheaded than bedraggled and unrecollected at mass.
Greg, do you really want to bring a literal interpretation of Scripture quotes into this discussion? Be prepared to follow some pretty silly rules yourself.
When we attend the Extraordinary Mass there is a box of mantillas in the back of the Church for women who want to wear them. Most women do but some don’t. I wish the mantillas or veils (not hats though) would come back. It feels more reverent and moreover (and i know this is a vain reason) if your hair isn’t just so, it hides it. It also is less of a distraction because many women do notice the other’s hairstyles.
That said, I don’t wear one at the celebration of the New Mass, and I haven’t seen any woman yet who does at least in our parish.
One of the joys of being Catholic is that we have the authority of the magesterium to guide us. Let us trust in the Holy Spirit through the instruments that He has given us…and…give to the world a picture of unity and charity instead of what really looks like a bickerfest.
a practice that was required by the 1917 Code of Canon Law but that then fell into desuetude after the Second Vatican Council and was abolished by the release of the 1983 Code of Canon Law. After Vat.II the whole Church fell into desuetude thanks to liberal/dissenting theologians,Priests, and Religious. My late beautiful, obedient, humble Mother told me in the late sixties they were’nt required anymore. Now I wonder where she got that from. Probably the liberal dissenting Marianist Priests/Religious from St. Mary’ University that ran our Parish. Between the Marianists and the Oblates this city is a mess. Thanks to EWTN and the Guadalupe Radio Network the Truth is getting out. As always I’m with the Magesterium. When I see a woman wearing a veil she reminds me of the Virgin Mary. I’m 60 and have witnessed a lot of bad stuff and I find it interesting to read articles by well meaning converts that weren’t there. God bless you Jimmy.
Not only is Cardinal Burke have the credentials on Canon Law but he’s also one of the most orthodox faithful Bishops out there. But I would like to know his reason for such a statement. If it is because of can14 (which you cite above)then: it could be that the new code of intended to require women to wear the veil but because there was a lack of clarity resulting in “doubt” they are not bound to do so and are not sinning if they don’t. If this is he case, wouldn’t it be more in line with the intentions of Holy mother Church for women to wear the head veil?
“The 1983 Code abolished the requirement established by the 1917 Code. That much is absolutely clear and straight forward.” Is that clear when one considers can30?
Yes, there’s always the stance one can throw away Holy Scripture and two thousand years, without sin.
But what did the saints do, what did Our Lady do? And what do they say?
They veiled, and they say veil. What God wants is a head covering, it’s that simple. And to sin.. to sin is:
‘If man or angel always rendered to God his due, he would never sin. . . Therefore to sin is nothing else than not to render to God his due.’
- St. Anselm of Canterbury, Doctor of the Church
‘And by reducing it to an absurdity, he appeals to their shame, saying by way of severe reprimand, “but if she be not covered, let her also be shorn.” As if he had said, “If thou cast away the covering appointed by the law of God, cast away likewise that appointed by nature.”’
- St. John Chrysostom, Father and Doctor of the Church
</i>Randall- Can you point out the Silly Rules found in the New Testament? I know there’s a ton in the Old Testament, but I am pretty sure only the Jewish people are under those laws. We as Christians follow the teachings of the New Testament. If there are silly rules in the New Testament I would be curious to see them, please provide a couple of reference. Than you.
I agree with Erin Manning. The lace mantilla was more or less exclusive to the Mediterranean. A hat is perfectly acceptable, and avoids the awkwardness of appearing holier than thou. Quite a number of women and girls in our parish wear a veil, by the way, without any eyebrow raising. Good for them, good for the Church, but the hat is best for me.
Chapel veils were not tasteful attire in the old days. A hat was what was considered most proper, a conservative, non-flamboyant hat. a chapel veil was what women kept in their handbags in case they were downtown and hatless and wanted to make a visit to the church. A veil was sometimes interpreted as meaning one was ashamed to be seen in the street on Sunday with a hat, and people would know that one was Catholic. The issue was not about attending Mass, but any woman or girl who wanted to enter a church had to have her head covered, and any man had to have his head uncovered, which made for ridiculous legalistic arguments like whether a man with a toupee could wear it in a church. Of course, this is such silly stuff and has absolutely nothing to do with Salvation in Christ, and to think we are wasting time on it in a world where there are so many moral dilemmas and so much suffering and despair, which are areas where we Catholics are supposed to be on the forefront. The work of charity can be done with silly little veils or without them, but it is the work of the Church, which the issue of veils is not.
Father Coogan,
I’m quite surprised to hear you made broad, contemptuous statements about women who choose to cover their heads at Mass. Surely you “shouldn’t be making blanket statements on issues that are so personal.” An “inclusive pastoral approach” is certainly called for; the Church, after all, is for everybody.
Careful Greg. Throwing out the OT is a heresy. It also consumed much of the “theological” work of the Nazi “church” in Germany.
Frankly, this is an archaic custom. Everyone wore something on their heads because that was the fashion of the times. It serves no purpose and has no inner meaning to be recognized. Instead, it may cause a distraction during mass and a breeding ground for gossip in “who is wearing what designer hat.” The whole thing is ludicrous and there is nothing sacred about it! It might even prevent a woman from going to Sunday mass because she can’t find her head piece. Good grief!
I’m astonished that so many seem to think covering the head is a recent “fashion statement,” and not a New Testament (and early Christian) mandate. If the Church has abrogated the requirement, fine. But there is NO justification for ridiculing an age-old practice, which is certainly still followed in most Catholic countries.
I also don’t consider obedience, reverence, and charity to be “silly,” or irrelevant to salvation. If we are faithful in small things, he will make us responsible for greater. If YOU don’t want to wear a hat, veil, or scarf, that’s dandy with me. Just don’t belittle those who do find it meaningful.
