Author Topic: Modesty and how to dress (Read 33139 times)

clare · « **Reply #155 on:** September 30, 2010, 03:37:53 AM »

Quote from: OurEternalFaith

As a newcomer, I would like to thank everybody in this forum for the lively discussion, and especially Matthew for the initial post.

Don't you people think that in order to avoid long debates (which can become sterile depending on who you are talking with), we should simply be a bit more legalistic and stick to the rules? And as far as I know (and I bet that everybody here agrees), here is the 'latest' regulation...:

"We recall that a dress cannot be called decent which is cut deeper than two fingers breadth under the pit of the throat, which does not cover the arms at least to the elbows, and scarcely reaches a bit beyond the knee. Furthermore, dresses of transparent material are improper."

People may argue that this is a 1930 opinion and that fashion changes.

I don't have a problem with those guidelines (though I do sometimes wear shortsleeve t-shirts, whose sleeves don't reach the elbows). I always wear skirts which reach below the knees, usually to the ankles, occasionally mid-calf though.

Trouble is, I could adhere to the rules Pius XI made, and still get kicked out of St Padre Pio's confessional!

St Jude Thaddeus · « **Reply #156 on:** September 30, 2010, 10:26:40 PM »

My personal unsolicited opinion on this is that since Padre Pio could read the hearts and minds of the penitents who came into his confessional he knew which women had problems with vanity and modesty and he assigned to them dress codes that were even stricter than those prescribed by the Holy Father. Perhaps women who didn't have such problems were not given such severe guidelines.

Or, Padre Pio was very aware of the growing tendencies in society towards lewd dressing and he was trying to get the penitents headed off in exactly the opposite direction.

Caminus · « **Reply #157 on:** September 30, 2010, 11:28:53 PM »

Quote

And to find the idea of men and women wearing similar clothes as subversive and un-Catholic, even though Our Lady and St Joseph wore similar clothes!

The distinction then was the fact that women were VEILED all the time, that was feminine dress. The veil of those days would be akin to what the dress signifies today. Thus, your appeal to relativism is without foundation. The point is that there has always been some kind of distinction. We wish to maintain that distinction as it is a particular customary determination of the natural law.

parentsfortruth · « **Reply #158 on:** September 30, 2010, 11:46:48 PM »

Quote from: clare

Quote from: parentsfortruth
Quote from: clare
I was reflecting on the importance of feminity to get a woman to Heaven, and I remembered a saint I had read about years ago.

St Wilgefortis. Her dad wanted her to marry. She didn't want to marry, as she had made a vow of chastity. She prayed to be made repulsive, and her prayer was answered: She grew a beard!

Is that the same one, AFTER she got into the convent, that God made her even more beautiful than before the repulsive transformation?

:pop:

Her dad had her crucified.

Must be two different, but similar stories.

clare · « **Reply #159 on:** October 01, 2010, 03:11:53 AM »

Quote from: St Jude Thaddeus

My personal unsolicited opinion on this is that since Padre Pio could read the hearts and minds of the penitents who came into his confessional he knew which women had problems with vanity and modesty and he assigned to them dress codes that were even stricter than those prescribed by the Holy Father. Perhaps women who didn't have such problems were not given such severe guidelines.

Yes, that occurred to me. Maybe he didn't do it in every case, but only in cases which he could tell were in dire need of it, and knowing it would work and not be counterproductive in those cases. Of course, we wouldn't hear about cases where he didn't do it, only that he did do it, and therefore he must have done it indiscriminately!