Beauty, Plain

If you are looking at this blog it is apparent to you that I am a Plain woman. This has nothing to do with standards of beauty. I dress in simple, layered, monochromatic clothes, my hair is long, uncut, and pinned up, and I wear an unadorned white cotton bonnet called a prayer cap. You won’t see my legs, and my feet are ensconced in ankle high boots. It’s about as unsexy as I can get.

My husband, Nicholas, was watching television last night. (We were watching “Canada’s Worst Handyman,” a competition to see if five very untrained people can learn basic home maintenance skills. Some can, some can’t. I’ve learned some things myself.) A commercial for the Olympics in Vancouver came on the screen. “She looks like you!” Nicholas says. “Who? Where?” I asked. “That one, the one with the dark hair.”

I could not see any resemblance between myself and a cartoon Olympiad in athletic clothing. “No, I don’t look like that.” He was getting a little frustrated with me. “Yes, like that.” “No, sweetie, maybe years ago…”

“That’s how I remember you,” he said, which was sad, since he lost some vision and some memories with the stroke.

“But I don’t look like that now,” I said. “I certainly wouldn’t look like that in those clothes. I’m just a middle-aged Plain woman now.”

“But that’s beautiful,” he said. “I think you are just as beautiful now as when you were an athlete.”

And, friends, it doesn’t get better than that. I’ve got a few extra pounds keeping me warm; the hair is decidedly streaked with silver; some days the knees, hips and feet ache, a legacy of that athletic past. Still, the most important man in my world doesn’t just tell me I’m beautiful. He knows it. He means it.

The slim, dark-haired, blue-eyed runner I once was may have been physically beautiful, but my spiritual beauty hadn’t fully emerged. Prayer, humility and some tough breaks in life have deepened that beauty, so that my partially blind husband can see me inside, not just the shell the world sees. That counts for more than anything.

I couldn’t have reached this point in my life with strength if I hadn’t chosen the Plain way. If my appearance and public approval of me had been more important than following my Lord, my conscience and my heart, I would have fallen away. If the mirror had held too much of my attention, I would have neglected more important things.

Plain is a gift from God. Don’t turn away from that gift when it is offered to you as a Christian. It improved my soul’s strength, and I believe it is a way of life that could strengthen our world.

Plain Living, future tense

Nicholas and I got rid of furniture about a year ago. We were moving around a lot, living in furnished situations, so there wasn’t much use in hauling about our beat-up stuff. And while we are in another furnished living environment, I’ve been thinking about what we will do when we move to our own house.

And I’m too old to sleep on the floor anymore.

I will scrounge most furniture – desks, tables, lamps, dressers. I can refinish wood and make it look almost new. I prefer older things of real wood, good simple lines and some presence in a room. However, my dust mite and mold allergies are so bad that I cannot risk used upholstered furniture, rugs and certainly not second-hand mattresses.

Although the furniture where we are living is exceptionally clean for its years of use, and the mattress we have on our bed is perfect, this is not always the case. I’ve spent miserable weeks, unable to sleep, because of breathing difficulties, headaches and even muscle spasms because of dust mite contamination in mattresses. Rugs and curtains are big culprits. Vacuuming and a spray with dilute hydrogen peroxide helps for a little while, but once those dust mites get into the textile, it’s near impossible to get them out.

So I am contemplating how much money we will have to save to buy furniture, and where we will get it.

So much modern furniture is made of plastic and PVC. I have a certain level of chemical sensitivities as well, and the all-natural stuff is so expensive! I think the mattress may have to fall into the natural category, but the living room furniture would cost as much as a new car if we went that route.

And there`s the issue of sustainability. How was it madeÉ What kind of materials were used in manufacturingÉ Was the wood sustainably harvestedÉ

I`ve looked at Ikea furniture online, and I like it. It has the plain style that is suitable for our life, and it is priced right. But my sister, who lived in Europe for years, calls Ikea `the Swedish Walmart.“ Are their manufacturing and shipping practices as ecologically sound as they implyÉ

What are others doing about thisÉ I don`t want to make a big decision like this without adequate information.

Anglicans, Covering, Hats and Tradition

Anglican women used to cover their heads in church. It wasn’t that long ago. My Baptist mother and her friends wore plain hats or scarves in church until the mid 1960s; many Anglican and Episcopal women did so until later.

