Leila Marie Lawler's Blog, page 24
April 21, 2020
My four secrets to saving your marriage and your family
My heart is breaking over some of the comments on my previous post. That post reviews and offers a giveaway of Leila Miller’s Impossible Marriages Redeemed: They Didn’t End the Story in the Middle. (Affiliate link) I can’t answer all the comments there, but I want everyone who left a note about a difficult marriage to know that we two Leilas are praying for you, your friends, and/or your parents!
As it happens, I am going over and editing (again!) the section of my forthcoming book in which I give you my four secrets to what I call “destruction-proofing” your marriage.
So I thought I’d go bring these four important points back up out of the archives — points without which a marriage is at great risk.
As I repeat here on the blog and in the book, there are no guarantees. We all have free will. The terrible truth is that anyone can destroy anything at any time. But the good news is that sacrificial love conquers all — if not in this life, then in the next. Christ’s cross triumphs!
Sacrificial love is lived out in certain particular ways. I love my husband dearly and he loves me — but you can imagine that during the 40 years of our marriage we’ve had our share of turmoil. We’re only human! We also have seen how others’ marriages endure over the years — or not. And all that is what I’m bringing to this post. I’m sure these ways I’ve identified are not sufficient, but they are necessary.
Here they are:
The first secret
Live your Sunday as a day of worship, rest, and celebration. If you, husband and wife, set clear standards for how this day will be, you will see your whole week — that is to say, your whole life! — orient itself rightly.
One super practical suggestion: Make up your mind that you will not shop on this day (excepting emergency trips for medicine or other necessities — even foregoing milk on this day is not going to kill anyone). I really cannot see how a Christian can schedule routine shopping on the Lord’s day. Just think about the peaceable justice that would settle on this land if even the poor could rest and not work on this day.
Everyone needs a day set apart, a day that not full of activity, commerce, work, and cares the way the others are. God gave as one of his 10 Commandments that we keep this day holy. Seems important. Read more about how to do this here.
The second secret
Eat dinner together as a family. I have a lot of strategies to accomplish this goal written out here on the blog. Let me just say that every family should prioritize Sunday dinner (supper, picnic, brunch, whatever works) — but this requires that they eat together at least four times a week. You can’t snap your fingers and have good habits and be pleasant company for each other — if you don’t practice, you will be frustrated.
Dinner together is family communion. Husband and wife have a chance to converse; children see how important this is to them. Here is where family life is solidified, around the dinner table. Guests benefit from the love that overflows. Children learn to listen and to talk.
The family that eats dinner together stays together. When your older children start to go off, turn your attention to the younger ones. Before you know it, grandchildren will be partakers in this banquet as well!
There is no way to have this blessing without making it a priority!
The third secret
Keep the marital embrace pure and be generous. Love each other when you want to and welcome the children God sends you. The truth that is obscured by our baby-averse society is that very few couples will have a lot of children, and those that do are just fine, especially where people accept that this is a normal outcome of married life.
Many couples will not have the number of children they envisioned when they worried about it at the start; some will have none and this will be a great suffering to them. Our resistance to babies prevents us from seeing how many people do suffer this way.
If you thought you could never have any children or very few, would you act differently? I find that it’s really only fear that drives couples to contraception.
Strangely, contraception doesn’t work the way people say it does. Far from being a magical solution to all life’s problems, it fails miserably. Contraceptive methods fall into two categories: the kind that don’t work in preventing conception (and must be backed up by abortion) and those that mostly (but not always) work, but in the process do real harm to the woman and/or kill her child.
Yes, there is natural family planning. I am not going to go into it here — in my experience, it’s best use is to help those who have difficulty conceiving.
What if there was another way? I suggest that we can avoid all the heartache of what I call Baby Resistance if we look at the marital embrace as a normal way of living out marriage and children as a gift. No one tells you this, but you need to know. For my full explanation, go here.
The fourth secret
The reason you need to know the third secret is that you can’t implement the fourth secret unless you have first removed the serious disorders brought on by Baby Resistance. These disorders include bitterness, lack of libido, feelings of being used, chemical/hormonal imbalance leading to poor health, excessive control, and lack of communication.
You see, the fourth secret is that husband and wife ought to be friends and admire each other! Naturally, you can’t even begin if you are not following the third secret… but if you are, you can be free to work on this area. What good does it do to know your respective temperaments, love languages, and so on, if you are thwarting your most basic form of communication, the conjugal one?
Most marriage advice is about romance and spontaneity, when the real issue is that spouses fall into bad habits of being indifferent or even contemptuous of each other, leading to sometimes serious betrayals. Husband and wife need to admire each other and really be friends. They need to put each other first in a joyful way.
Friends are courteous to each other, find each other’s company restful and charming, and are somewhat in awe of the gift of disinterested love that each brings to the other. Friends naturally strive to be more, not less, virtuous for the sake of the other.
Begin today with the first step, which is gratitude. We can only overcome contempt with gratitude! And I will warn you, if you don’t work to eradicate the evil weed of contemptuousness in your own heart, your marriage will not be safe from destruction. The good news is that admiration works wonders to heal even the saddest relationship! There are more particulars, especially about the different ways each sex needs to be admired, here in this post.
Of course, starting out well would be ideal. But even the most difficult marriage can be turned around — for proof, read Leila Miller’s book. Please be sure you have entered to win one of the copies we are giving away, by leaving a comment on the giveaway post. We will close the giveaway on Thursday.
The post My four secrets to saving your marriage and your family appeared first on Like Mother Like Daughter.
April 18, 2020
A giveaway of ‘Impossible Marriages Redeemed’ with your bits & pieces!
I hope you had a lovely Easter and are continuing the glorious celebration of the Risen Lord!
The above picture is from yesterday, cold but sunny.
Today:
Never mind.
I have an important book to give away, so let’s get right to it: 3 copies of Impossible Marriages Redeemed: They Didn’t End the Story in the Middle. (Affiliate link*),
Leila Miller has put together hopeful and inspiring stories, all completely true, of marriages that are saved. These people didn’t give in to the divorce culture, despite truly oppressive difficulties.
They stood and fought. Read about how real couples rescued their marriages and went on to live happily ever after — yes, it is possible, once we realize that this vision includes struggle and sacrifice — sometimes by one spouse without the help of the other for a good long time.
Leila gives 65 voices a chance to convince our world with their own marriages that divorce is not the answer, no matter how dire the circumstances seem. And your mind will boggle at what people have done to hold fast! In nearly every case, my own thought was, “Well, this is one where she should just walk away for sure.” How little faith we have.
In some cases, the people in the book simply stood, one spouse holding to the truth of the marriage, with no fairy tale ending. As I’ve written here many times, this standing has its own reward in preserving the hope of the children and in bearing witness to society. For the stander there is only the satisfaction of remaining firm in suffering; but we have to remember that we are not made for this world.
You will remember that Leila Miller edited another book, Primal Loss (affiliate link*), that sparked a real and noticeable change in how people speak about divorce. For the first time, when the stories of what children really think and suffer in divorce were allowed to be heard, the narrative that “divorce is necessary for moving on and the children are all right” could be challenged. The next step was clearly to offer hope for preventing divorce, and I really admire Leila for accepting that challenge with this new volume.
This new book, Impossible Marriages Redeemed*, needs to be read by everyone whose marriage is rocky, who counsels those whose marriage is under attack, and who knows anyone who is at risk for divorce. (The Foreword, written by my husband, is very good too!)
We need to turn around our divorce culture. The readiness with which we break sacred bonds has called down on our society great evils. But it’s true that in many cases, people resort to divorce because they don’t have a vision or model for anything different, and this book remedies that problem. There are examples galore, right here in this book, offered from the heart.
I encourage you to enter for a chance to win one of three copies that Leila has generously offered, and to buy copies for yourself, your parish priest, and your counselor friends. Slip one to that person in your life who is about to make a terrible mistake!
Enter a comment for your chance! I will pick three winners at the end of the week.
*An affiliate link means a small amount goes to us when you buy, but we would recommend this book even without it!
bits & pieces
Remember that Lenten coloring calendar that was so intricate? Good news — there is an Easter one as well! Get it here. It’s lovely and quite involved — good for an older child who can read, enjoyable for the motivated adult.
Excellent review of a bad feature film about the great Phyllis Schlafly. Learn who she really was.