Edward Gergerich: I was told when the new Code was promulgated that the 1917 Code remained in force UNLESS the 1983 Code specifically abrogated it. My informant could be wrong, but I understood that Canon Law is a bit like amendments or case law: it builds on previous codes. I posed this question to Jimmy, but have not yet received a clarification. In any case, covering the head is surely permitted and remains a pious practice.
The Lord said not to worry about clothing. It’s great when you can dress appropriately for the solemnity but that shouldn’t keep anyone from worship. I was raised after VII so never thought much about head coverings though every 1st communion girl had one. We never truly got that dressed up again. Now as a revert to the faith who finds prayer better at a reverent, traditional Novus Ordo Mass more than a formal Latin Mass, I still wish it was customary to cover the head - just makes prayer easier. I agree it does tend to distract others if it’s not common practice so I only do so now if others are too. Easiest to keep a light shawl handy - multipurpose and modest and keeps you from freezing in some churches in the summer.
Well, women have come a long way since I was a child in the 50’. Back when women wore hats, scarves, veils, and kleenex tissue. A few years back, on occasion, I was at a liberal Parish for Masses. In more than one Mass women were on the Altar distributing Communion wearing nothing on the head and levis, and crocs. And one a Deacons wife. I’ve seen men wear levis to Mass but not crocs. Talk about distraction. One woman there spilt the Precious Blood on the floor and didn’t even do anything about it. I no longer attend there. I’m at a more conservative Parish where some women wear veils and some don’t. But no one wears levis and crocs.
While it is not obligatory to wear a veil at either form of the mass, I think it can be a great aid to those assisting at the liturgy. Just as we wear our nicer clothes to Mass on sunday, and our nicest clothes to feast days and celebrations, a mass veil (or other head covering) can provide a wonderful composition of place. Yoga instructors tout the benefit of having your own personal yoga mat that is your place of reflection and centering. (Weak comparison, I know.) But why can’t a mass veil serve a similar purpose; centering us on the liturgy with the proper reverence? I will admit, I also find lace mass veils to be distracting only because being born in ‘83 I had not seen them until the recent resurgence in their use. But as a former poster noted, why not scarves, or shawls? They are common enough not to draw attention while providing similar benefits as a traditional mass veil. Long and short, it is a pity that such a helpful practice has fallen into disuse.
If wearing a head covering brings a women closer to Our Lord in their own spiritual relationship with him, she will be at a place where she doesn’t notice anything else. I wear my best clothes to Mass no matter whether its a feast or not. I wear the same color tie as the season. My tie clasp is a 2” monstrance I converted to a tie chain. I think one has to only understand what is going on in the Mass that they find themselves in heaven. Just prior to the Sanctus(HOLY), Sanctus, Sanctus, Father is saying the Eucharistic Prayer and when he says, “Therefore, with Angels and Archangels, and with all the company of heaven,...” Heaven opens up and all of Heaven is present in the Sanctuary, and we are all there together. The Holy Trinity, Mary, Joseph, Peter, all the saints our love ones that are in Heaven. And at the Consecration through transubstantiation, Jesus’ is substantually present, Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity in “only” two places. At the right hand of the Father and in the Eucharist. With the beautiful singing and organ music all is so beautiful that at times I feel like I’m floating up to Communion. When I leave after Mass and I’m at my car or before I enter any place else I purposefully dress down to make sure that only at Mass do I dress my best. I take my blazer and tie off unbutton my shirt, roll up sleeves etc. But thats just me and my own relationship with Jesus. And I realize that there are people that can’t afford nice clothes for Mass but they wear their best. I once saw a gentlman with two young boys. He was wearing levis with holes all over, but the were very clean and the boys were too. It was obvious that those were all he had. But a family that has money comes in with T-shirt and shorts with high tops unlaced. So I think, well at least their here. I guess my point is its the lazy, liberal, dissenting Priests that are responsible for all this mess. Their lies to me and my family, and families everywhere including the Kennedy’. I’ll never forget when they changed the Mass after Vat. II. We called it the Folk Mass. A few years ago I was at a Folk Mass and the electricity went out. Nothing worked not even the electric drums. So the Choir leader ran from the front of the Sanctuary to a room in the rear and back up front to the Choir and gave the drummer BONGO drums which he played while his wife, dressed up like Stevie Nix played a Tamborine. The rest had standard guitars that were’nt miked any more. Well, that was it for me.
The Spirit works in the Church in spite of our sinful tendencies. I don’t think there is any perfect rite of worship in the Church because the Kingdom is not of this world. We pray (and show reverence) as we can by the graces given to us and we mainly need to be dressed in repentance and love of God and neighbor. The Lord is the Chief Priest so I simply start praying for those He’s chosen to serve with Him at the altar if they seem to be struggling or if I see liturgical abuses or get offended on behalf of God, I just offer prayers of reparation and ask the Lord not to hold the sin against them. It’s all fuel for intercessory prayer. We’re obligated to report any serious abuse to those in authority of course. Much to be grateful for in all the shared blessings/crosses of Mother Church.
As a female, I do not wear a veil per se but I do keep my scarf on during the winter months. I say, as long as the head is covered…it don’t matter if it’s a veil, a scarf, or some snazzy hat with feathers.
Its just another item the liberals have taken away. Piece by piece bit by bit. Some Parishes are so divided they have Masses for liberals, a Mass for conservatives. Then there is the Spanish Mass. And if you’re conservative and the staff is liberal and you try to start a conservative devotion/event, like adoration of the Blessed Sacrament, or Fullness of Truth, they say we are not supporting that right now. You tell them you feel called to be a Deacon and they tell you, “you don’t need to be a Deacon to help in RCIA, or at the Altar, or ministry to the sick.” Your daughter miscarries your first grandchild and you call Fr.——- in the early morning hours and he gets mad and says “you woke me up.” And it goes on and on.
