Catholic Info
Traditional Catholic Faith => Anσnymσus Posts Allowed => Topic started by: Änσnymσus on May 04, 2024, 02:25:35 PM
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In 787 the Second Council of Nicea banned all tattoos as a “pagan practice.” https://earlychurchhistory.org/daily-life/tattoos-in-the-ancient-world/
Can somebody confirm that? Does that mean no tattoo is allowed at all?
What about piercings? I feel like nose rings that look like cow's nose rings are a big no-no but a thin small ring on one nostril doesn't look that bad (although I still would prefer that people not do that). Would you say even that should be forbidden?
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Personally, I think single-hole earrings are okay. My husband doesn’t care for them. I used to wear earrings but I haven’t for the past few years.
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Single hole piercing in the lobe of the ear--for girls. This is the absolute limit.
Anyone who puts a nose ring through their septum should be required by law to wear a cow bell and should be ineligible to receive respect.
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Single hole piercing in the lobe of the ear--for girls. This is the absolute limit.
Anyone who puts a nose ring through their septum should be required by law to wear a cow bell and should be ineligible to receive respect.
I can't stand any kind of nose piercing. It's trashy in my opinion.
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There at first glance, I thought the subject line was about body "mortifications". Now that would have been an interesting thread.
A "thin small ring on one nostril"? No, just no. That's pagan-wannabe mid-IQ hippie chick, not traditional Catholic. Keep to the tiny pearl earlobe thingies.
Think of it this way: Do nose rings (even dainty ones) go with chapel veils?
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None are OK.
In the Old Testament piercings, cuttings, tattoos were forbidden.
And I know that formerly there were Kosher laws that were neutral in themselves, but were a test of obedience. I completely understand that Christ set us free from the Old Law, which couldn't give grace. And moreover, Christ elevated us to a higher standard and law at the same time.
But the Old Law also contained the Natural Law (10 commandments), which obviously persists. Along with prohibitions on incest.
BUT -- do you really think Our Lord "freed us from the Old Law" so we Christians can multilate our bodies like heathens like the worst of them? Good thing Christ set us free, right? Now we can extend our necks like giraffes, our lips like ducks (like some pagan Africans do), put large holes/discs in our ears like heathens, put rings in our flesh all over the body, and cover our flesh with tattoos like pagan Aztecs? Seriously?
I'm going to argue from common sense on this one. Seems to me that this is one of those things like Adultery, where if you even THINK about a woman now you're guilty of Adultery. Likewise, we are temples of the Holy Ghost now -- it would seem to be a WORSE crime for a modern Christian (i.e, Catholic) than if a Hebrew had done the same thing(s) to his body.
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Slaves and cattle had a ring through their nose. It's the worst kind of trash fashion. Nothing says "white trash" like a nose ring. It's up there with a Tramp Stamp.
Matthew
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St. Therese had her ears pierced.
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Modest clip on ear jewelry would probably be the way to go vs piercing.
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Slaves and cattle had a ring through their nose. It's the worst kind of trash fashion. Nothing says "white trash" like a nose ring. It's up there with a Tramp Stamp.
Matthew
I more view it as "bimbo," "liberal," or "mentally ill"
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I can't stand any kind of nose piercing. It's trashy in my opinion.
Indeed. Every time I see someone with any piercing on the face, my eyes focus right there and I can't see anything else. But the bovine nose ring is the worst. And, by the way, I'm seeing it now on all races and both sexes.
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I’m okay with pierced ears and smallish, tasteful earrings. Some Indian women look nice with a tiny stud on the side of the nose. It’s traditional in the culture. Guys shouldn’t have pierced anything. Any piercing that harms the health is out. Tongue rods, barbells, pierced lips, septums, eyebrows, cheeks, or privates including belly buttons screams, “I’m cheap and have no class,” to me.
Tattoos on women? No thanks.
If a guy has been in the military and has a tattoo that can be covered up, I understand. It would be better to not get it, but it wouldn’t disgust me if the tattoo itself was of something masculine and decent.
Other body mods like scarification, branding, foot binding, lip plates, etc. cannot be undone, so these should not be done. This isn’t to say one can’t become Catholic after the fact, but Catholics should avoid permanent body modifications.
I’ve seen women with Rosaries tattooed on their calves or arms. Sorry, to me that looks cheap. Why not wear a Rosary or carry one? Somehow, I don’t think anyone actually prays on a Rosary tattoo.