The more I look in to how disease is overcome, the more I am convinced that the most important factor is basic hygiene. Truly, there is no need in ordinary life to be compulsive; certainly we should be attentive. We need to practical hygiene that doesn’t overlook the most fundamental issues of air, sunlight, and cleanliness. An interesting article about the evolution of the bathroom.
Do you know about this site that provides evidence-based childbirth information? Lots of good stuff about birthing in these scary times with Covid as well as all the other issues to navigate. Specifically, here is a sample form to sign to refuse separation from baby.
Giving Poland and Hungary Their (Qualified) Due — worth reading and thinking about the concept (described by Pierre Manent) of the fanaticism of the center.
In general I have become more skeptical about the efficacy and safety of vaccines, but I am most concerned with those that are derived immorally, from aborted fetal cells. No matter what the benefit, it can never be right for the death of one person to be required for the health of others. We are in the position of being able to voice our concern with a potential Covid vaccine, as two are in development and one does not use aborted fetal cells. I would hope that all those of good will would urge the pursuit of that one! I’m not sure who one tells, but at least know the facts.
Using aborted fetal cells in medicine can seem like a scientific issue with only a remote relation to ethics. But abortion is connected with paganism, including the idea that the sacrifice of innocent life protects people from harm. “You might be thinking modern-day abortion, although perhaps done for the same reasons, is not the same as ancient ritual infant sacrifice. For one thing, where’s the ritual? Believe it or not, it is not at all uncommon for women to engage in some kind of ritual behavior around their abortion experience.” Read the evidence.
Some day when we can all travel again, let’s go to this gorgeous shrine of Our Lady of Guadalupe in Wisconsin!
A more flourishing society, including one that is more hospitable to neighborhood businesses and services, would have a lot less occupational licensing. The emergency lifting of these barriers to entry in the current crisis could be the turning point if we pay attention.
I’m so glad that public schools are closed. They have done no end of mischief. Our children need to be sprung from those jails! Here is a good article about the transgender ideology that is being promoted there (and other places), victimizing our nation’s children: “Our academies, our hospitals, and our schools are sick with the belief—ancient and well-intentioned but fatal nonetheless—that the flesh is a prison from which the spirit can be freed.”
from the archives
Spirited woman, strong marriage — my book review of an older classic work of historical fiction, Hannah Fowler
Whining children getting you down? Whining whiners and how to cure them
liturgical year
Saturday in the Octave of Easter — let’s continue to celebrate our joy of the resurrection!
follow us everywhere!
Stay abreast of the posts when they happen:
I just share pretty pictures: Auntie Leila’s Instagram.
If you want politics, rants, and takes on what is going on in the Church:
Auntie Leila’s Facebook (you can just follow — my posts are public — sometimes I share articles here that don’t make it into {bits & pieces})
The boards of the others: Rosie’s Pinterest. Sukie’s Pinterest. Deirdre’s Pinterest. Habou’s Pinterest. Bridget’s Pinterest.
And the others on IG: Rosie’s Instagram. Sukie’s Instagram. Deirdre’s Instagram. Bridget’s Instagram.Habou’s Instagram.
The post A giveaway of ‘Impossible Marriages Redeemed’ with your bits & pieces! appeared first on Like Mother Like Daughter.
April 4, 2020
Holy Week, the shut-down, and {bits & pieces}
Friends, we have one more week to go in this long Lent, and an indefinite time in our Corona confinement. Pardon the long post — I have a lot to say right now, I find.
Please do not let anyone tell you that now is the time to let up on your Lenten resolutions* or “go easy on yourself.” Don’t listen to the poison of “self care” rhetoric that is thinly veiled enabling of indulgence — the surest way to misery. (“Self care” is so different from a Christian notion of rest and festivity!)
*Obviously you might have to adjust those resolutions, which is different from just giving up on penance entirely and giving in to what St. John called the flesh, “because things are hard.” Seriously, read a book about truly hard times people have gone through and still didn’t give up on their penances.
A reader was kind enough to write to me and say this:
Dear “Auntie” Leila, I wanted to thank you for the time you have poured into your blog over the years. You’ve inspired me since my oldest was a new baby (and he will be 11 in April!) in motherhood, homemaking, homeschooling and living the domestic church. In light of the current crisis, I feel like we, your readers, have been “trained” for this all along. It hasn’t come as a familial shock for us to have to pray together in the home (of course we grieve not having the Mass!) or to teach our own, or even to bake bread when there is a shortage in the store. We have been cultivating a home life that can adapt to a worldwide crisis well, it seems.
Thank you for rallying the troops, as it were, for all these years. ~ J
This message truly made my day! Someone gets my ramblings! Your humble servant has only been trying to tell you that without you, woman, wife, mother, and your competent and loving care of others — your home will have no center.
So either you’ve been preparing for this moment all along, or you are receiving a crash course. And if the latter, I get it: It’s not easy.
We are needed at home.
This truth, which we had twisted into some sort of preference, dispensable role, or even luxury, is now being forced upon our society with a vengeance by the Coronavirus and the subsequent shut-down.
I can’t help noticing that the very people (be they bloggers or bishops) who have been telling us women that we can do anything, we can do it all, we can leave the care of the home and children to others, it can all be outsourced — are the ones who are now “giving us permission” to have a melt-down and be a weak wreck.
This has always been the fatal defect of the feminist ideology, that it insists on women being both powerful and victimized. But stripped of the support of our prosperity and independence, all is being revealed. In the home, even with all its demands, we women can rest when we need to. We can’t soldier on, the way men can. At the same time, the home without our cheerful feminine determination loses its savor. Men and women are different, in fact.
When the routine (with its comforts that hide our defects from us) is disrupted, we come right up against our will. That is a grace given to us for our spiritual growth, not an excuse to grab the wine or box of cookies and hide. What is any of our life for, if not to learn to love and sacrifice for the others in our lives, even in uncertain times?
Whatever is going on, don’t waste this precious moment in self-pity.
Bu it’s so hard! I’m sure it is, but nevertheless, here we all are, being tested! And likely the people around us are the ones who need us to help them. They need us to be cheerful, not mopey and grumbly.
Practical advice
The current situation is a problem to be solved, and I’m not here speaking in any broad terms, but about my household and yours, and their many needs. Let’s tackle the issues.
A few tips from someone who isn’t particularly disciplined but who has lived for a long time with all the kids and a husband working from home (going on about 30 years now) and so on:
Agree on a schedule with your spouse and stick to it. The schedule needs to include a balance of intense physical activity (kids need to run and shout!) and rest/quiet time.
It’s not that you need to take refuge in your bedroom because you’re an introvert. A lot of togetherness is something that has to be broken up a bit. I’m as extroverted as they come, but I’ve learned that a lot of conflict can be avoided by the discipline of separation.
After lunch (which needs forethought and to be served at a certain time), everyone needs to have a nice quiet time. Two hours is not unreasonable. In the evening, figure out the balance between some postprandial activity and a real need to wind down before bed.
Get up at a certain time, take a shower, get dressed.
Get outdoor time, including working outdoors, for everyone.
If you already homeschool, you’re in a good place. If you are doing the distance learning thing, I have two things to tell you:
Stop every 30 minutes of computer time and insist on some other activity — a chore, a little outside time, a snack. Being on the computer all day is too much for a growing child. (I oppose even a little computer time for a pre-adolescent child, but at the minimum, long breaks are necessary.)
You don’t have to do it. Shut the computer and declare that you are homeschooling. My whole blog is about teaching your children yourself. Have a poke around. But mainly, know that your children will learn if they have the liturgical year, books, music, art, and the outdoors. If you decide to homeschool, it will be fine and certainly vastly superior to being stuck on the computer. I am here to help.
Make a list of things you want to do and need to learn to keep your household running and start checking them off!
Meet the challenge head on
Lent is a built-in time of penance (hopefully this isn’t a news flash for you at this point, the day before Palm Sunday!) and this Coronavirus is truly a chastisement, the proportions of which we have not yet grasped.
The antidote to whining, despair, and self-pity is to work and pray: this meditation from St. John Cassian might be perfect for what ails you. Lord, have mercy on me! Accept the need for mortification — dying to self — and ask God to help us meet it with a fighting spirit. I would have thought that we gave up wine and cookies for Lent… The Kingdom will be won by the little ones who lovingly accept God’s holy will!
Holy Week
This coming week, Holy Week, is one we need to live to its utmost, using what we have, and it will be decisive for what comes after. Let’s not waste it wallowing in our woes. Let’s start planning and hoping and helping each other.