I think it is a beautiful practice for women to wear the veil. It highlights the sacredness of the Mass, and would greatly help (men and women) to appreciate what is going on. Women, I think you have a special opportunity to really call your brothers and sisters to a greater appreciation for the Holy Mass.
Conversely, I think that men should be wearing a jacket and tie to Mass. If the Mass does not call for a jacket and tie, then no other event does. There is no activity in the entire world that is more special than the Mass. Of course, this same standard should be expected for women.
Best,
Mark
Veils are fine but some wearers have a very unChristian attitude toward those who don’t. I will recount a true story… In the late 90s, when one of my daughters was 16, she attended a Tridentine Mass with a friend, who seldom attended Mass period. She did not dress up but wore slacks and modest short sleeved top, so as not to make her friend uncomfortable, since she did not wear dressy clothes period. From the time they came into the Church, (mind you, they went of their own accord without an adult coaxing)they were glared at and made to feel horribly unwelcome by those who should have been happy two teenagers wanted to be there! I know quite a few Tridentine worshippers, who are constantly critical of others. We can wear veils and salt & pepper cords but in the end, it is the heart that Christ looks at.
I love open, respectful conversation on wearing veils. However I wish we would first have open, respectful conversations on modesty. Sleeveless, low-cut, or short skirts should be a greater cause of current concern than whether or not one wears a veil. As a young practicing Catholic, I find it a great challenge to dress modestly in a world / Church that seems to have forgotten how to dress with dignity, especially in the house of God.
I grew up in the “cover your head” era and gladly uncovered it after Vatican II. I am the furtherest thing from a feminist you will ever see but I am offended by any effort to require me to cover my head. My prayer is no less fervent without a veil, my attention to the Mass, to the Word, the Consecration, the Eucharist is unaffected by wearing or not wearing a veil. Somehow this whole notion smacks of an effort to diminish the important role women play in our Church. No, I don’t want to be a priest but get really irritated when man’s (man used in the broader sense of the word, not as a gender identification) rules start usurping God’s laws!
Increased encouragement of ” the veil ” has one effect not considered here. As a visitor in a Catholic church in mexico- how unwelcome I felt!!! Yet here at home I sometimes go to the catholic church- and I am comfortable there- I can open the hymnal “to here I am” and join in the Lord’s prayer.
If it is a goal to distant oneself from other Christians I can see nothing more effective. For better or for worse for most non catholic Christians and I don’t know how many catholics- the veil does not bring to mind faith in Christ.
I am not a man so I can honestly say nothing has every made me think about sex during church- I have been offended by upper arms- but thats because of aesthetics- I think as a Christian I should try to ignore it. Breastfeeding in a pew doesn’t offend me.
” The wearing of a chapel veil for women is not required when women assist at the Holy Mass according to Ordinary Form of the Roman Rite.
It is, however, the expectation that women who assist at the Mass according to the Extraordinary Form cover their heads, as was the practice at the time that the 1962 Missale Romanum was in force.
It is not, however a sin to participate in the Holy Mass according to the Extraordinary Form without a veil.” - Cardinal Raymond Burke
Wearing a Mantilla is up to each individual woman - not for others to judge.
For those who are interested Mantillas can be purchased through several Catholic catalogs on the internet including EWTN’s catalog. The cost about $6 each.
POINT 1: Thank God there are faithful men and women still practicing their Faith and going to Mass weekly.
POINT 2: Dress decently for Mass and not like you’re going to the beach.
POINT 3: Is there ANYTHING that Cardinal Raymond Burke has not commented upon since he got to Rome?
It appears that the man never has an unpublished thought regarding ANY subject!
IN SHORT: Who cares what a woman wears on her head at Mass? This is just another topic to get the Latin Mass crowd fuming about their holier-than-thou hang-ups.
Clothing can be a big distraction at worship. A dress code would be a help. I appreciated hearing from the priest who had lived during the hat generation. I’m grateful when religious wear veils and priests wear their collars but I understand why some may not. Can’t judge a book by it’s cover but generally a sign of respect when folks look their best for Mass. I dress more solemn for the solemnities which gets challenging on the wardrobe with the Triduum and two, 8 day octaves.
Oh dear. Im struggling to believe that so many people have invested time and energy to say ‘wear a veil’ ‘dont wear a veil’
I can only wonder what great things might have been accomplished if all who wrote had said a prayer for peace instead.
Cathie, how do you know we didn’t? Your comment reminds me of a priest I used to know who said that contemplative prayer was a cop-out, that we should be engaging in social service instead. He didn’t seem to grasp that it is prayer that fuels the (true) apostle. It’s no wonder that so many activists lost the passion for (and ability for) winning converts. As St Benedict says, “Ora et labora.”
Don’t we as Catholics have more important things to discuss? No wonder much of the world sees us as irrelevant!
Well- again -if there is an interest in gaining converts from other Christian churches - the veil is a HUGE stumbling block. It looks primitive and foreign and my understanding is thats the opposite of what the church should be. Other Christians should feel they have come home.
What do you mean, ‘don’t we have more important things to talk about?’ It’s not obvious to me that this matter just totally lacks any relevance or important. I have no idea why people are acting as though we’re all being ridiculous, wasting everyone’s time, and doing something wrong by having this discussion.
I could (though I wouldn’t), in the same way, just ask you, ‘don’t you have better things to do than go on websites? But, since I think such a question is pointless, I won’t ask you that question as though it would be enough to just convert you from your website-visiting ways. Nobody thinks that merely visiting websites seriously interrupts Christian life, so why would having a discussion about the way we worship be pointless?
