This blog is almost a year old. It`s purpose is to promote dialogue and not debate in an increasingly polarized church and society. Except for a lively discussion in the early weeks around liturgical music, the comments have come mostly from kindred spirits. I have not heard from too many voices who think differently than I. Until yesterday.
The discussion board settings require me to approve the first comment made by a new reader before it is published. If approved, subsequent comments will be automatically published to the site. Comments can be deleted by the blog owner at any time.
For some unknown reason, the January 15 post titled nuns`veils, simply a habit? continues to get several clicks a week. Yesterday, the following comment on this post showed up in my mail-box, awaiting approval,
The baseball team the Yankees is not to identify with the crowd and wear “civies”; I find it ironically superficial for nuns to take off a habit and veil and break the symbolic union with nuns who have passed on—this symbolic clothing points towards mystery and, therefore, is an immediate reminder of God. Instead, you wear what points towards the secular.
It is incredibly stupid to dedicate a life towards God and not mirror it in your clothing. Padre Pio in the hours before his death refused to take off his habit in order to breathe better. To me, nuns without habits or veils are like the pride of the Yankees dismissed by removing your baseball uniform and telling Babe Ruth to go take a walk. Modern spirituality continues to reveal a symbolic walk away from mystery, tradition, and union with all those who went before. Yuk!
Ah, a voice that doesn`t agree with me! A voice that I don`t agree with! I clicked the approve comment button. It would be hypocritical of me not to. I believe that our church and world is big enough to allow a diversity of views. The key to dialogue and not debate is to discuss those views in a reasonable and respectful manner. While I don`t agree with the reasoning of this gentleman, he has the right to express his opinion.
Please click on the post to join in the dialogue.
catholic dialogue 
Jesus said, “Follow me”, and when he said that this he didn’t say, “and when you do, dress in a medieval costume”. The sisters themselves have opted for follow the gospel,as well as Jesus’ opinion on liturgical fashion: “do not be concerned about what you will eat or what you will put on, it is after these things that non-believers seek.
In this present anxiety int he world in which we live and in the Church, not only is the temptation to remain the same; but, rather than moving toward future we can individually and collectively move toward nostalgia for the past. “When the Church was really the Church”- when Mass was in Latin”, or “when nuns dressed in habits from the middle ages”.
The sisters had almost lost the charisms of their founders and found themselves sheltered in convents, preoccupied with personal holiness. Vatican II said: “take a look at the original intentions of your founders, and learn to read the gospels in a new way”. “God is not sheltered in convents; He so loved the world that He sent his only begotten son…”
We have this nostalgia for something that did not really exist. Have you ever had a nostalgic moment of the good old days in your own life and then you really remember what those days we like? You realize that they we not as good as you thought they were?
When God is inviting us to new life we have to not only let go of what we have at present, but we have to let go of the nostalgia for the past that does not exist any more. The more nostalgia for this past that is gone, that we may be into, the more the anxiety our increases because it is impossible to recreate the past. God is always moving us to create a future. Take a look at what the sisters are creating today that will be a legacy for the future Church!
Ah…is that the sound of a kindred spirit I hear? 😉
Well said, Ray!