I don’t really know why they stopped. Many look back with nostalgia and wistful remembrance. Others found it oppressive and vain. It was perhaps both, as well s a sign of obedience and humility for others.

There was no order or canon about covering. It was expected, a custom. Then Catholic women stopped covering after Vatican II, and one would think the Church of Rome had spoken for all. This was not the case.

The Protestant argument that a woman’s covering is her long hair and not a piece of fabric became prevalent. As I’ve said elsewhere, this was an error of interpretation. Paul did indeed mean that  a woman should wear her hair long and uncut, if possible, as representing the glory of God; the veil was her modesty and obedience, a symbol of headship under Christ. Women alone have that privilege. Men uncover before the altar; women have the benefit of glory, as Moses was veiled after descending from Mount Horeb, for the glory of God was reflected in him.

Anglican women are not released from this headship and this glory. I believe it would be better if we acknowledged our relationship to Christ in veiling, that is, in covering our heads before the altar. I wear a prayer cap; others wear a small veil or scarf or kerchief, which has the same effect.

If hats are worn in church, they should be simple cloth or knit caps of the skull cap, snood or cloche type, unornamented. A plain black or straw bonnet is acceptable, if a bit anachronistic if one is not Plain. The hat should match the style of clothes. Plain women wear Plain coverings; modern dress women should wear something modern but unpretentious. One’s church clothes, in fact, should be simpler rather than elaborate. The occasion is a solemn celebration, not a garden party or an evening gala. Colour is acceptable, but unnecessary frills and certainly anything that suggests a show of skin and figure is inappropriate. Church services are not a fashion show or an occasion for finding a boyfriend. (Don’t get me started on wedding attire.)

I used to wear hats to church, before I was Plain. Some of them may have been a little more decorative than necessary. A black straw cloche was a favourite, and matched a lot of my clothes. A navy blue brimmed hat, of vintage extraction, was simple but elegant. I had a summer white brimmed hat, pinned up on one side with a fabric flower. It may have been a little elaborate for an older woman, but perhaps was excusable when I was twenty-five.

Still, Sunday morning is not the Easter parade. (That’s an arcane reference some readers will have to look up.) A basic dress and a simple hat will do service for many years, provided they are in good repair. A short veil of the charity style is never wrong, even if people ask if you are a nun. (Yes, they will.)

It’s too bad that women rarely cover even in church. It makes Christian women look worldly, more concerned with their appearance than their piety. Vanity and immodesty are never at home in the church, or in the heart of a Christian.

Mothers should, at least, set a good example for daughters by wearing a modest dress or skirt, and this one day in the week insist that their daughters put on a skirt and modest blouse.  I see young women every year who have never had a skirt until they want to look grown-up for prom or a wedding. They walk like boys in their skirts, they are so unaccustomed to the proper way to hold their legs, arms and feet. Teenagers today are much too concerned about appearance and social status. They need some sort of break from all that, if they are ever to find themselves.

Equally, young women should learn to wear a headcovering at the appropriate time. There are cultures where a woman in tight jeans and with her head bare will cause problems, and if our daughters ever travel beyond our own borders, they should have some sense of what to do and why.

Just because the rest of the world decided it didn’t need rules doesn’t mean we are excused from following them.

Anglicans, Speak Up!

Anglican is not a bad word. It is not something of which we must be ashamed. It is not synonymous with “hide-bound traditionalist” or “woman-hating crotchety old man.”

But you wouldn’t know that from the blogosphere.

Surely I am not the only Anglican moderate out here.

(To a given value of moderate, I admit.)

Be humble but forthright about your Anglican faith. Don’t leave the ‘net wide open for crackpots, extremists, and afore-mentioned hide-bound types. Boldly and bravely put “Anglican” in your tags!

Why?

Because I can’t stand to read any more blog posts from Anglicans who bloody well should just go to Rome already. 

I have had all sorts of problems with the church, wandered around a bit looking for that greener pasture, and yet I still came home.

Remember the other side of the parable of the prodigal son: The older brother, the good one, got reprimanded for his unloving, exclusionary attitude. There’s no virtue in being holier-than-thou.

To any bishops who might be reading (there aren’t, I know, wishful thinking): I’m ready to get back to work. There’s a million sermons in my head, a tougher attitude than I’ve ever had, and a willingness to put my hand to the plow without looking back. I promise I won’t whine and complain, or try to run away again to some beguiling church. I’ve got a real-world education now that no seminary could teach.