I don’t see why the veil is a stumbling block. I think that a religion teaching that you must carry a cross and die to yourself, to give your whole life for the glory of a king and to constantly acknowledge that you are a sinner who on his own deserves hell, is more of a stumbling block- but nobody thinks that we should just throw things out merely because they’re not comforting and don’t suit our selfish likings.
Really let me speak for the protestants looking at the catholic church (mainly r/t liking the popes a lot)- the veil is really really distracting. You may not lie that- but its a fact- and you could do a study to prove it.
Oh the veil isn’t a stumbling block if you are only looking for people who have died to themselves and given their whole life for God.
I actually don’t know a Christian that good- just people trying. I am trying to think of what Jesus would say- and I can’t speak for him but I absolutely can’t see him not allowing someone into a church with a bare head so I think to say its selfish to have a bare head in church is odd. I do wish men could wear hats in church- there are some terrible looking scalps out there.
If we’re to have a cultural bias as to how people should dress at Church, it seem safe to say that we should be biased toward the cultural dress standards during the time of the apostles.
It seems pretty ridiculous to think that we should be biased toward the dress standards of our culture- where the idea of covering your shoulders, knees, chest, or back dumbfounds people. Where telling men to wear a tie for Mass completely dumbfounds them, because they could so no good reason why any man should ever have to dress so nice for Church.
I don’t see why the veil would be distracting. It might grab my attention for split second, but only because I would be so moved and lifted by the reverence that the veil signifies. Anyways, I am way more distracted by the appalling way that women dress for Mass, and angered and frustrated and feeling sad for them because they either 1) know better and are not conforming to the ways of God, or 2) they don’t know better, and somebody has not loved them enough to tell them.
Meg, I was brought up a Protestant, but you don’t speak for me. Nor, I think, do you speak for the many Mennonite and other Protestant women who cover their heads in obedience to Scripture. In any case, when God calls us home to the Catholic Church, all the things we once found repellent or difficult suddenly no longer matter. We simply come.
I’m 60 and a cradle Catholic. We are the Church militant. I’m a soldier of Christ, a warrior. I’m also a sinner who struggles with sin every second. Therefore I use weapons to fight sin. The Catholic Church has provided me with countless weapons to help me in fighting my temptation to sins. I need all of them. From the Mass, Sacraments, Bible, Devotions, Prayer, Ejaculations, Saints,Movies, Novenas, Feast Days, Liturgical Year, Statues/Pictures/Holy Water/Palms/Chrism Oil/Candles/Holy Cards/Music/Rosary/Divine Mercy/Grace before meals/Divine Office/Scapulars/Adoration of the Blessed Sacrament/a Monstrance Tie Clasp/Dressing nice for Mass/A Tie the same color as the Liturgical Season/If I was a woman I would be wearing a veil. There is more. But its just me and my armory to help me keep my heart,mind,and soul centered on Our Lord and win my crown of Sainthood. I’ve been persecuted both from within the Church and without for using some of these. Its a daily struggle. I hope to gain the indulgences from the Divine Mercy Novena/Sunday. If all this does’nt make sense to you its because you don’t understand, and we are at different levels of spirituallity in our relationship to Our Lord. God bless you and know that I am praying for you.
I came across this blog “by chance” today. Interesting read as to what is “law” & what is mandated versus preference. It started when I developed a suuden & overwhelming desire to cover my head whenever participating in any of the Scaraments or in Adoration. I would feel naked without it. “No one told me” I needed to do it & yes, I probably stick out in Mass (although not to the degree that takes away from the liturgy). I am just not that special. Although not mandated, I always receive on the tongue & have asked my children to do the same. Also not required, since I started to receive Eucharist while kneeling, I don’t think I would be able to receive standing now, unless I was physically not able. Although it is completely human to wonder what others would think of our actions, I have complete peace with what I do, although I do not judge others who do differently. The words one day rang in my heart as I prayed the words from Matthew Ch 10, “Therefore, everyone who acknowledges me before men, I also will acknowledge before my Father, who is in heaven. But whoever will have denied me before men, I also will deny before my Father, who is in heaven.” The response was if I was too ashamed to kneel because what others might think, could I truly expect not to be denied???
Pax
I wear a veil and attend the St. Louis, MO Latin Mass, St. Francis de Sales. I took the veil seriously when I heard a Dominican priest give a fairly too long sermon on the veiling of the Tabernacle. That sermon was in San Francisco, last century…about 1996.)
Women, he premised, are the home of new life….no one can be so intimately connected with God when they carry a child. At conception, God comes and gives a soul to this joining of the sperm and the eff….now THAT is intimate. Only the receiving of the Body and Blood of Christ is THAT intimate. (I heard that comparison of this intimacy last evening at a training for sidewalk counseling by a seminarian who was right on target. Justin was so inspiring and encouraged us to get more and more people to the killing sites. We are, through the Grace of God offering people hope and real alternatives. We are the only ones speaking about this baby in her womb. When we die and get to heaven, God willing, that baby will greet us with joy…..as well, all the children and their children who would have come from that baby had that baby not been aborted. God plans that far ahead whom He wants to do His work.)
I realized last evening then the importance of this veiling….we are the potential tabernacles when we carry new life. We are women, so we honor our status as the givers of new life when wearing the veil.
Last night I truly appreciated what this Dominican priest was saying. In our churches, the Taberncle is veiled our of reverence. Moses’ face was veiled after he spent time with God..the radiance was too great for the people to look at him. Down through the ages, women have covered themselves. Only in the past few centuries and currently has the female been so uncovered everywhere…...media, on the streets, in the movies…more the norm than not. Need I say more!
