At about the same
time the Olympics games started in Athens, it was
announced that John Paul II had set up a Vatican
department to encourage sports among the youth. I was
quite disappointed to see in the item an unreserved
encouragement of all sports – without a word of warning
about modesty and the general Catholic decorum the
Church has always taught, especially for women.
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I am not an enthusiast of competitive sports for women.
Prior to Vatican II, neither was the Catholic Church. It
was always understood that the violent nature of many
sports is incompatible with the feminine spirit. The
demand for immodest sports dress, e.g. the swimsuit,
acrobatics outfits, gym suits, etc., imposed on girls
under the pretext of practicality, destroys their
natural spirit of modesty.
But it is not only the dress that is objectionable, the
positions and stances that girls and women assume are
frequently prosaic and often clearly indecent. One need
only consider the acrobatic routines of the 16-year-old
American who won the all-around gymnast gold medal in
Athens. The lithe young figure in leotards that reveal
every line of her body has become a role model for a
multitude of young girls, who will enroll in gymnastic
classes and imitate her hairstyle, scanty outfits and
poses without a thought about the immodest dress and
indecent postures the sport dictates.
These girls are to be pitied because they lack serious
moral guidance. Without such an orientation it is more
or less inevitable that they should reach the a-moral
(or immoral) level inherent to such sports today. The
blame should not be laid principally on them, but on
those who should have provided the direction. That is to
say, the Conciliar Church. The silence of Church
authority on the topic is disturbing. Before Vatican II,
the Church was not mute on this important topic. It
seems opportune to offer a few examples.
The Perennial Moral
Teaching
of the Church
Pius XI issued a letter to the Cardinal Vicar of Rome
expressing his disapproval of the impending national
gymnastic and athletic competitions for women. The means
employed to give health to the body, “the noble
instrument of the soul,” he stated, should take into
account suitability of time and place. They should not
excite vanity or promote immodesty. And they must not
lessen a young woman’s “reserve and self-possession
which are both the ornament and guarantee of virtue”
(Letter A Lei, Vicario Nostro, May 2, 1928).
Pope Pius XII, who watched the modern advance of
immodest styles for women with concern, often reminded
young girls to be vigilant against dangers threatening
purity. He offered the exquisite delicacy of conscience
of the martyr St. Perpetua as an example:
“When she was thrown into the air by a savage bull in the amphitheatre at Carthage, her first thought and action when she fell to the ground was to rearrange her dress to cover her thigh, because she was more concerned for modesty than pain” (Allocution to the girls of Catholic Action, October 6, 1940).Mode and modesty should go hand in hand like two sisters, he continued, because both words derive from the Latin modus, meaning a right measure. He warned:
“Many women have forgotten Christian modesty because of vanity and ambition: they rush wretchedly into dangers that can spell death to their purity. They give in to the tyranny of fashion, be it even immodest, in such a way as to appear not even to suspect that it is unbecoming … They have lost the very concept of danger; they have lost the instinct of modesty” (ibid.).
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• “Dresses which hardly suffice to cover the person;
• “Others that seem designed to emphasize what they should rather conceal;
• “Sports that are performed with such clothing;
• “The kind of exhibitionism that is irreconcilable with even the least demanding standard of modesty” (ibid.).
Some Objections
* Pope Pius XII addressed the objection that was already
being raised about the convenience of the new sports
fashions. Some young women, he noted, offer practical
objections, saying that “a certain form of dress is more
convenient or even more hygienic.” This kind of protest
is commonly heard today: “How can I do acrobatics in a
dress? You can’t play soccer in a skirt,” and so on.
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“If a form of dress becomes a grave and proximate danger for the soul, it is certainly not hygienic for the spirit, and you must reject it” (ibid,).Again, he turned to the example of martyrs to make his point. He challenged young girls to follow the example of girls like St. Agnes and St. Cecilia, who suffered tortures of body to preserve their virginal innocence and save their souls:
“Will you, then, for the love of Christ, in the esteem for virtue, not find at the bottom of your hearts the courage and strength to sacrifice a little well-being – a physical advantage, if you will – to conserve safe and pure the life of your souls?” (ibid.).What is more, he added, if one does not have the right to endanger the physical health of others simply for one’s own pleasure, then it is certainly even less licit to compromise the health of their souls.
“But how can you know anything of the impression made on others? Who can assure you that others do not draw therefrom incentives to evil? You do not know the depths of human frailty …. Oh, how truly was it said that if some Christian women could only suspect the temptations and falls they cause in others with modes of dress and familiarity in behavior, which they unthinkingly consider as of no importance, they would be shocked by the responsibility which is theirs” (ibid.).* Pius XII added a strong word of warning to Catholic mothers who imprudently allow their sons and daughters to become accustomed “to live barely attired.” The relevance of his words make them well worth repeating for the benefit of both mothers and fathers today, many who are well meaning but ignorant of the dangers of the immodest clothing that has become commonplace today. He affirmed forcefully:
“O Christian mothers, if you only knew what a future of worries, dangers, and shame … you lay up for your sons and your daughters by imprudently accustoming them to live barely attired, making them lose the natural sense of modesty. You would blush and take fright were you to know the shame you inflict upon yourselves and the harm which you occasion to your children, entrusted to you by Heaven to be brought up in a Christian manner” (ibid.)There is something yet more reprehensible, he continued, and that is for the mothers themselves and other women among the faithful - “and pious women at that” - to show approval of immodest fashions by wearing them themselves. The moment a “questionable fashion” appears on persons “beyond all reproach,” he warned, others will no longer hesitate to follow the current, “a current that will perhaps drag them to the worst falls” (ibid.).
A masculine young woman ... or a feminine young man? LA Times Magazine, August 22, 2004 |
She is an icon for the “baller girls” in-the-making who
surround her in the picture at right. They wear
their baggy t-shirt and shorts not just on the court,
but at home, at school, in the malls, even to church.
They slick back their hair tight, no curls, bows and
fancy barrettes for them. They shuffle everywhere in
tennis shoes and socks. This kind of behavior represents
a trend toward the ever more masculine girl. Such women
seem to have taken a step past the loss of the instinct
of modesty that Pope Pius XII warned against, they are
losing the very instinct of femininity.
One can only wonder about the harsh and unhappy future
of girls who reject their femininity openly and
blatantly. They clearly have lost the notion of the
dignity of the woman in view of her most noble office as
wife, mother and helpmate of man. The masculine woman
does not reflect a true emancipation. It is rather the
debasing of the feminine character, a rejection of the
wise plan of God. It is a position against nature.
Health of Soul Takes
Precedence over Health of Body
Catholic Morals are not like styles, they do not change
with the times. What was immodest or indecent yesterday
has not miraculously become acceptable today because of
the omission or the complacence of the Conciliar Church.
The words of Pope Pius XII to girls and women continue
to be appropriate today:
“Beyond fashion and its demands, there are higher and more pressing laws, principles superior to fashion, and unchangeable, which under no circumstances can be sacrificed to the whim of pleasure or fancy, and before which must bow the fleeting omnipotence of fashion. These principles have been proclaimed by God, by the Church, by the Saints, by reason, by Christian morality…There is only one way, today, as yesterday and tomorrow, for the Catholic girl and woman to counter immodesty in immoral fashions, bad language, and masculine attitudes: an absolute rejection of them. For the good of the soul, certain gymnastic exercises and sports are simply not suitable for Catholic young ladies.
"As St. Thomas of Aquinas teaches, the good of our soul must take precedence over that of our body, and to the good of our body we must prefer the good of the soul of our neighbor” (Allocution to the girls of Catholic Action of May 22, 1941).