People covered in tattoos, piercings, and with other bizarre modifications looks demonic, imo.
If anyone wants to make lots of money in about ten years, just invent a method of effectively and relatively painlessly removing tattoos. Patent it and sell it to aging people with crepe skin!
Keep in mind, also, that tattoos and some jewelry is expensive. Better to give alms than to get a religious tattoo!
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A small ring in the nostril is nasty and it’s from a culture of pagans.
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St. Therese had her ears pierced.
Or they could be the kind of earrings that clip to ear.
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St. Therese had her ears pierced.
Wrong. Her mother had her ears pierced. Being a dutiful daughter she probably did not object.
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In 787 the Second Council of Nicea banned all tattoos as a “pagan practice.” https://earlychurchhistory.org/daily-life/tattoos-in-the-ancient-world/
Can somebody confirm that? Does that mean no tattoo is allowed at all?
What about piercings? I feel like nose rings that look like cow's nose rings are a big no-no but a thin small ring on one nostril doesn't look that bad (although I still would prefer that people not do that). Would you say even that should be forbidden?
Were they simply banned, or were they said to be evil in themselves?
I have a hard time understanding how any body modification (unless it would be something that would quickly heal over if not caused to do otherwise, such as an ear piercing, or any other kind of piercing for that matter, that has had the stud removed long enough to close up) can be acceptable. However, if the Church has never condemned such modifications as malum in se, I cannot either.
The bizarre piercings we have nowadays, such as those to accommodate nose rings (really?), would then seem then to be more contrary to modesty (and, if I can say this, human dignity), than problematical because they are temporary mutilations of the body.
But tattoos are not temporary (unless one wanted to be really jesuitical, and say "well, they're temporary, because you will eventually die and decompose, and so will the tattoo"). Again, if the Church doesn't condemn them as per se sinful, then neither can I, but I still don't get it.
People have gone absolutely nuts in recent years. And the teenager or twenty-something who simply has to have all of those tattoos right now, needs to think what those tattoos are going to look like 40 years from now. They'll pretty much just be big ugly blobs. What's good about that? (And tattoos are far more problematical to remove, than they are to get.)
I've never had a tattoo or any other form of body modification, and I don't intend to.
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Most earrings tend to be rather discreet and I have no problem with that. That photo of St. Therese is cute and the earrings are part of it. But once you begin dismantling your face then that is where the problems begin and welcome to our times.
Likewise, tattoos used to be the domain of sailors, pagans and outlaws and were largely anti-social. So it's another sign of the times now that everyone is sports is covered or has the prerequisite 'sleeve'.
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The tasteful earrings on St. Therese the Little Flower is the "camel nose under the tent". I could make a meme about this (someone should!)
Left side: How it starts (St. Therese the Little Flower with 2 tasteful earrings)
Right side: how it ends (show picture of guy with nose ring, entire face covered in tats, eyebrow rings, "gauge" earrings -- the big disks in guy's earlobes, etc.
In other words, "Give an inch, they'll take a mile". It's a classic wise proverb 100% true.
People hear Fr. Brown watched "Our Lady of Fatima" once, they go home and subscribe to Netflix trash and watch R-rated movies, including Game of Thrones for 6 hours every day. THEY ARE NOT EQUIVALENT. Stop looking for excuses to be evil.
P.S. St. Therese the Little Flower is one of the most MODERN saints you can find. So even though her "Little Way" and heroic virtue got her into heaven, and is worthy of imitation -- not EVERYTHING in her life was necessarily ideal, or the #1 choice. That's not what sainthood means. Her mom Zelie didn't exactly stay-at-home and raise her kids Trad Catholic style. I think it's better and more perfect to skip earrings altogether. Remember the female saints who practiced heroic virtue (for a female) by cutting off their pretty hair...
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Wrong. Her mother had her ears pierced. Being a dutiful daughter she probably did not object.
Wanted to write this but thank you for doing it for me.
By the way, if she did do it herself it would be noted by the advocatus diaboli just like smoking was for St. Pius X.
The advocatus diaboli exists for this very purpose, to prevent Catholics from finding all the small faults of saints and thereby excusing their sins.
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P.S. St. Therese the Little Flower is one of the most MODERN saints you can find. So even though her "Little Way" and heroic virtue got her into heaven, and is worthy of imitation -- not EVERYTHING in her life was necessarily ideal, or the #1 choice. That's not what sainthood means. Her mom Zelie didn't exactly stay-at-home and raise her kids Trad Catholic style. I think it's better and more perfect to skip earrings altogether. Remember the female saints who practiced heroic virtue (for a female) by cutting off their pretty hair...