If your church is open, but with no services, consider taking your family there very early (to avoid any possible crowd) to just sit in the Lord’s Presence, even for five or ten minutes if the littles won’t allow you more.
If your church is not open at all, then your domestic church, your home, will be your All.
If there are outdoor Stations of the Cross near you, take the fam and go! (Check the Catholic cemetery or a nearby monastery.)
Here is a lovely guide (Anglican, but very Catholic-friendly) to the coming week (don’t feel that you have to do it all, but do consider some of it). Here is a link to the Great Litany — beautiful.
Probably live-streaming is going to be part of the picture, even with times of quiet family prayer with no screens. Some links for Traditional services all over the world.
I don’t have much in the way of Holy Week–specific liturgy to offer you. Remember that Magnificat has its magazine online for free these days.
Praying the Mass (Traditional Form)Praying the Divine Liturgy (Orthodox)Praying the Divine OfficeMy advice for learning to pray the Rosary as a family.
If you have resources, please add them in the comments!
bits & pieces
A longish but intelligent essay on what it means to be a citizen, by R. J. Snell: “If we are to be agents, we must be citizens; if we are to be citizens, we must be agents. Citizen-agents do not overlook their commitment to the common good, but neither do they hand their agency over to bureaucrats or experts.”
The lifespans of musicians, in graphs.
Authorities in Malaysia stepped on some toes by telling women not to nag their husbands in lockdown. Let’s not nag each other… but what I find hilarious is the quandary provoked by ruling that only the “head of the household” could go shopping. “Make sure your phone is fully charged” is probably good advice for those men wandering the aisles…
An oral history of how the Washington Nats got started, just to fill up that baseball-shaped hole in our hearts.
from the archives
I bet your readers are gobbling all the books! Don’t forget the LMLD Library Project! Here’s a sample post: Read this, not that ~ books for your voracious reader!
Don’t be afraid of teens — it’s going to be grand. Annoying, rebellious teens are a modern construct. Your 13-year-old boy.
liturgical year
Saturday of the Fifth Week of Lent; Optional Memorial of St. Isidore, bishop and doctor.
follow us everywhere!
Stay abreast of the posts when they happen:
I just share pretty pictures: Auntie Leila’s Instagram.
If you want politics, rants, and takes on what is going on in the Church:
Auntie Leila’s Facebook (you can just follow — my posts are public — sometimes I share articles here that don’t make it into {bits & pieces})
The boards of the others: Rosie’s Pinterest. Sukie’s Pinterest. Deirdre’s Pinterest. Habou’s Pinterest. Bridget’s Pinterest.
And the others on IG: Rosie’s Instagram. Sukie’s Instagram. Deirdre’s Instagram. Bridget’s Instagram. Habou’s Instagram.
The post Holy Week, the shut-down, and {bits & pieces} appeared first on Like Mother Like Daughter.
April 1, 2020
A new service from Auntie Leila!
During this time of staying home, sheltering in place, and staying put, I’m happy to offer our readers a new service!
Over the years, I can’t tell you how many of you sweet readers have said to me, “I just wish you could be in my home, follow me around, and tell me what to do!” Yes, there’s Ask Auntie Leila, but the cry has gone up for more, much more, than an email from me.
Well, good news! We can make this happen! All you need is to install this webcam (affiliate link) in the major areas of your home: Kitchen, bedrooms, living room, laundry room — really, you can choose, but to get the best benefit from our time together, the more rooms the better.
For a slight upcharge, you can wear this bodycam and I can follow you everywhere and be better able to tell you exactly what to do with your life!
I am offering to a select group of lucky readers the fabulous opportunity to have moi, Auntie Leila, follow you, virtually, all around your home! I will be able to see everything that you see and tell you just what to do!
This service will enable me to:
“be there” early in the morning to help you get up and take a shower!
see how you prepare your meals, do your laundry, and clean your house! We can bake bread “together” — I can look over your shoulder and critique your technique! I can sit at your dinner table with you (virtually!) and help you have meaningful conversations with your family!
monitor you and your family in your devotions! Ever wonder exactly how to set up your Little Oratory and pray together as a family? Good news! I can be there (virtually!) and do it with you so that you do it right.
look over your kids’ school work to be sure they are excelling! I’m happy to take over “principal” duties for the time we are together!
troubleshoot vacuum cleaner problems and identify stains! The Reasonably Clean House was never so doable!
Never make a mistake again disciplining your children, calculating unit prices, or separating your lights from your darks — Auntie Leila will be there to tell you what to do.
Kids having trouble with math? Auntie Leila will give you confidential, discreet, real time advice on straightening them out.
And all in complete conformity with local and federal COVID19 quarantining guidelines!*
*this service is CDC and FDA compliant — no endorsement by these agencies is implied
There are two plans**:
I can follow you all the time, checking in at random points for up to an hour a day forever — just send $50,000 to my account (email for details). I call this the “Lifetime Golden LMLD Plan.”
Or sign up by the week of intensive Auntie time — just send $5,000 per week and we’ll set up a 24/7 monitoring session that will get you up and independent in no time. I call this the “Kick in the Pants Plan.”
The upcharge for the bodycam service (“I’ve Got You Covered Add-On”) is a flat $15,000 fee.
Obviously I can provide this service only for a lucky, special few — so sign up NOW! Don’t delay! From what I can tell in my travels, this offer is going to go fast! This offer will be limited and once spots are gone, they’re gone!
**I understand — of course! I’m Auntie Leila! I totally get poverty! — that you might not be able to afford this amazing deal on one income and a possible total shutdown of your visible means of support.
Therefore, we are offering “The Budget Plan” — you won’t get me streamed directly into your home, but you will get Rosie, Sukie, Deirdre, or Bridget, depending on your resources. This plan includes four days, 8 hours per day, or a year with two of them switching out, $1,599.99.
If you are really poor, we’ll connect you with one of the boys. For $89.99, they will send you an informative TikTok*** on the best method for waxing a floor using the least effort.
*** I don’t actually know what a TikTok is, I might mean YouTube
For $19.99 we will set up any number of grandkids to ping you randomly with a helpful “That’s not how MY mom does it!”
If you don’t care about catching the virus [JK everyone cares, what kind of monsters do you think we are], we will send a couple of toddler boys over to baby-proof your house. “Ah, that was too fragile” – -A Satisfied Customer from BC19****
****Before Covid 19 obviously
MWAH! Love you!
Happy April Fool!
[image error]
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March 28, 2020
bits & pieces
Thanks so much for joining in on our virtual “Book Club” — a reading of Wendy Shalit’s A Return to Modesty!
Intro is found here
Part 1 is found here
Part 2 is found here
Part 3 is found here
Conclusion is found here
You can join in at any time — the comments are open. By the way, do be aware that if you try to submit a comment with a link, especially a video link, it might go directly to spam, not stopping at “pending for approval” — so do let me know and I will go dig it out. Presuming it’s not actually spam.
About That Subject That Is On Our Minds, I won’t say anything except this: I understand the consolation of streamed liturgies, but do be sure that you pray with your family without screens for the most part — even praying a “Mass without a priest.” The best thing would be for the father of the family to lead if this is at all possible. Your children won’t remember awkwardness; they will remember that the family prayed together.
Jesus has promised us, “For where two or three are gathered together in my name, there am I in the midst of them.” (Mt 18:20) Even when you are alone, make time to speak to the Lord in silence. Don’t make the screen the focus of your little oratory or your heart.
To some this might seem like swimming without a life vest, but now is the acceptable time to try it! I will post helpful links below.
bits & pieces
Here is the shorter method of praying a “dry Mass” (traditional form).Here is the Orthodox “dry liturgy.”
Beautiful Lenten music: William Byrd, Tristitia et Anxietas; Stabat Mater, Giovanni Battista Pergolesi, one of the most beautiful motets ever composed in my humble opinion. (The first movement is the best known part of this work, but the whole is magnificent.)
How to make your own bagpipes, if the recorders weren’t grating enough. (Jk, learning the recorder is great!)
Teach your children to read music! Here’s one approach. Do you have a favorite method for teaching music theory? Solfège? Let us know in the comments!
The whole Abolition of Man, from CSLewisDoodle is on YouTube! These are gold. The first one is here.
I actually recommend pausing a lot or even maybe slowing it down a little, just because the concepts are a lot to absorb, even though the language is down to earth. So much that many dismiss AoM as lightweight, I suspect due to the simplicity of the vocabulary. This was a challenge Lewis set for himself: “Any fool can write learned language. The vernacular is the real test.” But the effort to uncover the important ideas he presents will reward the reader, because how a child is educated on a philosophical level makes all the difference to whether he will ultimately achieve the state of a free man or a slave.
