Aesthetically retarded
The Catholic school at which my wife teaches is thinking of abandoning plaid on the school uniforms. Plaid is to parochial schools as peanut butter is to jelly. And plaid has deep roots in our culture, spanning back hundreds of years to our northern European ancestors.
What? You don't have any northern European ancestors? Well, first, my condolences. Past that, plaid has been passed into your legitimate American cultural heritage, the same as Auld Lang Syne, Christmas trees, Halloween, and bagpipes at police and firemen's funerals.
Plaid is more than a design, its particularities express our group loyalties, espcially in a non-plaid culture, as we now find ourselves. It runs in the same herd as crests, which show to which family we belong, which school, trade, etc.
Abandoning plaid is sorrowful. The school in question could even be called orthodox theologically, but aesthetically, it is runs by cavewomen. Or cavenuns? Hmm.
Aesthetics get a bum rap from the modern crowd, even the orthodox and conservative. They fail to understand that aesthetics is the first defense to fall between civilization and chaos. Now, while it may not be philosophically or morally binding, a lapse in aesthetics can show deep spiritual or rational problems.
Consider altar girls. While this practice does not break canon law, it certainly defies 2,000 years of church history. Acolytes (now altar boys) used to be men on the road to priesthood; they then advances through various levels including deacon, unto priest. So, while, acolettes do not break the letter of the law, a la ordainment of females, the spirit is infracted. The system we use has been bastardized, where now the previous "ground floor" of ordination has been sacrificed to modernism. Mark my words: eventually, modernists will use acolettes as a stepping stone to push female priests and deacons.
Thankfully, the Chair of Peter will never take such a step, blessed as it is with doctrinal infallibility. But the battle will come, and it will be painful; it is presaged by the death of plaid.
What? You don't have any northern European ancestors? Well, first, my condolences. Past that, plaid has been passed into your legitimate American cultural heritage, the same as Auld Lang Syne, Christmas trees, Halloween, and bagpipes at police and firemen's funerals.
Plaid is more than a design, its particularities express our group loyalties, espcially in a non-plaid culture, as we now find ourselves. It runs in the same herd as crests, which show to which family we belong, which school, trade, etc.
Abandoning plaid is sorrowful. The school in question could even be called orthodox theologically, but aesthetically, it is runs by cavewomen. Or cavenuns? Hmm.
Aesthetics get a bum rap from the modern crowd, even the orthodox and conservative. They fail to understand that aesthetics is the first defense to fall between civilization and chaos. Now, while it may not be philosophically or morally binding, a lapse in aesthetics can show deep spiritual or rational problems.
Consider altar girls. While this practice does not break canon law, it certainly defies 2,000 years of church history. Acolytes (now altar boys) used to be men on the road to priesthood; they then advances through various levels including deacon, unto priest. So, while, acolettes do not break the letter of the law, a la ordainment of females, the spirit is infracted. The system we use has been bastardized, where now the previous "ground floor" of ordination has been sacrificed to modernism. Mark my words: eventually, modernists will use acolettes as a stepping stone to push female priests and deacons.
Thankfully, the Chair of Peter will never take such a step, blessed as it is with doctrinal infallibility. But the battle will come, and it will be painful; it is presaged by the death of plaid.
posted by Guy Haraldsson | Friday, January 30, 2004
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