Citizen Columns
Question
Why is female modesty important in your faith? Is it
more important for women to be modest than men and if so, why?
Answer
Modesty can be understood in two ways. First, there is that modesty that
surrounds ones body with a certain reserve about displaying it to others.
Related to this is what the Oxford Dictionary calls "an instinctive aversion
to impure or coarse suggestions". Secondly, there is that modesty which is
the antithesis of self-promotion and arrogance. It is that attractive
humility which recognizes that much of any success must be credited not only
to our own hard work, but to gifts we did not earn and to the gracious help
of others, especially God. Both these sorts of modesty have to do with
moderation in self-display, freedom from excess and exaggeration, and both
are valued by Orthodox Christians in men and women.
Your question focuses especially on female modesty. But today, women and men
are equally under attack if they seek to live a life of Christian modesty,
especially in regard to sexual display and behaviour. Until recently women
were much more protected from this struggle than they are now, but purity
has always been a spiritual battle. In the first century Christians and Jews
were well-known for their stand against the pervasive sexual permissiveness
of the ancient world. They considered themselves "aliens and exiles" who had
chosen to be led by God's will and not by their "human passions" (1 Peter
2:11, 4:2). Old friends would not understand, and there would be a social
price to pay. "Let the time that is past suffice for doing what the Gentiles
like to do, living in licentiousness, passions, drunkenness, revels,
carousing, and lawless idolatry. They are surprised that you do not now
join them in the same wild profligacy, and they abuse you" (1 Peter 4:3-5).
Then as now Christian modesty was counter-cultural, and demanded that men
and women draw a line between their old and new life.
Father John Jillions
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