I loved this video a reader sent me, of a beautiful Orthodox Jewish woman explaining the importance of setting standards for oneself in the area of modesty, and sticking to them.
Maybe watch this with your girls! The only thing I would say is that, while it is never right to judge a person’s soul for what she wears, it is indeed not only acceptable but a cornerstone of our life together to judge conduct. She is certainly right that standards can differ, and that each woman has to decide for herself what her own rules are. But there is definitely immodesty and we need not to relativize this truth.
Without this sort of judgement, society can’t help its weaker members and will find, without it, that they are prey to predatory forces (in this category I include perverted designers and greedy manufacturers). We have to be willing to protect those who have no one to help them.
Simply knowing that “people” will disapprove can help an uncertain person make the right choices. It’s a balance. We don’t want “human respect” to guide our every move — we always must do what is right, even if it goes against convention. But convention, backed up by virtue (in the simple form of the 10 Commandments, the cornerstone of any reasonable society), is a powerful incentive to stay on the right path when one is not very thoughtful.
Thus, I found it helpful with my own children to make comments about fashion choices that are not appropriate: “Poor thing, she will be cold and feel embarrassed.” “I wonder if no one told her that she may think she looks attractive but she is revealing too much.” “A strapless gown is the wrong choice.” (You might feel judged by such a statement, but if we are ever to return to modesty, we have to go there. It’s okay to regret a strapless gown, just as some of us might regret our absurd eyeglasses or big hair. It’s interesting that we can mock big hair but not revealing dresses! Why is that?)
We are influenced by the printed word, says Cardinal Meyer (Archbishop of Milwaukee when he wrote this pastoral letter, back in the day) — and today we are influenced by images everywhere, as regards chastity and modesty. For a different, more systematically theological approach to these virtues, read what he says.
The current crisis reveals that we made a mistake when we encouraged two-income families, from Tim Carney.
The birds are starting to twitter — a helpful guide for identifying them!
from the archives
It’s warming up in most places, but talking about modesty reminds me that my posts on dressing your child in cold weather (really, dressing your child appropriately) has long-term effects for their understanding of the concept of modesty. Don’t put off this aspect of formation for when your 16-year-old is heading out the door in a tank top and cut offs.
Time to learn to use those chicken livers in a delicious paté.
Sorry, I have to keep re-upping this, but you do not want to take your child to the ER if you can help it. (They don’t want to admit your sick person either — and will send you home with basically these instructions.) How to take care of your sick child.
liturgical living
Saturday of the Fourth Week of Lent.
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Stay abreast of the posts when they happen:
I just share pretty pictures: Auntie Leila’s Instagram.
If you want politics, rants, and takes on what is going on in the Church:
Auntie Leila’s Facebook (you can just follow — my posts are public — sometimes I share articles here that don’t make it into {bits & pieces})
The boards of the others: Rosie’s Pinterest. Sukie’s Pinterest. Deirdre’s Pinterest. Habou’s Pinterest. Bridget’s Pinterest.
And the others on IG: Rosie’s Instagram. Sukie’s Instagram. Deirdre’s Instagram. Bridget’s Instagram.Habou’s Instagram.
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Filed Under: {bits and pieces} Tagged With: domestic church, modesty
March 14, 2020 By Leila 21 Comments
Book Club Part 3 with your {bits & pieces}
Continuing our Lenten book club with Part Three! (The previous discussion can be found in the last two posts. The bolded words are the chapter titles.) Against the Curing of Womanhood: We need to stop medicating women out of femininity (just as we need to stop “treating” little boys for being boys). Since the time that Shalit wrote this, the “cure” has stepped up considerably, and now includes the attempt to excise the girl right out of her body via puberty blockers and breast removal surgery. One thing I really want to say is that girls are far, far too stressed out in our culture. The push to achieve is too much. Most people are not meant to achieve in the ways we ask of our children — and the ones who are meant to, will. Another factor that Shalit just doesn’t address is the … [Read More…]
Filed Under: {bits and pieces} Tagged With: bank robbery, C. S. Lewis, Flannery O’Connor, sacred architecture
March 7, 2020 By Leila 36 Comments
Book Club Part 2 with your {bits & pieces}
Thanks for all your thoughts on my own book! I will keep you posted on how it’s going, including the number of volumes! Continuing with our reading of A Return to Modesty (affiliate link), let’s look at Part Two. (Part One is here — we can still continue the discussion in the comments!) Forgiving Modesty: Maybe modesty is a fine virtue, we can’t help thinking as we read the compilation of evidence in the book. Maybe, as Shalit says, there really are differences between the sexes, and when we women choose something to wear that is pretty and not provocative, we simply feel more comfortable. We feel more settled in ourselves and more able to cope with the outside world. I grew up in the miniskirt era. Truly, the sheer embarrassment of those days was so scarring. So much energy put … [Read More…]
Filed Under: {bits and pieces} Tagged With: abortion, chant, Communism, euthanasia, Fr. McTeigue, Fr. Pokorsky, God exists, Oregon engineer, secret passage
February 29, 2020 By Leila 109 Comments
Book club! {bits & pieces}
So my own book manuscript (the book is a compendium of all the work I’ve done here on the blog over the years) is at the publisher — and the question is, given its length, would people rather have one large tome (like Home Comforts — affiliate link — a 900 page book about housekeeping) or three volumes? Either way, carefully produced to be worthy of gift-giving (wouldn’t a boxed set be nice? Or for that matter, even the one volume could be boxed!). Any thoughts about that? There would be a pretty picture here but I have the flu… it’s probably not coronavirus because I live in a backwater and never go out, but it still has me laid low. So keep me company with your great thoughts on our book! book club Today we are looking at Part I of A Return to Modesty. In the … [Read More…]
Filed Under: {bits and pieces} Tagged With: chant, cuba, examination of conscience, LGBT, Our Lady of Walsingham, prayer, race theory, Return to Modesty
February 22, 2020 By Leila 16 Comments
Book club! {bits & pieces}
Book club? St. Greg Pocketbook? We on? Read Part One this week and we will talk about it next Saturday! We’ll aim to cover one part per week of Lent (and actually end on time!). A Return to Modesty (affiliate link — the new edition is not necessary)– I am planning to restrain myself and not write extensively, but just maybe pop up a post — or add on to {bits & pieces} — would that work? — and see if we can have a conversation about it! You be ready with your quotes and takes. Now, I have to warn you that this book is not at all appropriate for your teenage girl. It deals with Subjects. Auntie Leila cringed and she really hopes that your teenage girl is innocent of all these Subjects and that we will not be the means of introducing them to her. But if this girl is … [Read More…]
Filed Under: {bits and pieces} Tagged With: eugenics, fasting, Fr. Copenhagen, icons, parental rights, Russell Kirk, sacred art
February 15, 2020 By Leila 2 Comments
bits & pieces
My husband gave me a special bottle of mead for Valentine’s Day, and I had to tell you about it — if you are near Tyngsborough, Massachusetts, it’s worth the detour to the Honeybound Meadery! He has ordered bees from them before, and sometimes stops at the store to get some equipment on his way up to Thomas More College. Recently, as he was buying whatever it was, the owner asked him what he thought of mead. “The truth is I really don’t like mead,” was his answer. “I love it when people say that to me! Would you try some now?” Well, he tried it and Reader, he liked it a lot! I laughed at him for not making a purchase then and there (in a loving way of course — this is a running joke at our house that we have incredible sales resistance, sometimes against our own interest). … [Read More…]
Filed Under: {bits and pieces} Tagged With: architecture
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The post bits & pieces appeared first on Like Mother Like Daughter.
March 21, 2020
Book Club Conclusion! with your {bits & pieces}
I have enjoyed discussing this book with you so much! I hope you have enjoyed it too. Little did we know how we’d be spending our days as we moved through Lent…
A Modest Conclusion: Innocence: On p. 243 Shalit says this: “The most obvious connotation of sexual modesty is, of course, innocence. Yet I have been shying away from this aspect of it all along. I have defended modesty, essentially, in the most obscene way, but I did it because I had a hunch that this was the only way our culture would ever reconsider it. [Keep in mind that her intended audience isn’t homeschooling moms but the elite academic and sophisticated urban guardians of culture or the lack thereof.] At least at first. But now that we have explored the aspects of modesty which are most counterintuitive, let’s end by examining what is intuitively true about modesty.”