Ah, I don't know. I don't see anything wrong with a single piercing and relatively modest earring, or a necklace. You could also claim she would have been "more perfect" if she had fasted on bread and water for many years. Perfection does not consist primarily of the outward and the bodily. It depends on the motivation and whether it's disordered, i.e driven by "vanity". That distinction is actually one of the foundational princples of her Little Way, that perfection does not consist primarily of heroic deeds, but of interior dispositions, love, selflessness, etc. If you recall she wore the earrings and wore her hair up for one reason only, to try to appear older and more mature, since she was petitioning Pope Leo XIII to get into the convent before the normal canonical age. Nor does a woman who wants to put a pair of earrings on to look feminine or pretty engage in any kind of disorder, since it's natural for women to want to appear feminine and pretty. Perhaps they should wear potato sacks all day so as not to appear feminine and pretty also. It's all about the interior disposition. If a woman puts on earrings for the reasons St. Therese did or just to appear more femine (let's say she has some masculine physical features and may be trying to offset it, or perhaps is somewhat homely and want to appear more pretty), then there's absolutely nothing "less perfect" about it, any more than a man might put on a nice suite for Mass to give a certain appearance. In other words, whether or not earrings has anything to do with perfection is a matter of the internal forum dispositions of the individual. Obvious, some actions in the external forum are inherently incompatible with interior perfection, but this isn't one of them.
I'd be thrilled to be as "less perfect" as either St. Therese or Zelle Martin.
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To argue that cute little earrings are the gateway to bodily mutilation is erroneous. Women and girls have been doing what St. Therese exhibits here from time immemorial and I'd also argue it's part of the feminine charm. What we're seeing below, however, is a sign of the post-Christian, pagan breakdown in even rational thought - a clear 'sign of the times'. When I first 'found tradition' many of the young ladies were wearing what amounted to burlap sacks which lacked all manner of style or charm. I'll take the St. Therese earrings any day of the week.
(https://i.imgur.com/wv3exNL.jpeg)
(https://i.imgur.com/viQYR4W.jpeg)
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I forgot to uncheck the anonymous button there.
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Single hole piercing in the lobe of the ear--for girls. This is the absolute limit.
Anyone who puts a nose ring through their septum should be required by law to wear a cow bell and should be ineligible to receive respect.
Except from Hindus
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... and I'd also argue it's part of the feminine charm.
Agreed, as per my post above. Why is it that those who still have proper sensibilities are repulsed by seeing men wearing them?
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Maybe St Therese didn’t have her pierced at all. During those times many earrings were clip ons for non pierced ears.
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Why is it that those who still have proper sensibilities are repulsed by seeing men wearing them?
Random Thought -
This is off topic but I've always wondered why it is that the toughest men in history all wore skirts, uh, I mean kilts. The Spartans, the Roman Legions and those dastardly Scots all wearing those short skirts? I get it in the that Roman heat but in Scotland? What's the deal?
Ok. Back to the thread...
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Wrong. Her mother had her ears pierced. Being a dutiful daughter she probably did not object.
Wrong? Wrong about what? The picture says it all. Cool...her mom's ears were pierced too, awesome! And NO I don't agree with body mutilations and full arm sleeves & etc either, the cute little earrings are as far as I go.
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To argue that cute little earrings are the gateway to bodily mutilation is erroneous. Women and girls have been doing what St. Therese exhibits here from time immemorial and I'd also argue it's part of the feminine charm. What we're seeing below, however, is a sign of the post-Christian, pagan breakdown in even rational thought - a clear 'sign of the times'. When I first 'found tradition' many of the young ladies were wearing what amounted to burlap sacks which lacked all manner of style or charm. I'll take the St. Therese earrings any day of the week.
(https://i.imgur.com/wv3exNL.jpeg)
(https://i.imgur.com/viQYR4W.jpeg)
My sisters & I don't need to get our ears pierced to get that "feminine charm"
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My sisters & I don't need to get our ears pierced to get that "feminine charm"
Congratulations.
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Who said it was necessary that a girl must have her ears pierced to have feminine charm?
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It's pretty puritan to make a big deal over earrings.
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But tattoos are not temporary (unless one wanted to be really jesuitical, and say "well, they're temporary, because you will eventually die and decompose, and so will the tattoo"). Again, if the Church doesn't condemn them as per se sinful, then neither can I, but I still don't get it.
