Gregoria

I learned that my ex-boyfriend read my diaries. He read about my PTSD flashbacks and traumatic lustful fantasies about people we both know. He read dozens of lists of confessions.

Writing is the only thing I have and the only thing I really love. It's my only coping mechanism. This outlet no longer feels safe.

Cutting is much better, which I will return to soon, when I'm able to get sterilization equipment. In the meantime, I will practice abrasion and heat injury.

He already likes me. I just want to be brought into communion with the reality he sees. I wanto to become more myself-- more as God made me to be.

The Instagram of a man at my parish came across my feed. It was a video of the church that I go to with the words, "Grown men see this and still go back to their feminine concerts and ted talks." It was sad because I'd talked with him just that day, and he seemed nice enough, but I'd prejudged him as one of these manosphere convertodox people. There was something about him. I'd seen it enough and been around it enough that I thought I could tell. At the time, I chided myself for my prejudice, and I told myself that I was being ridiculous. I ended up being correct.

Despite my run-ins with this online, I'd never actually run into it in real life aside from dodging some tactical nukes in the form of ex-boyfriends. When you study sexual paleoanthropology as I do, you can sometimes forget that Phallus worship still exists, not just literally, but figuratively. Yeah, Hindus are still strapping ceremonial dildos to things, but there are some alleged Christians who center their lives on the Phallus.

Feminine is a religious slur to these people, as bad as reprobate or infidel. The feminine is evil. The womb and the child is evil, doing perpetual, life and death battle with the phallus and the spear (or the god of the Hunt). The primary evil of Protestantism is not that it is unembodied, that it is disobedient, or wrong, but that it is feminine.

Is Protestantism feminine? Personally, I struggle to think of a more masculine movement. Turning away from the Mother Church and the Mother of God, forging your own path of spiritual austerity, and further systematizing theology? These are masculine acts of severance, act, and domestication. In what meaningful way is Protestantism of any kind feminine? In what way is Protestantism receptive or penetrable?

Of course, mega churches are not actually feminine, except in the fact that they're cavernous, empty spaces waiting to be filled. They slur things they hate as "feminine," despite them not actually being feminine, but do not mistake this as a lack of legitimate hatred for femininity.

They do hate femininity. They hate receptivity even as their ears are open to whatever words tickle them. They despise what is penetrable even as they are penetrated with sin. They despise the container of the world, even as their souls are empty.

I'm always saying that maximal-slay-the-house-boots-down is not modest. It can even be immodest if you're showing up to church with the thought, "I am the best-dressed person here, everyone bow to my fabulous fashion." In my mind, this is obvious, and this is obvious in the minds of other people too.

I've deliberately avoided consuming this kind of content-- this whole "Dress to church like you're meeting a King because you are," attitude. Therefore, I've gotten different kinds of modesty content on Instagram, Pinterest, etc. Most of it is traditional dress (which is usually modest), but some of it, every once in a while, is Mormon-Core. Deliberately unflattering --not shapeless, UNFLATTERING-- shilluettes, clashing colors, shoes that make no sense, and cheap polyester in brightly colored prints that physically pain the eyes.

I shall put some examples below:

There are more examples, and I admit, this kind of "Modest Fashion Inspiration" (these are ALL from cultivated Look-Books) is largely a product of an older age of the internet and an older age of fashion. Nonetheless, things like this can still be found, and they're usually attached to a subculture of modesty apart from fashion.

Intrinsically, this is good. So much modesty discourse is just costume enthusiasts masquerading their personal preferences as Christian values. Modesty is not about dressing as close to a Stepford Wife or Betty Draper as possible. However, modesty is also not about making oneself look as undesirable as possible. Modesty, real modesty, is about not being noticed. Whether you like it or not, whether it is just or not, dressing like you got ready in the dark will get you looked at just as much as short-shorts and a belly shirt.

On top of that, just as a Christian dressing/acting immodestly is a scandal against the Church (because it gives a false impression), putting zero or misdirected effort into your appearence in the name of modesty gives the virtue of modesty a false impression. Effectively, you are committing a scandal against modesty.

