Quick rant.

I'm very amused to see the Church featured in the local Sunday Tabloids today, for enforcing dress codes. The cynical bastard in me wishes to loquaciously lament on the fallen times of today, however such is a consequence of embracing the multifaceted ever-changing venomous hydra of modern liberalism. To reach a point whereby the local news scene actually took notice and published an article is a clear sign of the degradation of certain social values and concepts in society today. That and there is nothing newsworthy to report; after all Egypt is having a wonderful era of peace.

I think the biggest concept that the Singaporean Church has lost is the Sense of Sacred. If you are drawing a blank on the term, you are not alone. The idea of Sacredness has been lost in most churches for a very long time, so not many practicing Catholics actually have an idea of what it feels like to step into somewhere sacred. They cannot be blamed of course, who can fault these poor ignorant souls when churches no longer vaguely resemble churches save for the cross on the roof and the crucifix inside? Most churches nowadays look like multipurpose halls or the inside of aircraft hangars. Or when the music inside church seems so similar to the Laneway concert? Or attempts to be and ultimately fails. Let's face it, these musicians are rather talented and professional and they aren't trying to play religious music.

So when you think about it, it isn't really difficult to mentally come to conclusion that, 'Hey! i'm going to an aircraft hangar to listen to some guys who can't play as well as laneway! ALRIGHT! Let's dress appropriately!' Naturally, you are going to get people dressed like they're going to their friend's place for a beer. Yet, as we all know, these same young people...usually young people (most old people have a certain sense of class) will be dressed in suits and dresses for a wedding dinner or dress clothes to go for family dinners at restaurants. Of course, a wedding dinner is at a hotel and dinner in a restaurant call for class. There is an unspoken dress code and a way to carry oneself in these places. So why can't churches expect similar behaviour from people?

After all, more than just appeasing the older relatives and matriarchs and patriarchs of the family clan, and giving face the wedding couple and their family, when you go to Church, you are standing before God himself, and he is there in the eucharist (for noncatholics and those who've forgotten, YES, LITERALLY THERE. LITERALLY.) Most of you wonder dream of visiting the Queen in nothing less then your best clothes possible, so how can you go before the creator of the universe, your creator, dresses so flippantly as though he's just your next door neighbour?

I hope you see my point now. If I had my way, I would bring back 'Sunday's Best' for church. After all, when you love and respect someone, you want to look good when you see them. What more respect can you give your very creator? In fact, dressing well and modestly helps your fellows parishioners to concentrate and prayer better too, rather than be distracted. We're all human after all. In fact, in most examins of conscience, you will find under the 6th commandment, this typical question, 'Have I dressed immodestly? Been the occasion of sin for another?' See you're helping God by dressing well!

I'm very glad that they denied Ms Audrey Seow from receiving communion. Her comments regarding the matter that, 'We are taught that God loves us no matter what we are, so why should the church discriminate against our attire?' suggest that Ms Seow has also forgotten the criteria for communing, that she has to love God too. And to love God means to follow his rules and his will and not our's. Had she been attending a church that looked like a church, I'm certain that she'd have dressed appropriately.

Dress codes are far from the largest issue. If priests just made their churches look like churches again and if they brought back the beauty and elegance of the music and the architecture, they will see a change in dress. After all why should we aim so low? The point of going to church is to strive to new heights and become better people because we love God.

For further reading, I do direct you to an old piece by Msgr Charles Pope on modesty being reverence for the mystery http://blog.adw.org/2010/02/modesty-is-reverence-for-mystery/
and to Fr Longenecker's older entry on what churches should look like
http://gkupsidedown.blogspot.com/2010/01/chust-for-nice.html