Resume and references supplied upon request.

Soul and Suffering

Some people should not attempt to sing spiritual carols like “Go Tell It on the Mountain.” I’m an American, I lived in the South; no Christmas was finished until someone sang this as a solo, or a choir echoed it through an all-pews-filled church. It is a beautiful, beautiful hymn, written by people who had longed for freedom and peace. It has to be sung from the heart, or not at all.

Gospel hymns make it into hymnals for a couple of reasons. One is the perception that they are easy to sing. The other is that they are ethnically inclusive. The former is usually not true, because the notation of the hymn is untrue to the improvisation of the original, and the second is often condescending, removing something beautiful from its context and trying to make it universal.

To sing “Go Tell It on the Mountain” well means that the singers have to know the experience of waiting patiently, with sometimes just a glimmer of hope. The singers can’t be afraid of the song. They’ve got to be willing to rock it some, give it some soul, open up to its possibilities and improvisations. It needs to be sung a capella, without amplification, and with an audience who knows where it came from and why, at least somewhere in their hearts. Like many gospel hymns, it is deeper than its simple words and melody would suggest.

I love good gospel hymns, especially the old ones. They speak to the heart of freedom, love and joy. They speak of release from the sins of this world and the glory of the Lord’s world, living amongst us and yet to come. I love it when they are sung by a choir well-versed in the gospel ways, who have sung together for years, whose roots are in gospel and soul. These are the choirs that came up singing a capella because for years the churches couldn’t afford instruments. They trained each successive generation to use their voices like the parts of an orchestra. They make room for the Holy Spirit to enter and transform the singer and the listener.

That doesn’t have to be limited to gospel choirs. Every choir, every church musician could open their hearts to that possibility. Every preacher, every liturgist, every litanist, every listener could ask that Spirit to teach them of liberation, of simple joy, of hope, and of love.

Did You Believe in Santa?

I was raised in a Baptist family that did not teach about Santa bringing gifts. We knew about Santa, and thought it was fun, but my parents were careful to explain that he is pretend, while Jesus is real. So I grew up knowing the difference, and never had my childhood faith shaken by thinking my parents lied to me about one Christmas story, so they must be lying about the other one. (North Pole vs. Bethlehem.) What about others? Did the realization that Santa Claus does not exist (in a real, physical way) affect your belief in Jesus?

Winter Memories, Christmas Past

The three of us were talking about winter and Christmases of our childhoods. I am a rural child; the other two are urban/suburban. I am American; they are Canadian. Their strongest memories of Christmas involve Santa Claus and the Eaton’s department store windows. My Baptist, rural roots didn’t include these.

My parents did not teach us that Santa Claus brought Christmas toys. Santa Claus was a nice story to make children feel special at Christmas, but not real. We still had Christmas stockings, and a “Santa gift” that Mom didn’t want to wrap – usually the big gift, like a tricycle or dollhouse. I don’t know if my younger sisters believed in Santa; I cerainly didn’t, and never did. I remember my mother making it very clear to me, about the age of four, that Santa is a myth, not real like Jesus.

I think I enjoyed Christmas more bcause of it. I liked the Christmas pageant, the Nativity story, and I really loved other people’s creches, although we didn’t have one for a long time. (It was a serious theological issue in the Baptist Church those days – should we have any representations of Christ, or does that encourage idolatry?) The tree, the gifts and the seasonal music were part of a party atmosphere that broke up the dreary days of winter, but not as important as the whole mystery of the Incarnation. Well, I probably didn’t think of it that esoterically, but I had that sense even as a child.

Nicholas and Mother Kay were raised in secular families. Santa was the center of the celebration. They went to department stores to see Santa, and Kay remembers a video phone at one store from which children could talk to Santa. Christmas Eve was full of exciting anticipation, but there must have been many Christmas mornings of disappointment.

In this household, three priests and a small child sharing a roof and table, the two-year-old, Child Patience, brings us a renewed perspective. She knows about Santa (outside influences can’t be helped unless we all move to a strict Old-Order Amish community) but seems to think he is just a cartoon character; she hasn’t encountered a costumed Santa here. And while we have Christmas trees (one is an angel tree, her favourite) the house has several creches and no jolly old elves. She knows who Mary is, and the Baby; that guy Joseph is still not an important part of the story. We stop to look at the creches, and she identifies “Mirrym” and “Baby.” There is a photograph in the hall of a marble statue of Mary and the infant Jesus, and they have been a part of her life since she was herself a babe in arms.