And that is that innocence should be reclaimed — for ourselves and for our children.
For years now I have written about modesty, innocence, purity, and chastity. I have tried to say that we have a sacred duty to do whatever it takes to protect our children. It’s always stunning to me that grown adults will argue, saying that this is a lost cause, that innocence is lost.
It’s as if the nature of a child has changed. But it hasn’t. Children still can only know about life what we choose to expose them to. They still come with no preconceived notions and no hindsight. It’s we who have changed the nature of parenting in order to rationalize our own choices and our lack of courage!
I can’t find it now, but one of the writers Shalit mentions at the beginning (Katie Roiphe?) wrote a review of A Return to Modesty — I think it was in Vogue Magazine. I remember reading it in a checkout line at the grocery store! Whoever it was acknowledged the truth of what Shalit said about the loss of innocence, but concluded that “experience” was worth the cost. Of course, if she wasn’t willing to repent of her life, which had been defined precisely by her abdication of modesty, what other recourse did she have? Take your stand, the world says.
But listen to Charles Péguy (I encountered this passage in John Saward’s The Beauty of Holiness and the Holiness of Beauty):
They say they’re full of experience; they gain from experience.
Day by day they pile up their experience.
“Some treasure!”, says God.
A treasure of emptiness and of dearth…
What you call experience, your experience, I call dissipation, diminishment, decrease, the loss of innocence…
No, it’s innocence that is full and experience that is empty…
It is innocence that knows and experience that does not know…
On Modesty in Men: I knew that at the end of this discussion I would want to say something about men. The book really doesn’t address this aspect of the discussion (other than in passing), but it certainly comes up when we try to extol modesty in girls — and when it does, the ensuing discussion always leaves me frustrated, because the truth is, men and women are not the same. I’m trying to put my thoughts in words here…
Men in scanty clothing are not provocative (except to other gay men). Maybe this is just me, but when women fantasize about men, they are wearing dashing uniforms or crisp tuxedos! If I am wrong, then explain the popularity among women of BBC costume dramas! And yet this fantasy is not prurient.
We worry for a woman who shows up at a party wearing what turns men on (men who don’t guard their thoughts); we are generally satisfied if a man arrives at a party wearing a tux or his military dress. It seems fitting! (Unless it’s a beach party, I suppose!)
Modesty in men has nothing to do with revealing or hiding the body. Or rather, men’s nakedness is just not what women’s nakedness is. But for men, the issue is being respectful of others in their dress. Where a woman is protecting her self with her modesty, a man is protecting others with his.
And given how much is said on women’s dress or undress, I am claiming the right to say a few words about how men should dress to be respectful.
When a man wears an underwear shirt around the house, he shows disrespect for the inhabitants thereof. He feels comfortable; they must endure the implicit insult. The proof is that his wife will say, “It doesn’t bother me.” Not: “I love it when he wears his underwear shirt around the house, it shows how much he cares.”
When a woman goes to church in a short skirt that reveal her shape where it should be draped a bit more, she is crying out for attention to be directed to herself. When a man goes to church in sports attire or casual wear (like a printed t-shirt and shorts), the effect is quite different. The energy doesn’t go towards him, it comes from him in the form of apathy and disrespect.
A man who strips off his shirt like the cock of the walk isn’t being sexually provocative, but he is trumpeting his refusal to take on a respectful attitude. It’s interesting that because being shirtless isn’t sexual (the way it would be with a girl), people tend to think it’s fine. But it’s not, for a different reason. I was much impressed with a Catholic man, a contractor and father of many, who told me that he never let his men work without a shirt. For him it was a matter of respect.
For a man, modesty in dress is not a sexual matter (speaking here of normal relations between men and women). When a man does dress in a sexually predatory way (open shirt, tight pants), he doesn’t trigger a sexual response in women so much as whatever the response is that enables narcissism.
For parents, the challenge with girls is to give them the gift of modesty, which includes protecting their bodies with clothing that is attractive and useful but not revealing. The challenge with boys is to give them enough awareness of their surroundings that they are able to choose the right clothing for the situation, so that they project responsibility and a desire to protect. This is the gift of chivalry.
So those are my (wordy) thoughts! I am so interested to know what you thought of the book overall!
bits & pieces
Some resources for being stuck in the house (the faithful are free to choose a form). Plan now for tomorrow, so that your Sunday may be sanctified!:
Praying the Mass (Traditional Form)
Praying the Mass (Novus Ordo)
Praying the Divine Liturgy (Orthodox)
Praying the Divine Office
My advice for learning to pray the Rosary as a family.
You can and should baptize your baby or a person who desires baptism or is in danger of death if no priest is available and you are reasonably sure that he won’t be for some time. Catechism of the Catholic Church, 1256. Know the exact Trinitarian form and use it.
The artist Daniel Matsui has made printouts available for free, for coloring and devotions.
Let me once again remind you of this amazing free resource for home learning: Ambleside Online.
U.S Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) has announced that it’s lifting restrictions on telecommunications between health professionals and patients. “We are empowering medical providers to serve patients wherever they are during this national public health emergency,” said Roger Severino, OCR Director. “We are especially concerned about reaching those most at risk, including older persons and persons with disabilities.” Auntie Leila’s advice is that you should not take a child to the doctor or ER if you can possibly avoid it, like for ear infections or other issues that can be addressed over the phone. Know that the HIPAA regulations have been lifted.
Free classic audio books.
As of now, there is no evidence that ibuprofen shouldn’t be used in cases of corona virus (just meaning studies haven’t been done, but that’s something, when the advice has been saying that it is not good — my issue is that acetaminophen — Tylenol — has detrimental effects).
An interview with J. R. R. Tolkien.
Are you baking lots of bread now? (I hope so!) This is the best method I have found for developing gluten in my dough: a certain stretch and fold that you do 30 minutes after resting your just-mixed dough, and then two more times if you can manage it, 30 minutes apart. Wet hands really helps things along. (But I do it on the counter or in a big heavy tin or bowl so I don’t have to deal with that annoying little bowl he has in the video). Then bulk rise the dough as usual.
from the archives
10 Survival Tactics for Rescuing a Bad Day
What is the LMLD Library Project?
Protecting innocence in children.
liturgical year
follow us everywhere!
Stay abreast of the posts when they happen:
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The boards of the others: Rosie’s Pinterest. Sukie’s Pinterest. Deirdre’s Pinterest. Habou’s Pinterest. Bridget’s Pinterest.
And the others on IG: Rosie’s Instagram. Sukie’s Instagram. Deirdre’s Instagram. Bridget’s Instagram.Habou’s Instagram.
The post Book Club Conclusion! with your {bits & pieces} appeared first on Like Mother Like Daughter.
March 14, 2020
Book Club Part 3 with your {bits & pieces}
Continuing our Lenten book club with Part Three! (The previous discussion can be found in the last two posts. The bolded words are the chapter titles.)
Against the Curing of Womanhood: We need to stop medicating women out of femininity (just as we need to stop “treating” little boys for being boys). Since the time that Shalit wrote this, the “cure” has stepped up considerably, and now includes the attempt to excise the girl right out of her body via puberty blockers and breast removal surgery.
One thing I really want to say is that girls are far, far too stressed out in our culture. The push to achieve is too much. Most people are not meant to achieve in the ways we ask of our children — and the ones who are meant to, will.
Another factor that Shalit just doesn’t address is the effect of contraception on the female psyche. Attacking one’s healthy reproductive system is just never going to end well, psychologically or any other way.
Modesty and the Erotic: Although this isn’t a topic I would delve into too much, I think it’s worth saying that women who embrace their traditional roles really do seem to have a lot more fun being with men and in their marriages. They also seem to have better friendships with other women.
What worries me about the conversations that I read and hear when girls and women are talking to each other outside of the modesty discussion — when they are just “amongst themselves” and assuming certain common factors of modern life — is how terrible they find the very things that ought to be delightful. Ordinary pleasures that women of another era waited for and then enjoyed are totally burdensome to women today. The quiet satisfaction of intimacy between two honorably joined persons is a mystery so deep now that it is simply unknown to most — they don’t even suspect it exists.
Because they are expected to be so sexualized from the get-go, college girls speak of needing to get drunk in order to be able to have (not to speak of enjoy) sex. I know it’s a daring thought, but what if remaining chaste until marriage actually removes this problem entirely?