Abby Johnson, the head of a Texas Planned Barrenhood killing site, when asked recently the person they most hated to see praying outside her clinic. Her response was the fully-clothed, head-to-toe habit-wearing nun who appeared always so clothed…summer or winter, rain or shine.
I think some things just need no explanation. We are so bombarded with the unclothed female body, the veiling looks stupid! As for me, the veil without explanation, always and forever. I will be buried in one!
Patricia in St. Louis, MO
There is an absolute load of good and a few not-so-well-thought-out comments on this, so am tossing in my two-cents-worth in the form of a true story:
Many schools in our area have felt they had to require a strict dress code, including a “no hats” rule - any hat, anything that goes on your head. We do have a few ladies in our parish who wear the veil to church, as well as ladies who like a well-made and fashionable hat. Even more sport warm head gear in the winter.
My own daughter, being home-schooled, was not aware of the strict dress code in the schools and I had not ever had to be overly strict in her own dress due to her being naturally modest.
When she was about ten, a middle-schooler standing next to her in the church choir was insistently whispering to my daughter and then pulled the knit cap off her head. My daughter retrieved it and replaced it, increasing the middle-schooler’s agitation. Neither girl was known to be poorly behaved, ever, in church, so it was of concern to me to find out what the problem was before I acted. I asked the girls quietly, when I could, what the problem was, and the older girl, thinking school rules applied to church, was upset that my daughter didn’t understand not to wear anything on her head. I had to smile and tell her, “Honey, when I was your age, women were REQUIRED to cover their heads in church.” It actually led to a good discussion and a few bits of church history for both children.
Bottom line - there is good reason for wearing the veil in church, or even a nice warm cap if your ears are cold. There is also no call whatsoever to look down on women who, for fear of drawing attention to themselves, go with a quiet style that doesn’t include a veil.
If I can get a better grip on the little voice in my own head that says, “Wow, she has a really pretty veil… I wonder where she got it?” I will probably start wearing one myself, but for now, I’d be too interested in getting a pretty one to feel humble doing it.
I think that if wearing a veil makes you self-conscious it is not a good idea. If you feel you are sticking out and drawing attention to yourself, you will be distracted by that and it will not help you to focus on prayer. Throughout much of history, women (and men) very commonly wore things on their heads, whether hats, or scarves, or veils, and these headcoverings were not just for protection but also for style and dignity. Now almost NOBODY wears things on their heads…excluding baseball caps and things like that. So naturally most of us feel a bit uncomfortable. I do not have a good impression when I see a veil at Mass. It does not for me have connotations of reverence for God, but rather self-conscious religiosity. Not a judgement, just a gut reaction. I’m just not used to it.
Thank you for giving that very clear explanation of what is expected and what is required and what is not considered a sin. I totally agree with you that it would be nice if everyone understood the actual church canon so clearly and explained it clearly and refrained from mis-quoting simply to bolster one’s personal biases or to make more money. However, we are dealing with human beings. I think your hope, which I share, is, well, a little too much to ask of humanity at this time. The 21st Century this may be, but we aren’t nearly as morally evolved as we like to think. More’s the pity.
To those who are uncomfortable with the thought of standing out, I empathize. We are social creatures and our natural tendency is to try to fit in. (Even kids who are rebelling and wanting to be “different” by wearing crazy hair, makeup, or clothes are simply trying to fit in with others who wear the SAME kinds of crazy hair, makeup, or clothes!) So, my main question for you to ponder is “what group am I trying to fit in with and why?” As long as you are clear on that, you will have no problems wearing what is appropriate. And no, I am not trying to imply that wearing veils is the way to go. In this, both options (wearing and not wearing) are appropriate. What I AM saying is that the world would be a better place if everyone’s choices are made from a genuine, deliberate decision guided by their plan for their spiritual development instead of guided by fear of standing out. (Whether you are afraid of standing out at a church where everyone wears head coverings or a church where no one does) Finally, if you choose to do differently than the others in your church yet are still afraid of standing out, please remember that we are called to shine our lantern, not to hide it. Maybe that call from God will be enough to help you overcome your fears.
To those who think this discussion is a waste of time:
If you walk into any supermarket or gas station or do a google search on fashion magazines, you can see in a moment the staggering quantity of time and energy that women- and men- spend talking about women’s fashion. Whatever the goal of all that discussion is, I kind of think that maybe most of it isn’t about giving glory to God. So, in contrast, I think this (relatively minor) discussion is…kind of nice…for a change…..Think about the contrast….
Count me among the women who would like to wear a veil, but on the rare occasions I have, I get so many comments from others, I know it’s a distraction.
I’ve taken to wearing a folded scarf tied over my hair like a headband. This scarf is gradually getting wider, covering more and more of my hair. After a while, I’ll switch to a veil. I figure people will become so used to seeing something covering at least a portion of my hair, eventually, it will be a non-issue if I cover all of it.
(I appreciate Esther’s sentiment, but Mass is not where I want to be shining *my* light. Isn’t it funny how it used to be a woman’s hair that called attention to her and now it’s her veil?)
Such a lot of verbiage, while Romeis burning!! Who really cares! I don’t. Get with t/program. Confront ourselves, empty ourselves, do good help t/lonely and pray for t/dead and sinners(include yourself). Get real!!
Dear Jimmy,
I am very grateful that you are posting articles in an effort to clear up this “to veil or not to veil” issue. I find that it tries my patience when pepole make such a huge issue out of this, even though the Church is leaving the option to us, with the exception of recommending a veil when attending the Latin speaking Masses. I fervently wish that we would stop splitting hairs and fussing about petty things, while there are still so many people who do not understand the Real Presence of Jesus as the Holy Eucharist, AND we could be focusing our energies on seeking to save the lives of the unborn. If we Catholics would come into serious unity and solidarity, abortion would be no more, it would be UNTHINKABLE.
