Why I Started Wearing a Headcovering
Someone asked me recently why I cover my head. My response to her turned out to be rather lengthy, and I thought it would be a good idea to save it for the next time someone asks.
The first time I noticed a woman wearing a head-covering was when I had an acquaintance who was a Messianic Jew. She always covered all of her hair, and finally one day I asked her about it. Her response was that the beauty of her hair is a special privilege reserved for her husband alone. I thought that was a beautiful, symbolic way to represent the exclusive relationship between a husband and wife. But I also distinctly thought, “I can’t do that because I’m not Jewish!”
It was sometime later that I began to feel a disenchantment with the lacey, mantilla veils that I was wearing to Mass. I noticed that some of the women at church began to have large collections of veils in various styles and colors, and that they would match their veils to their Sunday outfits. Now, there’s nothing wrong with this! But the only reason I wore the veil to Mass at that time was exterior reverence to Christ truly present in the Blessed Sacrament. It was a sign of my submission and humility before Christ. Since the veil represented humility, having extravagantly beautiful veils that worked as fashion accessories seemed to defeat the purpose of the veil in the context of Mass. I used a simple black mantilla and I never desired to buy more, to have a collection, or to have a pretty veil that would attract attention. It simply didn’t make sense to me.
At the same time, many of the veils I was seeing were so transparent that I could see the women’s hair through them. Some of them were so tiny they didn’t cover much of anything at all.
I began to ask questions like “what really constitutes ‘covering one’s head?’ is there a standard or rule? does wearing a thin headband actually count? does all of the hair need to be covered? is it truly covering if the material is completely transparent?”
I don’t share this to pass judgement or condemnation on the type of veil or covering that anyone else chooses to use. I share this because these were the first thoughts that caught my attention and started to get me thinking about head coverings. If you think I’m sitting in Mass passing judgement on other women’s head-coverings, you’re very wrong. I have zero authority to decide the answer to any of these questions, so please don’t think I would even pretend to.
The fact of the matter is that the Catholic Church today has no laws, rules, or disciplines regarding women’s head-coverings. It’s been completely done away with, and women are no longer required to cover their heads inside churches at all. There is nothing in our religion that tells us the type of material to use, the length of the veil, the level of transparency, the color, the shape, size, etc.
Still, I was feeling a pull towards using opaque materials to cover my head, more like the styles that are ordinarily seen in the Orthodox Church. I wanted greater coverage, and I didn’t want the material to be transparent.
I thought about this for over a year without switching my style of head covering! I didn’t know what to buy, wear to buy it, how to wear it, and I feared judgement from others if I was the only one at Mass not wearing the standard mantilla. Quite frankly, I didn’t even know if this was important, or if it was something that God wanted me spending my time and energy focusing on. I pushed it out of my mind.
Just before Thanksgiving 2022, my husband approached me and expressed a concern. He told me that he wanted to instill greater modesty standards in our daughters, and one of the things he wanted to do was switch from mantillas to opaque cloths. I’m not sure where this idea came from for him, but the same thing had already been on my mind and heart, although I had not expressed it to him.
Now that I had at reason outside of myself to look deeper into head-coverings, I started to conduct research about their use throughout history, and their eventual disuse. I learned many things.
Firstly, believe it or not, I previously had no idea that St. Paul explicitly commands women to cover their heads in Scripture. For some women, that’s reason enough! Secondly, I dug into what the Church Fathers said and there was practically unanimous agreement on their part that women should cover their heads. They held that it as a Biblical command.
So, two important discoveries I made were that: 1. We have a biblical exhortation to wear a covering; and 2. We have an apostolic tradition. It’s clear from history that the first Christian women covered their heads, and that this practice was in place during the time of the Apostles and was carried on after them.
For the next part to make sense, I need to explain why St. Paul commanded women to cover their heads. In 1st Corinthians verses 7-10, he says:
“The man indeed ought not to cover his head, because he is the image and glory of God; but the woman is the glory of the man. For the man is not of the woman, but the woman of the man. For the man was not created for the woman, but the woman for the man. Therefore ought the woman to have a power over her head, because of the angels.”
His reasoning is the natural order of creation. It’s because woman is the glory of man, is of the man, was created for the man. He says "a power,” that is, a veil or covering, as a sign that she is under the power of her husband. This goes back to Genesis, when God made them male and female, and woman was “taken out of man.” (Gen 2:23) According to St. Paul, the veil is a visible sign that the woman is under the authority of man. The symbolism of the veil takes that which is invisible — the order established by God — and makes it visible. This isn’t my personal interpretation - this is how the early Church and the Church Fathers understood St. Paul’s words. In his commentary of 1 Cor, St. Thomas Aquinas said the same thing:
"The man existing under God should not have a covering over his head to show that he is immediately subject to God; but the woman should wear a covering to show that besides God she is naturally subject to another." — St. Thomas Aquinas
Now, if you look at our society and culture today there is a serious and gross effort to completely erase all distinctions between the two genders. It started with the feminist movement, when a wave of women wanted to be “equal to men” in all things, which is, of course, impossible. To be completely equal, the sexes would have to be absolutely the same, but they are biologically not the same. There are inherent, natural differences between the sexes. Despite this biological truth, our culture today wants to eliminate these natural differences. They tell us that men can be women and women can be men. This “blurring" of the line between men and women began when women attempted to become men. They began to act like men, to dress like men, to speak like men. And the distinction between the genders has only become more and more vague with the passing of time.