Her Nana, Mother Kay, was talking to an old friend on the phone last week. As usual, Child Patience wanted to chat as well. After a few “hi’s” and giggles, she asked, “Who’s that?”, meaning the person on the other end of the conversation. “It’s Mary,” Nana answered. Child Patience was immediately impressed.”Mirrym!” she cried, pointing to the creche.

Who wants to tell her differently? Other children write letters to Santa, visit Santa at the mall, and may even e-mail him. Child Patience has talked to the Blessed Virgin on the telephone.

Why Am I Still Here?

It has not been easy to shake off being Anglican. I’ve tried to move into other groups, but with no success. Either I backed out quickly or it was obvious said Christian group really did not want the likes of me. (And I’m still not so sure if the Anglicans want me.)

Frustrated, I offered the problem back to the Lord. Why am I still here? And the Lord did give an answer, quite clearly: This is where you are called. Your ordination means something.

Problematic as my relationship is with the Anglican church and Anglican tradition, God has dropped me into it and I am to wait, more or less patiently (and that depends on me, doesn’t it) until something happens, or until God and I can make it happen.

I am, according to those who have experienced my ministry, a good priest. I am conscientious, orthodox, and thoughtful. I work hard, I give more than expected. I am a good preacher, a good teacher, and a Book of Common Prayer traditionalist. I live a quiet life these days. I am dedicated to my husband. My idea of a fun evening is a little Charles Dickens in front of the fire with a tiny glass of brandy. I can cook, sew, garden, and shear a sheep. I’m healthy and physically strong. I like staying home and don’t want to go to conferences and workshops and committee meetings. (OOPS! That is not a plus in the Anglican church!)

I can live on very little money, I am a good housekeeper, can cope with old buildings and can mend paraments and vestments. I can sing and chant.

So why don’t I have a church?

Hello? Anglican Church? This is me…still here.

Food and Loneliness

I started a mini-rant on a friend’s facebook page when she posted an article on loneliness. The article had implications about social networks and increasing isolation, which is probably true, although I haven’t experienced it as such, because it is an easy way to keep in touch with my busy, computer-literate sisters, nieces and nephews. My sons are more likely to send the long letterish message via e-mail, and I love it when we get to talk on the telephone. My life has kept me more mobile than my family, so the internet has meant that I am in touch with them more than ever before.

The blog here at WordPress has also meant that I could continue in ministry without a parish, and receive the ministry of others beyond a small circle of friends, and I have needed that at times. Electronic, digital communication is a wonder, and I think in general it is useful for promoting the faith even as there are great problems with the technology being misused. But then, this was true of the printing press as well, and even the invention of cheap paper. (Parchment and papyrus take a lot of work and preparation; cotton or woodfiber paper can be made in a couple of days.)

The main drawback to communication at a distance is that it can keep us separated. While communicating, we have no incentive to see each other. We do not share that vital part of human interaction, which is the communal meal. We are designed to share food. It is the most basic of social events.

It begins with family meals, with the infant fed by the mother in the security of her arms, in the presence of the other members of the family. The nursing baby is then given table food, and eventually a seat at the family table. It should be the most secure of all our memories, that we were fed and loved in the presence of the rest of the family.

Our contemporary culture has lost a lot of that basic security. Meals are haphazard events, sometimes eaten in the car or alone or in the presence of strangers (think of the mall food court.) These are not times that evoke a feeling of safety and security. Families struggling with social pressures may devolve into nothing more than individuals sharing a house, all eating at different times, with different motives, and even competing with each other for resources. Food and eating disorders can be the result.

Our elderly who live alone may stop eating properly. Meals remind them that they are alone and lonely, that they are unwanted by family or society. Meal programmes at churches or community centres may bring them together sometimes, but it is not a good substitute for a healthy family life. This isolation of the elderly is a recent phenomenon; most of human history, the older family members remained in a family home with children and grandchildren. They contributed memories, knowledge, household help and childcare. Now they may go to nursing homes long before they are ready, or into seniors’ apartments. This can be a good thing for those who need medical care, or who remain in their home community, but it is very isolating if the elderly move to a new location with unfamiliar faces and places. They may end up eating alone most of the time, or not eating much at all, or eating inappropriate foods out of boredom and depression.