Dressing in an ugly way is different from dressing in a deliberately plain way, and I want to clarify that what's wrong with these outfits is not that they're unusual (dressing unusually is not "modest," but it usually is not immodest). There are plenty of sects/lifestyles that require or encourage plain dress, such as the religious life or many Anabaptist denominations.

But nuns and Anabaptists do not dress the way they do primarily because of modesty. In the case of nuns, they wear a habit for the sake of tradition and to deliberately stand out as a sign of their vocation. For Anabaptists, they dress the way they do because of simplicity, not modesty. They know as much as anyone that the way they dress gets them looked at in public. Neither are about modesty when you get down to it.

Now, I will give an in-depth explanation of what makes a """"modest"""" fashion disaster.

Incohesion.

Asthetics, broadly speaking, relies on things going together, harmonizing, and complmenting one another. This is a principal in architecture, painting, interior design, and so on-- including fashion. This is a reason so many people mistakenly hate 1970s domestic architecture. We're used to seeing it outside of the environment for which it was designed (namely, sorrounded by tall forests and lush nature).

Bad fashion suffers from a lack of coheasion, either in silhouette, color, fabric weight, etc. A flowy skirt is worn with pointed, jeweled shoes, and it's paired with an incohearent belt sinching the waist of a JCrew sweater. It's half a dozen different styles at once. Worse, the fabric weights are mismatched, and not in any conventional way. Normally, fabric weights get heavier as you go down the body (with fabric for shoes of course being the heaviest), but bad fashion ignores this, giving a distincly uncomfortable and sloppy appearence. A gauzy shrug is paired with a heavy, winter's velvet dress.

Instead, take time to look at and feel each fabric. Do they feel like they weigh about the same? Look at your silhouette; does it look like any piece of clothing is being forced to look a certain way? Do your mother's eyes hurt from the colors or patterns? If so, change.

I should note that the woman in this picture is an allegedly Orthodox (?) woman deliberately following Talmudic and Hebraic "modesty" laws. Needless to say, this kind of imitation is immodest and immoral in Christianity. Don't go around pretending to be what you aren't and participating in the traditions of Heathens.

2) It's a half-way effort

"Modest" fashion disasters have one thing in common: a total lack of discernment. They love thrifting, but instead of being choosy with what they find, they buy anything with a low price. Not only is this a WASTE of money and time, but it results in buying a lot of things that are not actually modest, and thus needing to compensate with layering.

Now, I don't mean a plain turtleneck or t-shirt under a strappy dress. I do not mean tights under a shorter skirt. I do not even mean leggings under shorts, though that is a little kindergarten. I mean patterned shirts under patterned dresses, jeans under dresses, jean skirts covered with babydoll dresses worn as tops, layering garments that bunch and pull. It's unintentional dress that makes people stare at you and wonder if you got dressed under duress.

If your personal modesty standards or those of your community/situation are specific (no showing knees, no showing elbows, no showing collarbone, no showing ankles, etc.) you should shop for full garments that keep these regulations. You should also avoid cutting your body into parts into pieces with garments that end anywhere besides a joint. Sleeves should come to your shoulder, elbow, or wrist; hems to your ankle or your knee (in general, though bottoms are harder).

Kapri leggings with a short dress says one thing: Sister Margret did not plan ahead. Plus, it looks awkward and uncomfortable. Jeans under a dress mean another: I'm poorly experimenting with a style from the Bush administration.

3) It's a performance

Modesty, I will repeat, is about blending in. It is not about dressing "plainly" in a pejorative way --which is to say ugly, shapeless, noticeably unfashionable-- but rather, what might best be called "basic". Yes, Basic White Girls from 2012 may have been paragons of modesty. They didn't go out of their way to be noticed, they wore a college girl habit which was practical, comfortable, and required almost no thought at all.