The most basic type of clothing that we see both genders wearing out in public today is jeans and a T-shirt, or what I’m noticing more and more lately is sweatpants and a sweatshirt. We could put the same pair of jeans and the same T-shirt on a male or a female body and there’s a little difference anymore. As the defining factors between “men’s clothing” and “women’s clothing” have become less distinct, clothing has become gender neutral and can be easily swapped between men and women. This is true of hairstyles as well. Fashion in general is becoming more applicable to both genders and less specific to one or the other. They even have a name for it. They call it “gender fluid fashion.”
It was natural that women caught up in the feminist movement began to scoff at anything that was overtly “feminine.” Anything traditionally associated with femininity was seen as bad, or even wrong. It was seen as backwards and oppressive, and it must be cast off.
The natural consequence of this “leveling” of the genders is that people are now transitioning into a different gender. They’re not just putting on the appearance or imitating the behavior of the opposite sex, but are actually taking drugs and having surgeries to alter their physical bodies. Men can now wear women’s clothing, make-up, accessories and hairstyles in public without ridicule, just as women previously began wearing men’s clothing and appearing as men.
It is no coincidence that the traditional practice of head covering, which has always been a part of Christianity from the very beginning, which has both biblical and traditional roots, and which is something that Christian women have practiced throughout history… ended in the 1960s, directly corresponding to the feminist movement.
The National Organization for Women (NOW) is an American feminist organization founded in 1966. In 1968, they released the following Resolution on Head Coverings:
"WHEREAS, the wearing of a head covering by women at religious services is a custom in many churches and whereas it is a symbol of subjection within these churches, NOW recommends that all chapters undertake an effort to have all women participate in a "national unveiling" by sending their head coverings to the task force chairman immediately. At the Spring meeting of the Task force on Women in Religion, these veils will then publicly be burned to protest the second class status of women in all churches."
NOW acknowledged that head coverings were the normative practice of females in Christian churches and initiated a "national unveiling" campaign in which head coverings were collected and then publicly burned in protest of the "second class status of all women in churches."
The following Easter, at a Milwaukee church, the “Easter Bonnet Rebellion” took place after a priest criticized a woman for her uncovered head. Fifteen women with outrageously large hats on approached the communion rail, removed their hats, and received communion in the “first church demonstration for women’s rights.”
The removal of head coverings was a rebellious act born of the feminist movement of the 1960s.
When a woman covers her head, it represents many different things. In fact, it was only recently that I learned many different symbols and meanings of the veil. It boils down to an outward sign symbolizing an inner reality: that she is a woman, and she has an inherent feminine nature given to her by her creator, and implied in that is everything that God intended for a woman to be.
Is it any wonder that feminism attacked women’s head coverings? Feminism seeks to destroy the maternal identity of women. It seeks to obliterate the inherit and natural differences between masculine and feminine. It desires to equalize the two genders to a point where there’s no distinction between what is male and what is female, thus completely destroying the order that God established. It seeks to suppress and stifle a woman’s God-given femininity, to reject her identity and to invent her own.
I began to see head-coverings as a way of saying: “God made me a female. Because I am a woman, I have the unique privilege of cooperating with God to bring new life into the world. This is part of my inherit femininity, and it gives me great dignity.” It also represents the natural order that God created – He made the male and female, and He placed man as an authority over woman. By wearing the veil, a woman is symbolically submitting to her proper place in God’s created order.
In this way, the symbolism of the head covering became extremely appealing to me. It is not only a sign of a woman’s dignity as a feminine creature, but it is also a sign of modesty, purity, piety, obedience, and submission to rightful authority.
In addition to Scriptural and traditional reasons, the head-covering also became an appealing way to revolt against the errors of the modern culture. The culture says a woman can be a man; God says she cannot. The culture says a woman should cast off her femininity and put on the appearance of masculinity. I refuse to comply with this error. Where the culture tries to feed me lies, I silently witness to the truth.
There is beauty and dignity in being a woman, and the veil is a special privilege which she alone can put on. A man cannot be a woman, and so the veil is not proper to his masculinity.
So, one reason I cover my head is to remind others that God made them male and female. God established an order and a natural hierarchy. There is such a thing as a man, and there is such a thing as a woman, and humanity has no right to change what is objectively true. As creatures, we submit in humility to the truth of our Creator. We cannot choose what is true, but conform ourselves to the objective reality that God set in place.
To summarize:
I cover my head to be a witness to the world of God’s truth. The world today is rapidly losing sight of truth, and I for one will not go along with it.
I cover in obedience to Saint Paul’s biblical command, and to carry on the tradition of my faith.
I cover to comply with modesty; that is, to wear what is appropriate to my sex. Practicing modesty protects purity by telling other men that I am reserved for one man only: my husband. In a way, this also defends the exclusivity of Christian marriage, which is between one man and one woman (another truth our modern society has lost sight of).
To be perfectly honest, I’m not sure what other people see or think when they see my head covered in public, but I know why I do it. I do it for submission and obedience to God; for modesty and humility; and to be a silent witness of truth to a godless culture.