I am 61 years old and I keep praying for patience, but I also want to prioritize. Thank you for all that you are doing to build up the truth and love of our One, Holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church. I, too, am a convert. God bless you. www.familyland.org, www.familycatechism.com
Johnno, There are multiple reasons in favor of wearing head coverings at Mass. The primary reason is “on account of the Angels” which is explained in depth by St. Thomas Aquinas, and presented for our understanding. I believe you interpret this incorrectly according to the error of Terullian. The angels are not distracted by the beauty of women; rather the point is that there are angels present in the church, attending to the Triune God; and we (women) ought to cover our heads. See this link: http://thedivinelamp.wordpress.com/2010/11/21/father-callan-on-1-corinthians-111-16/ and particularly this explanation: Because of the angels, i.e., women at the public Christian devotions ought to wear a veil in token of their modesty and submission, and also on account of the ministering angels who are present at the sacred functions of the faithful (4:9; Eph 3:10; Heb 1:14), and who would be deeply grieved if women did not observe the modesty and appearance of submission which God desires of them (Gen 48:16; Tob 12:12; 2 Macc 3:25; Matt 18:10; Luke 1:19; Apoc 8:13). Erasmus paraphrases this passage as follows: “If a woman has arrived at that pitch of shamelessness that she does not fear the eyes of men, let her at least cover her head on account of the angels who are present at your assemblies.”
Another explanation, that by “angels” are meant the priests (Ambrosiaster) is very improbable. The opinion of Tertullian that there is question here of demons who might lust after the unveiled women, or incite men to do so, is to be rejected.
Someone may have asked this question already, but I will ask. What about the holy scripture, new testament, reference that states women should have their heads covered during Mass. I understand the ruling of the Church, but now it contradicts scripture that says that women should wear head covering. As a women, I would like to know how this practice can be abolished when the scripture is clear? The only loop hole I found, while reading the scripture, was that my husband is not Christian so I am not under his authority, as a Christian head of house, so I am not required to wear it. Is this maybe why they abolished the requirement because women were marrying non-Christian men? It is very confusing when the scripture says something and then the Church changes it and their is no contradiction in Bible to allow for wiggle room. Sincerely would like to understand.
Dear hrwg;
You still should obey your husband-Christian or not- in all things but sin. His authority over you remains.
The practice of wearing head coverings has not been abolished; the church laws requiring them appear to have been lifted. I will not be surprised when, someday, the church’s laws come around full circle.
Anyone who harasses a woman for wearing a veil in church clearly has issues and they definitely do not include Christian charity.
I wear the veil and have never had anyone say anything to me about it. However, my eyes are always downcast when approaching the Eucharist and I concentrate only on the Lord. I have noted that the priest always knows that I will receive in the mouth. The Church has always taught me to go to Jesus through Mary. I always consecrated myself to her and try to imitate her in everything knowing full well that unlike her, I am a sinner. She wears a veil, I will wear one also, she dresses modestly, so will I. Why be concern what others say or think? Devote yourself totally to the kingdom of God and you will find yourself immersed with the joys or sufferings of the Lord and totally oblivious to the world.
1 Corinthians, 11:1-11 summarizes why women should cover their heads. My objective is not to please those around me or not to wear a head covering just because “that’s not what people do today”. My objective is to please God and follow his will, not man.
Our pastor once where explained that it is the custom to veil holy things, such as the Chalice. There is a special holy relationship between God and Woman whereby when a child is conceived, God creates the baby’s soul. This is not a point that you ever hear about, as it disproves the feminist ideas rampant at the time when women stopped wearing head coverings.
Carol, that’s a beautiful sentiment from your pastor about veiling holy things….I can’t help wondering though….are we saying/implying that men aren’t holy?
Tje fact that scripture and Canon Law require it(1 Cor. 11: 4-15 and Canon Law 1262) proves females have no business NOT covering their heads in churches.
Wear them or not. What I don’t like are those individuals who hassle a woman who chooses to wear one as if there is a problem with attending mass with reverence and decorum.
Dante -
What is it to you if a women wears a chapel veil or not?
Only a very sick creature would carry on in such a way.
Dwayne cited can. 1262 from the 1917 Code. The whole of the 1917 Code was abrogated when the 1983 Code came into force (see can.6 §1 1° of the 1983 Code). The rule about head-coverings (in Canon Law and in the New Testament) was purely disciplinary and that is why the Church is able to change the discipline. That point was already made here on April 26 by Fr. Terry Donahue CC in his quote from Inter Insigniores.
Maybe I can also reassure Michelle Rios (2 posts on April 27) that the 1983 Code was promulgated not as the result of any whimsy by canon lawyers, but after a very extensive process of consultation which constitutes one of the most significant exercises of collegiality in recent times - see the Apostolic Constitution Sacrae Disciplinae Leges by which the 1983 Code was promulgated.
I grew up in a Catholic School and wore a veil when there was first the Latin Mass and then when it turned into the English Mass and the pulpit began to face us. Easter Sunday I wore a hat with flowers and a matching purse with gloves. It all seemed so honorable, like when the President of the United States would come visit and his wife would wear appropriate attire for specific events. Our Lord is a special event and would take us in whatever form we presented ourselves, but would we want to not show him all the honor He Himself would give His Father? The priest would shoo the bikini clad young people out of the Mass because of disrespect; the Nuns at one time would cut off their Royal crown in an effort to show humility and draw attention not to their beauty, but rather honor our Lord’s beauty under the Crown of Thorns He bore for us. This is no longer a matter of law, but of honor, humility, and devoutness. When I was young, omitting Mass on Sunday was considered a mortal sin, so the day must hold some sort high esteem and not just be a casual event. This in itself holds us accountable for the way we dress and the priority we put upon the day of our Lord in our lives. How important is He to you and I? Even the capitalization in our written reference to Him is a tribute to Him; how much more the way we dress and present ourselves to Him and His people. A simple and honest gesture cannot be that much more difficult than the blood He shed for us in His beatings and the Cross He died on. He is why we are here, and He is why I would honor Him by wearing one.