I believe the Church has been pretty consistent in banning tattoos. (even the Old Testament Judaism) forbade tattoos.
Aside from our present day, piercings have not been as prevalent, so not as problematic. The last hundred years or so, earrings have become common, but any immoderate number of piercings would violate the spirit of the body being a "temple of the Holy Ghost" so too many piercings would be sinful, in the spirit of the law. Even if not expressly forbidden in some Moral Theology book.
The world is not big enough to hold all of the books required to explain/allow/condemn every, single, specific sinful activity.
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Wrong. Her mother had her ears pierced. Being a dutiful daughter she probably did not object.
This reminds me of how I ended up having my ears pierced.
I never planned to have get my ears pierced and was very against it...
BUT my husband insisted that I get my ears pierced.
I couldn't find anywhere saying that it was a sin for sure to have them and so I gave in to his wishes.
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So, having read this thread, my takeaway is that it's OK to tatoo your face as long as it's pretty. :popcorn:
Seriously, most of the responses here amounted to "If I think it's pretty, it's good. If I don't personally find it attractive, it's bad, possibly even sinful."
I appreciated those that pointed out that you can wear earrings without piercing your ears.
I don't know if piercings are good or bad, but if you're alright with ear piercings, you should be alright with tasteful nose piercings as well. It's a different look, but not inherently ugly.
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I appreciated those that pointed out that you can wear earrings without piercing your ears.
Are you next going to say that it's wrong to eat pork? This smells of OT-law-literalism to me, big time, pretending that some ritual law of the OT (Book of Leviticus) remains in force, where it's OK to wear earrings as long as the skin isn't pierced. :facepalm:
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I believe the Church has been pretty consistent in banning tattoos. (even the Old Testament Judaism) forbade tattoos.
OT also banned pork. :facepalm:
Principle in the NT is that the body is a temple of the Holy Ghost. In addition, Our Lord that sin comes from the interior and not the exterior. So, the extent to which it would be sinful to pierce or tattoo has to do with those two principles, 1) whether something is unbecoming of a temple of the Holy Ghost and 2) motivated by vanity, immodesty, etc. Clearly the picture of the woman with the tattooed face qualifies as a defilement of the temple (although we don't know that she's baptized and therefore qualifies for that designation in the strict sense, but she would at least be a potential temple of the Holy Spirit).
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I don't know what God thinks of a woman with a piercing in each ear lobe although I would hope He does not judge the custom harshly as it's (presumed) purpose is to decorate what is already beauty or beautiful.
OTOH, when I was a kid, I remember that men with pierced ears did it as a means of identifying who the queers were, aka "left is right and right is wrong" was the saying back then, meaning the homos had only their right ears pierced. Only piercing the left ear sent the message they were "real men" and definitely not queer.
These past decades however there seems to be a contest to see who can render their appearance the most hideous by tattoos, piercings, makeup and hairdos with freakish colors, and which is ugly by any measure. Ugly is ugly and God hates ugly.
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I don't know what God thinks of a woman with a piercing in each ear lobe although I would hope He does not judge the custom harshly as it's (presumed) purpose is to decorate what is already beauty or beautiful.
OTOH, when I was a kid, I remember that men with pierced ears did it as a means of identifying who the queers were, aka "left is right and right is wrong" was the saying back then, meaning the homos had only their right ears pierced. Only piercing the left ear sent the message they were "real men" and definitely not queer.
These past decades however there seems to be a contest to see who can render their appearance the most hideous by tattoos, piercings, makeup and hairdos with freakish colors, and which is ugly by any measure. Ugly is ugly and God hates ugly.
Me
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Maybe St Therese didn’t have her pierced at all. During those times many earrings were clip ons for non pierced ears.
From what I can see in that picture, that is not a clip-on earring. It looks like a thin wire hanging with no stud at the lobe. I used to wear clip on earrings (now I just don't bother with earrings at all), and you couldn't find a clip on like that. For clip-ons, you have to have at least a stud of some sort at the lobe where the clip-on mechanism can connect under the lobe and in the back. Not sure if that makes sense.
As for the nose piercings, I know a couple of traditional Catholic women who have them. One wears a stud and the other I have seen has one and wears a small ring on one side. It is surprising to me that they have it, and it definitely takes away from the beauty of the woman (especially the ring). It also makes it very difficult not to look at it when speaking with them.
