Not even an ordained priest can come into these rooms for six weeks before the birth and for six weeks after. In practice, in most households, a loving husband will break the rules and come in to see his wife during her confinement, as soon as the baby is born, washed, swaddled, and laid in the cradle. Many husbands will not touch her until she has been churched, believing that she is unclean after the travail of childbed, and might contaminate him