Even seemingly innocent — yet constant — contact with the opposite sex creates deformations, and I believe that those of us who are committed to modesty on one level need to confront the deadening effect of having to tamp down one’s normal, healthy instincts on our children whom we think we have protected.
The anecdote at the bottom of p. 178 has stuck with me ever since I read it about 20 years ago. It’s the one about the rabbi who cautions the teenagers that it’s “not kosher” to go off together, boys and girls, camping in the wilderness.
When they assure him that nothing untoward will happen, that “We’ve been doing this for years, we grew up together, we went to kindergarten together… we even share sleeping bags” — he responds in a way that is perhaps unexpected — but very wise:
“In that case, you don’t need to see a rabbi… you need to see a shrink. You’re in big trouble.”
What does he mean? It’s like I have said before when I’ve written about purity: It’s a good thing that young people have healthy sexual responses to each other! There’s something very wrong if they don’t! Something so wrong that it will cause mental illness.
And a lot of parents trying to oppose the current madness make this mistake. They are functional puritans and prudes, not lovers of chastity — at least, they have simply forgotten or repressed the knowledge of what it is or ought to be, to be a healthy, attractive, and vigorous young person!
There’s a reason the church opposes co-education, especially as adolescence approaches. It’s not only to prevent liberties from being taken. It’s to ensure that boys and girls will be interested in each other when the time is right. You can see how there needs to be prudence even in families. Cousins are cousins — they are also boys and girls. We don’t want them to be too familiar, but we also don’t want them to shut down emotionally. The best thing is to observe the proprieties at all times!
Ironically, as Shalit points out, young people are rebelling against their libertine parents, “returning to even older rules — often, those very rules of modesty their own mothers once called sexist.” (P. 192)
Pining for Interference: Shalit makes the excellent point that the sexual revolution made it so that there is really nothing to look forward to. Divorce — even the possibility of divorce — takes away hope.
It makes sense that young people want their parents to interfere for their own good (just as it makes sense that there will be what I call “attitude” if only to make the interference seem really legitimate!). What do we want? A happily ever after! How will we get it? By following the rules built up over the millennia to protect us from the many and various forms of evil that the human heart can cook up — and actually, it’s fairly simple: Keep sex for marriage, as something sacred:
“… But more significantly… as a way of insisting that the most interesting part of your life will take place after marriage, and if it’s more interesting, maybe then it will last. And, the hope of modesty continues, if it lasts, maybe then you can finally be safe. Instead of living in dread, feeling slightly hunted, afraid someone will call us to account and abandon us, maybe then we can rest…. Modesty creates a realm that is secure from an increasingly competitive and violent public one.” (P. 212)
Beyond Modernity: For real solidarity with each other — and to protect our girls, we need to return to what Shalit calls “the cartel of virtue.” This concerns not only modesty in dress but also the conviction that sex belongs in marriage only.
I would suggest that we take to heart the danger represented by deadening. One can rein in one’s unbridled passion, but I think we are seeing that awakening normal sexual feelings is difficult, precisely because one has gotten to the point of not caring.
In the time since Shalit wrote, it seems to me, looking at what girls actually wear, that the pendulum has gone way over towards just not being sexual at all — not overtly sexual but also not even sexual in a sublimated way.
One reason that leggings remain a fixture among women who in any other culture and time would be prime marriageable age (here I mean leggings and yoga pants full stop, no skirts or tunics) is precisely that they feel androgynous and yes, safe.
No amount of railing about how their tightness is provocative to men’s imaginations will have any effect, because they don’t feel that way. In a sense, the leggings-and-North Face-jacket phenomenon (and all its offshoots) is the perfect storm of the death of real chemistry between men and women that Shalit laments: It’s un-sexy (or un-flirtatious) to women and pornographic to men.
Fashions (or lack thereof) signal something more serious: An apathy borne of just having to cope with too much stimulation on all fronts. We need modesty and we need it now!
bits & pieces
A gripping story of the bank heist of the century.
John Cuddeback with a thought-provoking post: Make Your Home Like a Renaissance City. (I highly recommend his blog for men, especially. ) I would say — It’s not so hard to understand the connection between music and architecture (or design in general) — this was a standard way of thinking in medieval times. Music concerns harmony, which is a mathematical relationship that can be expressed in sound or in stone or paint. For the best explanation of this vital connection, I recommend David Clayton’s book The Way of Beauty. (affiliate link)*
A lovely recording of an Ave Maria by the Spanish Renaissance composer Francisco Guerrero.
Douglas Wilson on The Greatness of Insignificant Service — C. S. Lewis’ Abolition of Man and That Hideous Strength. ~ This is a keen insight from the author of the article, one which I sensed but never put into words, about the main characters in the novel: “Mark is driven by a desire to get in, whatever the cost, and Jane is consumed by her desire to stay out, at all costs.” ~ And Wilson reminds us of an important warning from Lewis himself, which every parent should take to heart, and which forms the impetus for everything I write here, especially on education, and why my standards seem sometimes to be so impossibly strict when it comes to children’s literature: “It must be remembered that in Mark’s mind hardly one rag of noble thought, either Christian or Pagan, had a secure lodging.”
Take a break from flogging your high schooler over five-paragraph essays, and enjoy this ultimately much more formative tour de force by Flannery O’Connor: Living with a Peacock. Yes, read it together! Yes, this is a way to write!
A New Cathedral for Montenegro – Thoughts on the Architecture — a really breathtaking construction that is both traditional and creative.
A solid meditation on spiritual growth during Lent from Debra Black.
Imagine if you turned on your tap… and wine came out! This actually happened — in Italy, of course!
from the archives
My own musings on that passage on “men without chests.”
*I wrote about David’s book here.
liturgical year
St. Matilda — and next week we have St. Patrick’s and St. Joseph’s! So be prepared!
follow us everywhere!
Stay abreast of the posts when they happen:
I just share pretty pictures: Auntie Leila’s Instagram.
If you want politics, rants, and takes on what is going on in the Church:
Auntie Leila’s Facebook (you can just follow — my posts are public — sometimes I share articles here that don’t make it into {bits & pieces})
The boards of the others: Rosie’s Pinterest. Sukie’s Pinterest. Deirdre’s Pinterest. Habou’s Pinterest. Bridget’s Pinterest.
And the others on IG: Rosie’s Instagram. Sukie’s Instagram. Deirdre’s Instagram. Bridget’s Instagram.Habou’s Instagram.
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March 7, 2020
Book Club Part 2 with your {bits & pieces}
Thanks for all your thoughts on my own book! I will keep you posted on how it’s going, including the number of volumes!
Continuing with our reading of A Return to Modesty (affiliate link), let’s look at Part Two. (Part One is here — we can still continue the discussion in the comments!)
Forgiving Modesty: Maybe modesty is a fine virtue, we can’t help thinking as we read the compilation of evidence in the book. Maybe, as Shalit says, there really are differences between the sexes, and when we women choose something to wear that is pretty and not provocative, we simply feel more comfortable. We feel more settled in ourselves and more able to cope with the outside world.
I grew up in the miniskirt era. Truly, the sheer embarrassment of those days was so scarring. So much energy put into what one was going to wear and whether one could manage it all without some untoward exposure (keep in mind that undergarments had been jettisoned). No wonder our wardrobe ended up being jeans and more jeans.
Modesty, says Shalit, invites men to “consider what the ideal relation between them and women should be” (p. 102). It doesn’t just invite them. It requires them to respect women, by not allowing them past the point where they can do otherwise.
The Great Deception: I am not as interested in what (early) modern philosophers thought about modesty as Shalit is. The whole problem comes down to the modernist rejection of givens and the desire to remake human nature.
The given that men and women are different must be recovered if we are not always to arrive at the position of John Stoltenberg (p. 112), that our relations amount to various forms of rape — of men imposing on women.
Instead of cooperating to make life peaceful, we are engaged in a war of all against all. That’s what I hate about the MeToo movement: It’s just another way to lock us into this endless battle, and it doesn’t ask women to do anything about how we behave or think about ourselves — it wants to keep the feminist sense of war going.
We should be able to ask ourselves why this wasn’t always the way the sexes looked at each other! And I think Shalit is making the best case for finding our way out again.
On the question of what is sexy to women: Modernism, because it begins and ends in doubt and will accept nothing outside of itself, is narcissistic and will always leave us with the man’s perverted understanding of himself — and that is why women find ourselves being force-fed male erotic imagery. We women don’t even understand that when society abandons modesty, it arrives at homosexuality — and with women being required to pretend that we like male nudity; the final mockery is in fact our unawareness that naked men exist for men, not for us.