This can be contrasted with what I will call Ostentatious "Modesty", which agrees with the fact that modesty is not only about covering skin, but brags with its own existence, "Look! Look at me! Look how much I do not care about the world! Look at my unmatching clothes, look at my sloppy silhouette, look at my pseudo Edwardian hairstyle." It's breast-beating, holier than thou praise. "Thank God I am not as this modern woman who brushes her hair or wears shoes she likes." It's the not like other girls philosophy but for modesty.

As a remedy, I will post some more actual modesty guidelines that people may find helpful. These are applicable to both men and women.

Dress in a way you find enjoyable

If getting dressed is uneasy or takes a long time in the morning, you are doing something wrong. Be choosy about what you buy, only buy things you really like and which work for you, and develop strong opinions on fashion.

Cultivate taste and discrimination.

2) Don't make an idol out of modesty

Avoiding immodesty should be a bigger concern than "growing in modesty", which is usually just an excuse to buy more things and post more Instagram photos.

3) Remember, Modesty is MOSTLY about preventing lust, jealousy, and confusion in others.

Fashion, dress, and behavior more generally can wound other people. Modesty is about not hurting people.

For a very long time, I was attached to the idea that true love is a reenactment of death, and that sexual and romantic feelings were intimately/directly attached to the death drive. In many ways, I still believe this, but I now believe that these truths should not be intuitive in a good relationship. Being told by art, art critics, or anthropologists that love (your love) is related to suffering to the point of death should be an upsetting, difficult-to-believe statement, only eventually accepted after a period of meditation.

In the relationship I recently left, which many of you have heard me cry about, my love being related to dying was obvious to me to the point of excitement, both on its own and in my relationship. This thought did not disturb me-- it was like a blessed revelation of the source of all my problems. "Why yes, of course," thought I, "the reason I feel so terrible in my relationship is simply that true love is a mirror of death." Well, that may have been true, but that truth acted as a convenient and convincing explanation of much deeper and less metaphysical issues in the relationship. It is not an expression of the death drive or the innate sadomasochism of love for me to feel sad when my fiancé informed me he was unhappy with my body, or that I'm too sad to function, or that I'm an awful vampire who sucks all the joy out of life. To that, sadness, even utter despair, is a natural reaction. Every miserable interaction was the height of drama, and it was as miserable as it was (once) exhilarating. It *was* exhilarating, but it became very boring.

But now, I'm losing my connection with the death drive. My relationship now feels life-giving. I don't feel like I have to try, but at the same time, all I do now is try because I admire his drive, I admire his ambition, I admire his efforts. He wants me to be a happier, better person because he cares about me, not because it would make his life better or easier. I notice he's actually not very emotionally invested in my emotions (or doesn't seem to be). To be sure, he's interested, but he's interested in a truly virtuous way because my emotions are connected to my own virtue and well-being.

Things simultaneously feel more palpable and sensual (as in the senses) and more detached and calm. It reminds me of Hesychia and a great internal quiet. I just feel rightly ordered; I don't feel harmed in my relationship to God as I did then. I feel at peace, at home. Often, when I'm sad (which is more often than not), I am fixated on the idea of returning home. I'll cry to myself, "I want to go home," and I usually mean something different every time. Maybe I mean my house, maybe I mean my mother, maybe I want to be alone, maybe I mean I want to die. I suppose I mean I want an escape, or I want sanctuary. Often, when I dwell on this now, I mean him. I feel extremely at home with him, moreso than I did with my ex-fiance.

With my ex, I felt literally at home, like as if I were at my physical home with my real family who has all these depressing hangups about me, all these judgments, all these preconcieved notions, all this simultanious lack of knowing and over-knowing. But with him, I feel truly seen, I feel truly known --known intimatly-- and undespised, which I have never felt before. Even when I knew someone loved me, I always felt they loved me in addition to hating me deeply, even as deeply as they loved me. But here, his love for me feels pure, unconnected to unsavory emotions, and intertwined with his sense of the world. I feel like I'm a human when I'm with him, and I'm a human who fits into his idea of the world.

He's on my side.

