So there are people who have some theories on why I have begun to wear head coverings in church.1- I believe that everything in the Bible is to be taken literally and the culture of the writing is irrelevant.
2- I am trying to be more "Catholic".
3- I have a some kind of drive to rebel.
4- I have been brainwashed by my ultra-conservative upbringing into not thinking for myself and allowing myself and other women to be subjugated.
One through three have some amount of truth. The fourth is just ridiculous and obviously spoken by someone who has never met my mother.
I do believe that everything in the bible is true and that it was written when and how it was for a reason and that there is something to be gleaned from almost every verse in the Bible. There is the one exception of that greeting Paul has about his coat, but when I get to heaven I am asking what that was about! But my choice to cover my head comes from an understanding of the cultural context, not an ignorance of it.
A woman with her head uncovered speaking in an educated way in Corinth was a courtesan. So women were to cover their heads and not speak in public gatherings so that the upstanding citizens of Corinth did not assume that Christian women were women of ill repute. The respect for women comes in here, Paul never said stop educating Christian women.
So what does that have to do with me then? Nobody assumes I'm a call girl because I don't where a head covering. Well when you see me in a head covering you make some other assumptions. You assume my belief in traditional gender roles and I am set apart from other women. In a society that is working very hard to destroy the delineations between the genders this is my way of saying "Not me! I am a woman and I strive to play a woman's role."
I am trying to be more catholic. I am not trying to be more Catholic. I am trying to be in line with the church universal. Not just the modern church but the church that has existed for 2000 years. It isn't until the mid 19th Century that ANY creedal denomination condones a woman entering the sanctuary uncovered.
That leads to number three. I do have a need to rebel. I have a need to rebel against the modern church claiming an exclusive right to define a faith that is two millenia in the making. If this were truth, and God was in control, why would he allow his church to continue in darkness for 1875 years and then imbue American theologians with knowledge and understanding which he denied his children, and his bride, for that long? I rebel against the arrogance of modernity (and post-modernity) that says that somehow we are better equipped now than ever before to understand the nature of truth. Was God simply waiting for Americans to evolve from the lesser Christians in order that his will would truly be known?
I am not asking anyone to join me. I'm just asking you to consider what banners you chose to stand under.