Can Modesty Be Natural?: P. 132: “So one of modesty’s paradoxes, then, is that it is usually a reflection of self-worth, of having such a high opinion of yourself that you don’t need to boast or put your body on display for all to see.”
I think this is undeniable — modesty protects women in the way a beautiful aqua box protects a Tiffany jewel, and proclaims in the same exact way the worth of what it protects. But —
Perhaps the weakness of women, that we often don’t have the self-worth necessary to make this claim for ourselves, can be resolved by Scripture: “Do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, which you have from God? You are not your own; you were bought with a price. So glorify God in your body.” (1 Cor 6:19-20).
P. 137: “You may think you see me, the modestly dressed woman announces, but you do not see the real me. The real me is only for my beloved to see.”
I would say that the modest woman is presenting her real, true self — but not every bit of it. A modest deportment is not a lie, but it is not the whole truth, because it couldn’t be. Some things are intimate and not for general consumption!
Male Character: Male honor, being a gentleman, the restoration of chivalry… “Ultimately, it seems that only men can teach other men how to behave around women, but those men have to be inspired by women in the first place, inspired enough to think the women are worth being courteous to.” (p. 157).
I think men would treat all women well if there were some women around to inspire them to it. This, after all, is a principle of chivalry: to be honorable no matter what the circumstances. But yes, we have to demonstrate that this is the world we wish to be in — we need inspiration all around.
I believe that one effect of virtue is precisely to help those who are less virtuous. An honest person provides a bit of cover for a person who struggles with honesty. A brave person helps a timid person over the rough patches.
If the most thoughtful women are modest, they contribute to a culture where heedless women are nevertheless treated with more respect, because the men have an ideal before them to which they, in turn, can aspire with their own kind of goodness.
The ending of this section should give us food for thought. If legislation designed to eliminate inequalities has the effect of making women’s lives harder, perhaps equality ideology (i.e. feminism) should be rejected.
bits & pieces
Three lessons from the fall of communism in Romania.
I was blown away by this insight from Fr. Pokorsky (remember how I had said that Pope Benedict offers a great Lenten meditation on the Temptations of Christ in his book Jesus of Nazareth? Well, Fr. P shows how Mary beat him to it!).
Fr. McTeigue interviewed me on the topic of abortion this past week. There was some technical difficulty, so things get a little iffy at times. However, I do get my main thoughts in! At the end, there wasn’t time to get to the point of my little story, but I will tell you here that the priest I was speaking of was open to learning more. We the laity need to be brave and hold the priests and bishops to the moral law.
The proof for God’s existence is all around us.
Oregon Engineer Makes History With New Traffic Light Timing Formula — I just love this story, not least because he had to overcome some ridiculous professional licensing injustices to get… the green light.
A secret passageway in Parliament — just discovered!
A Catholic artists’ directory.
“A society that believes in nothing can offer no argument even against death. A culture that has lost its faith in life cannot comprehend why it should be endured.” Death on demand comes to Germany.
Amazing chant
from the archives
The moral life of children and how to nurture it — a series (linked within)Rosie’s cauliflower soup!
liturgical year
follow us everywhere!
Stay abreast of the posts when they happen:
I just share pretty pictures: Auntie Leila’s Instagram.
If you want politics, rants, and takes on what is going on in the Church:
Auntie Leila’s Facebook (you can just follow — my posts are public — sometimes I share articles here that don’t make it into {bits & pieces})
The boards of the others: Rosie’s Pinterest. Sukie’s Pinterest. Deirdre’s Pinterest. Habou’s Pinterest. Bridget’s Pinterest.
And the others on IG: Rosie’s Instagram. Sukie’s Instagram. Deirdre’s Instagram. Bridget’s Instagram.Habou’s Instagram.
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February 29, 2020
Book club! {bits & pieces}
So my own book manuscript (the book is a compendium of all the work I’ve done here on the blog over the years) is at the publisher — and the question is, given its length, would people rather have one large tome (like Home Comforts — affiliate link — a 900 page book about housekeeping) or three volumes?
Either way, carefully produced to be worthy of gift-giving (wouldn’t a boxed set be nice? Or for that matter, even the one volume could be boxed!).
Any thoughts about that?
There would be a pretty picture here but I have the flu… it’s probably not coronavirus because I live in a backwater and never go out, but it still has me laid low. So keep me company with your great thoughts on our book!
book club
Today we are looking at Part I of A Return to Modesty.
In the new introduction (you can read it here), Wendy Shalit updates her book for the internet age. And she is right, the differences are in intensity, not in kind.
The destruction of modesty in the sexual revolution (abetted by feminism), started out of the gate strong. It’s not a case of a gradual process. Feminists wanted equality in all its aspects now and by the 60s had dropped any lip service to convention. But certainly, the images that porn conveys are seared into us in a new way with social media; the demand for it requires innovation in perversion.
Some points I want to bring out about this section (without writing an essay!) — Shalit packs so much into each page that there’s no way to go through it all, but feel free to bring out the passages that struck you:
The Intro(s) and The War on Embarrassment: I think I most loved Wendy’s description in the (old) introduction of her reaction to the photographs of the Orthodox Jewish couple — that she bursts into tears without knowing why, and somehow absorbs the message they offer her: No Touching, Touching, Hat.
Modesty is moving.
In the new introduction, Shalit makes the connection between modesty and charity. It’s only when a person can stop thinking about himself and how he appears can he be good to others.
The pervasiveness of porn (and porn’s seepage into regular fashions, media, and interactions) has made the embarrassment Shalit talks about in Chapter 1 near-fatal to a woman’s sense of self.
I’m thinking specifically of the fear of both sexes that they will find each other gross — and the burden now on girls to have their private areas look a certain way. This is terrible! It destroys intimacy. I can remember being really shocked to find out that high school girls attending a good Catholic girls’ school almost universally wore thong underwear. This seems… pornified to me. What will a woman’s expectations be when it comes time to undress before her husband? What will his be? Leaving aside the provenance of such a garment (and its practicality for the vicissitudes of female life), let’s be honest — very few would achieve the desired effect when wearing it. But shouldn’t every girl, no matter what her shape, be confident that her beloved will find her just as he finds her — and have nothing to compare her to?
Because of the inevitable immersion in an anti-modesty world — its whole purpose for unwary users being to show others me! me! me! — we need to make sure our children are not on social media! Be those parents! Let’s find determination in her observation that boundaries don’t stifle us — they allow for flourishing. Let’s let our children flourish!
Postmodern Sexual Etiquette: Have you noticed the proliferation of rules in the world of human interaction? We did away with “mores” and strict norms and ended up with a veritable Soviet-style bureaucracy of rules. Chesterton rightly pointed out that when we refuse to live by God’s 10 Commandments, he ends up with man’s 10,000 commandments. And they are all tedious, dreary, and not achieving the desired effect — not that anyone knows what that is! Having jettisoned the idea of marriage, not to mention keeping The Act marital, our society can only cling to the idea of consent. But I think Shalit demonstrates that this is a moving target; not to mention that women are desperately unhappy about it.
The Fallout: It’s a trope of feminism that rape is something endemic to patriarchy. Feminists promise a world without rape. But in fact, girls are assaulted all the time. The actual result of feminism, which called for women to be totally sexually available at all times and sought to destroy marriage, is that girls and women are at risk wherever we go.
One reason men and boys were less likely to harass and assault women in the past in civilized society (leaving aside war) is that they knew they would be at risk for retaliation from other men. Today they can act with impunity. Very few men will stand up for the lost cause of protecting women’s honor — but men are the only ones who can patrol their own.
Feminism has even succeeded in creating a visceral response to what I wrote above — because feminists are adept at rewriting history. One thing I like about the book is that Shalit has a lot of material from before the revolution to back up her points.
New Perversions: Anorexia, bulimia, and cutting are maladies that simply did not exist in any meaningful way in the general population when I was a child. You would have to read psychiatric manuals to know about them. Return shows that the rise of these issues predates social media, although it’s undeniable that sharing online gives an epidemic quality to them that they lacked before.
I think there’s more to it than modesty — divorce is one contributer; abortion and IVF are others. Why? Because when you give the child the idea that there is a “picking and choosing” aspect to family bonds, you disturb his reason for existing — his sense of peace and his relation to the universe. Growing up in a society that casually talks about “getting rid of it” and selecting out one of the babies implanted (I was told that in passing 20+ years ago by a perfect stranger) drives the point home: You are expendable.