I have been to more Christmas dinners given for the elderly than I can count. They often seem rather forced in jollity, and a poor substitute for the family table. Yes, everyone gets fed, has some company, gets a little souvenir of the day and goes home for a nap. But it is a thin replacement for the daily family meal, and there are eleven other months when there aren’t holiday meals provided. It’s a brief respite from isolation and boredom, but very brief – a ceasefire in the loneliness war.

Many family homes have formal dining rooms, or a large dining area with a big table. People fantasize when they buy a house that they will have family dinners, or intimate romantic suppers, or big parties in these dining areas, but how often do they become deserts, wildernesses of maple furniture and gold-rimmed dishes, never used except for the token holiday meal? The kids eat fast food or sandwiches in the car, and spend more mealtimes with their friends than their parents. Parents eat something out of the microwave or from the coffee shop while flying around from task to task.

Some of us are taking back the table. One of the reasons is that the Lord Jesus Christ gave us a special meal, communion, to bring us together, to nourish us in real physical and spiritual ways. Every meal among Christians is special, set aside, our sharing of God’s gifts, even if it is not the consecrated meal of the altar. We pray for blessing on that meal, and for our needs and the needs of others; it is a sacred time becuase it is so elemental. God gave humanity the good food of the earth in the Garden; humanity fell to temptation and corrupted it. But when we sit down in love and reconciliation at the family or neighbourly table, we are taken back into the goodness of the original home, and share its bounty with God.

Some churches continue the communal aspects of table fellowship with an open meal following their worship. This goes beyond the sign of communion, and takes its understanding of our relationship to God into the world. Perhaps we need to do this more, since the usual denominational “coffee hour” is so often paltry, cold and brief, poorly attended and even resented by those who have to arrive early to fill the pot and lay out the cookies. I was closely involved in the aftermath of a “coffee hour” gone tragically wrong; the spiritual implications of that will reverberate in that community, church and denomination for generations, I believe.

Traditional Christians are trying to take back the traditional family life. We are called to model that for others, to show that it works, that it builds up our families, our children and our elders, and supports our communities.

Familiar Winter Ground

I remembered an old essay of C.S. Lewis’s this morning, which I haven’t read in perhaps twenty years. It seems to be from God in the Dock, although I remember it as having been published in a magazine before that. After a little googling around, I found that many other Christians remembered this essay, year by year, in their blogs. “What Christmas Means to Me” seems to be the title – I don’t have a copy of God in the Dock at hand.

Lewis soon after the war refused to buy into Christmas – what he called Exmass in another essay. He would not buy gifts or send cards, or do more than entertain (which he loved) and get some treats and trinkets for children. He  was mystified as to why Christians did not celebrate the Christ-mass as thoroughly as they ceebrated the pagan Saturnalia.

This essay certainly shaped my view of Christmas, and I am not going to go through all the points. Readers can find it for themselves – I’ll list the sites at the end of the post. But it is just as true now as it was forty or fifty years ago. I have told family and friends this year that I do not want gifts. They can contribute to a food or water charity instead. I have clothes, shelter and nourishment this winter, and I am praying for the courage to seek out a new job. I am not at all concerned about those who purportedly must sell or manufacture for Christmas. So much of what we buy now is manufactured in a totalitarian country where people have been pulled from their self-subsistence lives on the land to work in near-slave conditions. The pittance they are paid is just enough to keep the United Nations from protesting. We would, many of us anyway, be much better off providing for ourselves year-round, as best we can, than buying and selling and speculating. In effect, we have an economy where everyone is taking in each other’s laundry. (For those too young to understand, poor people in past centuries did laundry by hand for their more successful neighbours. It was a life of scalds, lye burns and chilblains, conditions we rarely see in the developed world now.)

There will be hospitality in this household this Christmas, along with prayers and trips to church. There will be treats and trinkets for the very young, and gifts made to others who are in need of some basic items. There won’t be extravagances – no diamonds or perfume or gargantuan toys. There will be love.

To see more of the C.S. Lewis essay, try http:\\rosa-sinensis.blogspot.com/2009/01/rosas-essay-archives-cs-lewis-what.html

And I like Rosa’s blog, so have a look.

And also: http:\\benwitherington.blogspot.com/2007/what-christmas-meant-to-cs-lewis.html

Ben’s blog is now at http:\\blog.beliefnet.com/bibleandculture

And if anyone can tell me how to make these links, I’d appreciate it. I am so not blog-savvy.