I don’t think that explainations can be anymore on point and eloquent than that of Zelda Maria Clune, who wrote above. Perfect explanation of the respect that is due our Lord.! It seems that so many people are afraid to “be first” or to “stand out”!!? Someone has to be first, and afterall….there PROBABLY isn’t anyone…even amongst the most “liberal” Catholics at your parish Church…that is going to throw you to the lions for wearing a veil, mantilla, scarf or even a hat!!!! Think of the disrespectful clothing that so many wear….no one seems too bothered by that, so why worry about going the other way?? Hhmm-m…‘Going My Way’?!
I have been wearing a long scarf to Mass and to Adoration. When kneeling in prayer, I put the scarf over my hair. The sides of the scarf swing forward, providing privacy for me, which I like. I tend to get emotional during prayer and it can be embarrassing for my face to show. I would wear a veil at all times, but I don’t want it to send the message that I’m somehow more pious than others.
I think the wearing of the veil or not is a personal matter. However, the most important thing is where the heart is. It is in the heart that we acknowledge that we are subject to our spouses and to the Lord. If wearing the veil promotes that condition of the heart then by all means, wear one. If wearing the veil does not make a difference in that regard, then do not wear one. In the end, I think the Lord will want us to do that which leads us more to him and not do that which does not lead us more to him.
Born in 1955, I grew up with all women’s head covered at Mass. Weekly Mass was attended by all students at my Catholic grade school. If we forgot then we wore a tissue with a bobby pin supplied by our IHM sisters. It was a sign of respect, of reverence to the Blessed Sacrament. I recall that my mother told me that when I “grew up” I could then wear the mantilla style instead of the round circle veil perched atop our heads.
Ok, now it’s not “law” but what a wonderful practice for very sound reasons.
I was way too scared to wear one in our parish, as no one does, and I don’t want to be viewed either as a religious “wacko” or a fanatic. Sadly, that is the truth and don’t doubt for a minute that it would not be the case.
Yet, when away in a city where no one new me I tried it for the first time. The first time was a disaster as I forgot the bobby pin or some form of securing my veil. I spent more time pulling it back up, I was totally unnerved and distracted. At this Cathedral there were two other women with veils. So to press on I put it on the next day at the daily Mass with a pin.
I must say I totally was at ease and when I bowed my head to pray it was just such an intimate meeting with the Lord. I felt alone with Him.
I won’t do this at my own parish. I must say that no matter what side of this fence we are on, we need charity.
I really appreciated the concise way that you explained how veiling became a non-obligatory devotion. In reading your post, I was able to put to rest all of the misinformation out there and my own questions concerning the practice. I am a revert to veiling, having veiled as a child. You may be interested in my post at the Catholic Sistas blog which your post helped make possible (as a resource for the proper legalities). http://www.catholicsistas.com/2012/06/12/lifting-the-veil/
Sacred Scripture is quite clear: godly ladies cover their head when in church or in prayer. If for centuries the Church taught there were sound and valid reasons to require Catholic ladies to cover their heads when in church or in prayer, when and why did those reasons stop being valid and important? Does anyone care to answer?
How can something, be it not wearing a head cover or anything else, be a sin one day, and not a sin the next? If something is against God’s law, then it’s against God’s law always, not just while some Canon lawyers want it to be against God’s law.
If Canon Law is truly based on Apostolic tradition and Scriptural authority, and Canon Law required wearing a veil in church or in prayer, then Catholic ladies should continue to have to cover their head when in church or in prayer. Or is anyone trying to say that Canon Law is based on the arbitrary, capricious and whimsical likes and dislikes, opinions and preferences of Canon lawyers? Can divine authority be so casually substituted by mere human whim?
It is incomprehensible that one day Catholic ladies are subjected to the penalties of sin for not covering their head as mandated by Apostolic Tradition and Sacred Scripture, and the next day they’re told that covering their head is needless, capricious and inconsequential. If the Church was wrong in requiring use of the veil, what guarantees us that She is not wrong now?
Again: When and why did the Church’s valid and sound reasons for veling stop being valid and sound? NO ONE HAS BEEN ABLE TO ANSWER THIS. WHY?
I can certainly understand your confusion since I shared it before researching the topic as I was being drawn into the practice of veiling. The first matter to understand is the difference between Discipline and Doctrine. As scripture states, ‘the faith which was once for all delivered to the saints’, Doctrine was there forming the Church at the time of Jesus and the Apostles. While Doctrine develops over time as the Church understands it better, it cannot be changed – not even by the Pope – it remains fundamentally the same.
Discipline, however, is a man-made authority and can therefore be changed by the proper authorities. It falls along the lines of the God-given authority given to the Disciples, ‘Whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven…’. Examples of this would be the length of the period of fasting before receiving Jesus in the Eucharist – in the past it was certainly much longer than the one hour rule of today! Another example would be the lifting of the obligation to abstain from meat on Fridays outside Lent. Although we are still obligated to perform some sort of penance in its place, the restriction is not as narrow as it once was, allowing us some options or leeway.
Veiling also falls into this category. It is a Discipline that was required by the 1917 Code of Canon Law. With the coming of the Second Vatican Council, veiling fell into disuse. Finally the obligation was abolished by the 1983 Code of Canon Law. While women are still allowed (and even encouraged) to veil, the obligatory nature of this Discipline has been lifted. This beautiful devotion is seeing resurgence as women of the current times learn the reasoning behind it.