In girls, this manifests as self harm and what Shalit calls a feeling of deadness. I have seen this — girls so compliant that they seem not to have a will of their own.
I just saw a news story about three women who invented a straw that detects date rape drugs. On the one hand, so innovative. On the other, what’s next, a special pillow so you don’t hit your head when you pass out? And social media being what it is, no way the guys will not know what this straw is and simply take it away from you. But this conversation is stupid! No sane adult should be having it! Suppose you just didn’t go places and be with people who are so harmful to your well being?
However, those factors — divorce, abortion, IVF — are themselves tied to modesty, if we want to define that virtue as a sense of fittingness of our selves, especially our sexuality — of bestowing a sense of telos, of a meaning directed to something real and precious. What are divorce and manipulations of “the products of conception” but a denial of this virtue?
I love that Shalit allows us to catch a glimpse of the real longing that girls have for a fairy-tale ending for themselves.
Tell me what you thought!*
bits & pieces
Joseph Pearce on a ray of hope in England: Our Lady of Walsingham is on the move.
Is it acceptable to praise Castro’s Cuba for its literacy program?
Why race theory, as promoted in universities, is dangerous and destructive.
A thorough examination of conscience for this Lenten time.
Prayer is personal, but it’s not individual in the sense of cut off from formality, or from others. The patterns of prayer are fruitful for the soul. To be balanced with this homily of St. John Chrysostom.
Thomas More College students had a contra dance for their Mardi Gras celebration, and a highlight was senior Jacinta Yellico singing her great-grandfather’s #1 country music hit song!
A spectacular lost medieval chapel is unearthed at Auckland Castle in England.
Testimony: Growing up with two mothers forced me to be confused about who I was and where I fit in the scheme of the world.
Coronavirus highlights the $35 billion vaccine market. Here are the key players.
Peter Kwasnieski on Chant (you can watch or read): “The Roman Rite is the only one among all the Christian rites that has stopped chanting its liturgy.” At the 30 minute mark Prof. Kwasniewski begins an argument for the primacy of chant in worship. Another great observation: “The contrast between singing, which is human expression at its highest, and silence, which is a deliberate withholding of discourse, is more striking than the contrast between speaking and not speaking. The former is like the rise and fall of ocean waves, while the latter seems more like switching a lightbulb on and off.”
from the archives
What can children do? A refresher on chores and work (Lent is a great time to motivate all the
I’ll just keep re-upping this one on caring for your sick child at home until all talk of viruses has subsided.
[image error]
liturgical year
follow us everywhere!
Stay abreast of the posts when they happen:
I just share pretty pictures: Auntie Leila’s Instagram.
If you want politics, rants, and takes on what is going on in the Church:
Auntie Leila’s Facebook (you can just follow — my posts are public — sometimes I share articles here that don’t make it into {bits & pieces})
The boards of the others: Rosie’s Pinterest. Sukie’s Pinterest. Deirdre’s Pinterest. Habou’s Pinterest. Bridget’s Pinterest.
And the others on IG: Rosie’s Instagram. Sukie’s Instagram. Deirdre’s Instagram. Bridget’s Instagram.Habou’s Instagram.
*Let’s try to read without the specter of “modesty culture” hovering over our shoulders. Just read. False dichotomies create barriers to understanding. It is possible to take an incorrect stance on any virtue — but it is of course possible to live any virtue properly. It’s tedious to have the conversation center around those who respond to immodesty intemperately. And it makes me angry when that’s all we can talk about, because we need to rescue our children from what Shalit describes.
Just because there is a culture of daredevils who continually test their own courage beyond the limits of reason doesn’t mean that we should reject the virtue of fortitude! Just because teetotalers imposed Prohibition on a nation doesn’t mean that we need to wallow in drink. Common sense!
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February 22, 2020
Book club! {bits & pieces}
Book club? St. Greg Pocketbook? We on? Read Part One this week and we will talk about it next Saturday! We’ll aim to cover one part per week of Lent (and actually end on time!).
A Return to Modesty (affiliate link — the new edition is not necessary)– I am planning to restrain myself and not write extensively, but just maybe pop up a post — or add on to {bits & pieces} — would that work? — and see if we can have a conversation about it! You be ready with your quotes and takes.
Now, I have to warn you that this book is not at all appropriate for your teenage girl. It deals with Subjects. Auntie Leila cringed and she really hopes that your teenage girl is innocent of all these Subjects and that we will not be the means of introducing them to her.
But if this girl is going to one of our elite colleges in the fall, then maybe you read the book here with us and then read it with her… whatever you think best.
I also want to say — try to read without the specter of “modesty culture” hovering over your shoulder. Just read. False dichotomies create barriers to understanding. It is possible to take an incorrect stance on any virtue — but it is of course possible to live any virtue properly. Just because there is a culture of daredevils who continually test their own courage beyond the limits of reason doesn’t mean that we should reject the virtue of fortitude! Just because teetotalers imposed Prohibition on a nation doesn’t mean that we need to wallow in drink. Common sense!
And in general I think this book can really help us as parents and in our own lives to see the real value of taking steps towards an innocent outlook and offering our children the gift of purity.
Part of me would actually love to read Benedict XVI’s Jesus of Nazareth (affiliate link) with you — especially as the beginning of the first book (they are not chronological) explicates Jesus’s temptations in the desert in a way that brings them so very close to our own personal struggles and, of course, relates so well to the start of Lent… too late, I said I’d do Modesty!
Maybe we can read it during Easter, but if you have the book and want to get started, go for it. Here’s a long piece by Fr. Schall on the desert section.
bits & pieces
So funny: Self-Care Tips for Toddlers.
An excellent talk on the power of medieval sacred art and iconography to rescue us from the final decadence of modern art. I think this is an even better presentation than Roger Scruton’s Beauty one that I posted long ago. Older teens who are familiar with modern art’s degradations (but not for those innocent thereof — it’s modern art and it’s degraded) would benefit from watching, along with engaged adults.
You might not be aware of a threat to parental rights slipping virtually under the radar. I encourage you to take the time to listen to this talk by Fr. Michael Copenhagen. I think he will make connections you haven’t thought of before — he certainly did that for me. The fulcrum is vaccines (and in principle I am not opposed to vaccines) but what is leveraged is medical and parental freedom.
Shedding Light on Progressivism’s Dark Side — Samuel Gregg reviews a book on eugenics and race politics: “These aren’t arguments against change per se. They are, however, arguments for two things that should always go hand in hand: humility in the quest for truth and caution in the use of state power.”
The ancient Romans’ amazing logistical materials structure.
The Haunting of Russell Kirk.
Fasting for Lent — it’s still a good idea. If you are a mom in need of steady nourishment, try addressing the issue of a good breakfast so you don’t snack all morning; instead of a sweet, have on hand dried fruits and nuts; plan on having supper a bit earlier than you have been (this may require planning your menus — go to the top of the page and click on Dinner Every Day). Then you can close the kitchen and go to bed early!
The Clear Creek Family on Etsy has a sa-weet Lenten calendar — download for $1. It is the Traditional calendar, just so you know; beautifully done and a wonderful resource for meditation and gentle explanation during the season for your diligent colorer. (I am not affiliated — just sharing!)
from the archives
Discipline: Instead of “because I said so,” try this.
Here is a little suggestion for something to give up for Lent.
Other suggestions for Lenten reading.
More suggestions for Lenten reading.
The Guardini Spirit of the Liturgy guided reading. (This is the last post — all the others are linked here.)
The Ratzinger Spirit of the Liturgy guided reading. (Ditto.)
I have lots of Lenten food ideas for you — just search “Lent” in the categories.
liturgical year
Feast of the Chair of St. Peter, apostle.
follow us everywhere!
Stay abreast of the posts when they happen:
I just share pretty pictures: Auntie Leila’s Instagram.
If you want politics, rants, and takes on what is going on in the Church:
Auntie Leila’s Facebook (you can just follow — my posts are public — sometimes I share articles here that don’t make it into {bits & pieces})
The boards of the others: Rosie’s Pinterest. Sukie’s Pinterest. Deirdre’s Pinterest. Habou’s Pinterest. Bridget’s Pinterest.
And the others on IG: Rosie’s Instagram. Sukie’s Instagram. Deirdre’s Instagram. Bridget’s Instagram.Habou’s Instagram.
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