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Ah, I don't know. I don't see anything wrong with a single piercing and relatively modest earring, or a necklace. You could also claim she would have been "more perfect" if she had fasted on bread and water for many years. Perfection does not consist primarily of the outward and the bodily. It depends on the motivation and whether it's disordered, i.e driven by "vanity". That distinction is actually one of the foundational princples of her Little Way, that perfection does not consist primarily of heroic deeds, but of interior dispositions, love, selflessness, etc. If you recall she wore the earrings and wore her hair up for one reason only, to try to appear older and more mature, since she was petitioning Pope Leo XIII to get into the convent before the normal canonical age. Nor does a woman who wants to put a pair of earrings on to look feminine or pretty engage in any kind of disorder, since it's natural for women to want to appear feminine and pretty. Perhaps they should wear potato sacks all day so as not to appear feminine and pretty also. It's all about the interior disposition. If a woman puts on earrings for the reasons St. Therese did or just to appear more femine (let's say she has some masculine physical features and may be trying to offset it, or perhaps is somewhat homely and want to appear more pretty), then there's absolutely nothing "less perfect" about it, any more than a man might put on a nice suite for Mass to give a certain appearance. In other words, whether or not earrings has anything to do with perfection is a matter of the internal forum dispositions of the individual. Obvious, some actions in the external forum are inherently incompatible with interior perfection, but this isn't one of them.
I'd be thrilled to be as "less perfect" as either St. Therese or Zelle Martin.
Good post.
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I checked about 7 websites on the meaning of nose piercing for western women. I'm not going to post links here because I don't have time but the unanimous reason was "bodily autonomy, rebelliousness, creativity, openness to trying new things, and self-rule".
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From what I can see in that picture, that is not a clip-on earring. It looks like a thin wire hanging with no stud at the lobe. I used to wear clip on earrings (now I just don't bother with earrings at all), and you couldn't find a clip on like that. For clip-ons, you have to have at least a stud of some sort at the lobe where the clip-on mechanism can connect under the lobe and in the back. Not sure if that makes sense.
As for the nose piercings, I know a couple of traditional Catholic women who have them. One wears a stud and the other I have seen has one and wears a small ring on one side. It is surprising to me that they have it, and it definitely takes away from the beauty of the woman (especially the ring). It also makes it very difficult not to look at it when speaking with them.
The first few times I ever saw nose piercings, I thought it was a booger hanging down.
When did this stuff get started? Never heard of such a thing growing up.
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Tattoos have been forbidden by the Church for many, many centuries, no? Piercings were never as popular as tattoos, so not sure if there's a clear answer on this one.
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As for the Little Flower wearing earrings, is it not perhaps the case that she wanted others to think she was vain? This is not uncommon with the saints, and she had a very mature spiritual life at a very young age.
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As for the Little Flower wearing earrings, is it not perhaps the case that she wanted others to think she was vain? This is not uncommon with the saints, and she had a very mature spiritual life at a very young age.
Anonymous posting for the most part is very silly and cowardly. Why is this an anonymous post?
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The first few times I ever saw nose piercings, I thought it was a booger hanging down.
:laugh1:
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Anonymous posting for the most part is very silly and cowardly. Why is this an anonymous post?
If you’re so offended, scroll past the anonymous posts, sheesh! Do you like censorship?
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Are you next going to say that it's wrong to eat pork? This smells of OT-law-literalism to me, big time, pretending that some ritual law of the OT (Book of Leviticus) remains in force, where it's OK to wear earrings as long as the skin isn't pierced. :facepalm:
No, I actually lean the other direction and have no problem seeing tasteful nose piercings or tattoos. I don't personally have any of the above, but I don't find them repulsive.
My issue was with the lack of consistency in many people saying that earrings are fine but other piercings are not. How does that make any logical sense? If we're going to exalt or condemn something, I'm looking for something a little more solid than "it's customary" or "I don't like how that looks".
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No, I actually lean the other direction and have no problem seeing tasteful nose piercings or tattoos. I don't personally have any of the above, but I don't find them repulsive.
My issue was with the lack of consistency in many people saying that earrings are fine but other piercings are not. How does that make any logical sense? If we're going to exalt or condemn something, I'm looking for something a little more solid than "it's customary" or "I don't like how that looks".
I think an earring on each side is fine (1 each not Multiple) but facial piercings are disgusting.
Ears are on the head not the same as facial piercing.