There is a certain kind of historical humility written about by (usually Roman Catholic) saints that is fixated on smallness, weakness, and a need for protection. In the historical context in which it was written (pre-20th Century), this was a genuine expression of piety for both men and women.

Despite certain periods of aesthetic psychosis, where weakness and illness were exalted for both men and women (typically among artists and ill nobility), for the vast majority of human history, people considered physical strength and competence, health, tallness, and muscularity to be both good physical traits overall and marks of spiritual virtue. Physically weak people, the ill, chronically ill, and disabled, and even the short, were often seen as spiritually lesser. At that point in history, meditations on viewing oneself as small, incompetent, weak, and vulnerable (for both men and women) were radical acts of humility.

In the Western World, this view of virtue-- for women-- is no longer the norm. We are in a period of our history where it is an almost universal belief that a good woman, both aesthetically and in her virtue and nature, is small (both thin and short), helpless, weak, and unindependent. Even sickness is praised in women, and this phenomenon has left the artistic realms of abuse where it usually arises historically. Debilitating stomach issues, mineral deficiencies, and even TB (a disease few Westerners have or ever will experience) are romanticized by both men and women and are, subtextually, seen as virtuous, attractive, and good.

It is no coincidence that there has been renewed popularity in Women's Ministry TM of this kind of "meditation on humility". The most common root of this is Sister Therese of Lisieux and her writings, particularly "A Story of A Soul", from which Therese's title "Little Flower" is taken. It comes from several lines/passages where she describes herself as a wildflower, as a little bird, and other very adorable, quaint things of good repute. To judge the autobiography with honesty, the expectation of virtue for women being strength and countenance was already on its way out, so even at the time, this was a different interpretation of humility that would have been considered standard.

Various Women's Ministry programs today now encourage girls and women to exercise "Humility" by referring to themselves as cute little animals, darling flowers, and people both in need of and deserving of protection. "When you're being mean to me online, this is who you're being mean to, [insert pic of adorable baby animal]" is very much a spiritual fruit of this practice.

This is not Humility. This is self-flattery. It is a good thing in today's world for a woman to be weak and small, and comparing women to elegant animals (baby or adult) and vegetation has always been flattering. This is an interpretation of Humility that exists to make women feel better about themselves-- not to make them more in tune with reality and less obsessed with themselves, which is what Humility actually is. The Baby-Animal-School-of-Mortification just makes the sufferer think more about themselves and less about God. It inspires a view of Christ that amounts to a boyfriend or an older brother, and this is both a degradation of Christ and of our relationship with him. It also amounts to denying your ability to sin in a way that hurts anyone but yourself. I've said this before, but you need to know your ability to hurt a person. You're not an innocent flower-- you're a person.

A meditation on Humility is not something that should soothe the prideful reader. It is not a genuine expression of humility to repeat that God expects very little of us and even our smallest effort is great in his eyes, because that is a lie; God expects perfection of us, but we will all fail and incur an irrecoverable debt. It is not humility to run from your responsibilities under the cover of perpetual adolescence or "littleness". This is especially poor spiritual advice for laypeople and clergy because our responsibilities involve others in an intimate way, such as caring for children, parents, paritioners, businesses, etc. Lives are at stake, and you cannot doddle around with fixations on being like a violet flower.

I tried therapy, I did, and it was okay (when I was in college). But no therapist could get past the brick wall of reality that I presented them. I'm upset by reality. My main complaint, aside from my trauma, was medical. I was born with a deforming genetic and hormonal disorder. It would have been fixable when I was a pubescent or prepubescent child, but it wasn't fixed because I was already an ugly and fat child, and doctors did not see my appearance as something worth saving.

They were wrong. They let my appearance be permanently destroyed. Maybe I would've continued to be an ugly child and ugly adult, but I wouldn't be bearded. I wouldn't have a disgusting jaw and the bones of a man. Maybe I wouldn't have had transphobic violence directed at me as a child.

I'm upset because what was done to me was upsetting. And on top of that, their injustice grants me more injustice. People think I am dumb and cruel because I'm ugly, because this world hates the ugly. I'm upset about that because it is upsetting.