To read my reasons for veiling: http://www.catholicsistas.com/2012/06/12/lifting-the-veil/#comment-4636
PLEASE, COULD SOMEONE PLEASE ANSWER TWO SIMPLE QUESTIONS REGARDING THE ABOLITION OF THE CHURCH’S DISCIPLINE OF VEILING?
YES, there is a difference between the Church’s discipline and the Church’s doctrine.
YES, the Church does not play games with its discipline; the Church’s discipline is not childish, arbitrary, or capricious.
YES, the Church’s discipline is firmly grounded on scripturally-based, Tradition-approved, doctrinally sound reasons.
YES, the Church’s discipline, since its founding, has obliged Catholic ladies to cover their head when in church or in prayer.
YES, we know that after Vatican II veiling fell into disuse.
YES, we know the discipline requiring Catholic ladies to veil was abolished by the 1983 Code of Canon Law. And, YES, the Church has the authority to change its discipline on scripturally-based, Tradition-approved, doctrinally sound reasons.
What we want to know is: 1) WHEN, i.e., what date, did the scripturally based, Tradition-approved and doctrinally sound reasons for the discipline requiring Catholic ladies to veil stop being scripturally based, Tradition-approved and doctrinally sound? And 2) WHY are those scripturally based, Tradition-approved and doctrinally sound reasons no longer valid?
COULD SOMEONE PLEASE ANSWER THESE TWO (2) SIMPLE QUESTIONS? Thank you.
If the scripturally based, Tradition-approved and doctrinally sound reasons for requiring Catholic ladies to veil have NOT STOPPED being valid, i.e., they CONTINUE TO BE VALID TODAY, then WHY has the discipline been abolished?
Is not the abolishing of the requirement what is arbitrary, capricious or whimsical? COULD SOMEONE PLEASE ANSWER THIS SIMPLE QUESTION, while they’re at it?
It sounds to me like you have a problem with Church authority and need to ask elsewhere. As an obedient Catholic layman, I have no issues with the change of Disciplines, after all, I still have the option of following older Disciplines as I wish!
www.ncregister.com is a one of the more impressive phorums I’ve seen. Thanks so much for keeping the internet classy for a change. Youve got style, class, bravado. I mean it. Please keep it up because without the internet is definitely lacking in intelligence.
I, too, love NCRegister! Check out this link to Catholic Sistas called ‘Veiling Through the Joyful Mysteries. http://www.catholicsistas.com/2012/09/05/veiling-through-the-joyful-mysteries/
Couldn’t help but see many of the comments about how veiling is connected to increasingly modest dress, and I felt that I had to respond with my own experience. My own parish has experienced a recent influx of extremely conservative Catholic families in connection with a new college, and many of the women wear veils to Mass. Setting aside my other issues with their lack of respect for those of us from the surrounding area, I am uncomfortable with the amount of pressure they have been putting on the other parish women to cover their heads during Mass, and have observed many of the younger women who veil wearing extremely short skirts to church, leaving their shoulders bare, and even sometimes wearing sleeveless dresses. These are all things which the native parishioners would have frowned on and which would have been discouraged, but the very women who veil seem unconcerned by this immodest dress.
If a Catholic lady who veils does not observe the rules of modesty in dress, then she is obviously doing wrong. This “wrong” however, in no way justifies ignoring the biblical and traditional commandment to veil. Do two wrongs make a right? I think not.
Veiling is a way for me to practice humility. Recently, I began veiling with simple scarves. To veil helps to settle me for prayer and the Mass. I am grateful for this choice in a tradition I grew up with.
I am a 44 year old woman and since I was a young child my grandmother took me to Mass with either a veil or a doilie over my head… She also told me “Don’t you ever walk into the church without your head covered!” And my grandmother is gone now but til this day, I go to Mass with my head covered and sadly I am the only woman that has her head covered… I see it as a matter of respect
I am from Europe where mantillas are not used anymore. In my opinion if the 1983 Canon Law was introduced then it replaced the 1917 Canon Law. If not it doesn’t make sense to have new Law. The biblical issue is clear but we have to understand also the Eastern Culture then. Today when I attend Mass in Seattle and see women in black veils it reminds me more funeral Mass than Sunday Mass. Especially when some women cover their faces in those veils. What does it mean then? Just an old practice?
I’ve looked up the 1983 Canon Law and it says the following:
Can. 20 A later law abrogates, or derogates from, an earlier law if it states so expressly, is directly contrary to it, or completely reorders the entire matter of the earlier law. A universal law, however, in no way derogates from a particular or special law unless the law expressly provides otherwise.
Can. 21 In a case of doubt, the revocation of a pre-existing law is not presumed, but later laws must be related to the earlier ones and, insofar as possible, must be harmonized with them.
That being the case, then, the 1983 Canon Law would have to specifically state that it was abrogating the practice of women’s head coverings for it to no longer be binding, would it not? If it said nothing, shouldn’t we assume it is still binding? I don’t know if it says anything on the matter, though—does it?
I’d like to see veiling be mandated because why not? Basically everyone who writes about it says he is personally in favor of it. And women everywhere say it makes them more reverent. It’s a beautiful custom that puts us in touch with our roots and reminds us who we are. We Catholics need more opportunities to demonstrate our obedience and cohesion.
The controversy came about because of a few women who chose to wear a veil were hassled by Progressives who possess a high level of disdain for individuals who are noncompliant with their code of political correctness. It has elevated over the last few years simply because the fascist minded have elected to make a major scene over something that would appear to be rather inconsequential to the average casual observer. The problem with the culture war is that one side of the opposition has not yet recognized that they are involuntarily engaged in one.
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