It is not a disorder to want to be treated well, or treated at all, in the case of the doctors. It is not a disorder to see what is being done to me. It is not a disorder to be unhappy with a shitty hand dealt. It is not a disorder to say out loud what society and the media tell everyone into whose eyes it beams itself. The underlying desire of every diet, of every health supplement, of every life-improvement, EVERYTHING is to be skinny. I say it, and suddenly I'm the bad guy. I do not have any disorder. I have eyeballs and articulation.

When I was an infant, my parents and caregivers ascribed me the qualities of a toddler; when I was a toddler, my parents and caregivers ascribed me the qualities of a young child; when I was a young child, my parents and cargivers ascibed me the qualities of an older child. When I was finally and older child, I turned 35.

I was suddenly so old and so ugly and so broken. Everyone could see everything that had been done to me. The shield and barrier of childhood innocence were gone. But it wasn't like those things had been done to me as an infant --as they were-- or that they were done to me as an 8-year-old. They'd happened to a gross, old, miserable middle-aged woman in her distant, ugly childhood. I was already that wounded, pathetic woman. And no one cared about me.

When I was abused again in middle school, I was 45. People saw what happened to me, and I felt the truth of their judgments that I had brought it on myself through poor adult choices. I was abused because I deserved it and asked for it. I was a pathetic, 45-year-old whore.

Why was I an adult? Why was I so old and gross since I was eight? I'm a teacher now, and I know how eight-year-olds look, and they all look so innocent. They are babies. How could anyone ever have looked at me and thought everything was all my fault? What was so wrong with me? How has my face and body always been so distorted and disgusting that anyone --that EVERYONE-- felt like I was an adult? Why?

In discourse related to veiling (and reverent dress more generally) there is this disclaimer that these influencers almost always give: "My journey to veiling was so hard," "I know veiling is a lot of pressure," "it was difficult to start veiling," "there's so much pressure not to veil," "how to start your veiling journey." But, there is nothing actually difficult about the veil. It's a piece of fabric-- it doesn't require a tutorial or a guide, and it doesn't (or shouldn't) require some intense internal battle. This framing of the veil as something difficult, tiresome, or something that requires a great deal of effort is designed to make the veil seem like some extra practice of personal piety, rather than a basic expectation of the church, historically founded and based on scripture and tradition.

Veiling is not a virtue. Actual virtues, such as patience, kindness, chastity, etc., are things that require sustained effort, and their inverses --impatience, hatred, and lust-- require sustained resistance and repentance. This is because our world is fallen and things of all kinds, natural and unnatural, attempt to provoke us to sin. Modesty, a virtue in its own right, is also difficult, especially for women. So much of what the world tells us is our worth, as women, is bound up in our appearance. It is genuinely difficult to stop idolizing your body.

But Christians do not veil out of modesty. The veil is not about modesty. The veil is about obedience and reverence. It is an exceedingly simple thing, made difficult by people who want praise for doing the bare minimum and influencers scraping the bottom of the barrel for content.

Whatever context you are in, you can veil in some proper way. Even if your society, your culture, your church, or the place where you just happen to be doesn't participate in it, you both can and should still do it. If I find myself in a society of bigamists, I do not transform into a bigamist, just as I will not stop wearing my veil just because the women around me are unveiled.

For context, I teach at a Catholic school. Every week, we go to Mass, and of course, I go as well. I don't participate Eucharistically, but I pray for my students and my coworkers. No one at this parish --much less in the school-- veils. Even students and teachers who veil on Sunday do not veil when we're at the school Mass. I still veil because I want to, and because no one cares that I do. Truly, no one ever cares about you as much as you think.

Once and a while, a student asks me, after Mass --never, ever during-- why I veil. Actually, they ask me why I "wear that thing on my head," and I answer honestly. I say, "because scripture tells me to, and I like to. It's what I'm used to, and it's a way I show reverence." It is never distracting or derailing to the school day, much less Mass itself.