Discovering the Beauty of Veiling at Mass

The veil wasn’t something I exactly waltzed into (or under, rather). In fact, it took me nearly twenty years to be fully convinced of the beauty of veiling at Mass; twenty years to come to find peace and delight in bowing my head under the veil whenever in the Presence of my Eucharistic Lord.

I’ll be honest in that I started young enough in my reluctance towards it. After all, my younger sister was the one who dressed in bedsheets and serenely pretended she was a nun starting at the age of seven. On All Saints’ Day, she dressed up as St. Clare of Assisi (proudly holding a tin-foil monstrance to boot); I posed as a serenely bare-headed St. Agnes. Any more examples needed?

It seemed the perfectly plain and sensible thing to do in my eyes. As a young girl, I detested frills and never wore jewelry or eye-catching hair accessories. So to consider draping a piece of lace over my head during Mass? Cringe. Agony. Help. I always preferred my hair done in a simple ponytail, or, as I grew older, in a torrent of not-quite-tame curls. Obediently donning my First Communion Veil was probably as much as I could stand, and it didn’t change as I approached young womanhood. However, my sister never had a problem putting on a veil (aka a mantilla) from time to time, whenever the occasion required it. Her face would glow out from under the lace with pure, youthful piety; her little hands would fold in monastic content. She was a natural. Beside her, I felt scratchy, hot, woefully self-conscious and silly. Nope, not quite that same glow. Nope, not a natural.

As I grew older, though, doubts and self-consciousness began to slowly niggle away at my stomach any time the word “mantilla” or “veil” was spoken in my presence, or any time I caught sight of one being worn. My father would, from time to time, gently encourage me to wear one, explaining what a beautifully feminine and reverent thing it was to do. I would try to resolve to, but my fear of it would quickly take the reins and somehow I’d escape from the onerous task.

Yet it was as if the mere sight of a veil worn by women at Mass was a hurled gauntlet, a challenge that my own position of not wearing one should be addressed and explained. It was certainly never posed to me this way, and yet it always aroused a strange defensiveness in me.

That’s how I developed my Litany of the Non-Mantilla Wearer.

I’ll be a distraction.
I’ll be distracted.
I’ll make people think I’m trying to be extra holy. That wouldn’t be good.
Why is my hair more distracting than a piece of lace would be, anyway?
I cantor. I’ll be a spectacle if I wear a mantilla while I’m cantoring.
Isn’t this just something old-fashioned that I don’t have to worry about?

On and on, my list went. Only, instead of Have mercy on us, I repeated, That’s why I don’t wear one. Very inspiring indeed. No doubt that will tip the scales for my canonization.

To be clear, growing up, I wasn’t placed under continual pressure to veil my head at all. My family had, at that point, always attended the Novus Ordo Mass, where the appearance of mantillas and/or veils wasn’t very common. I wasn’t subject to zealous speeches from well-meaning traditional Catholics on the importance of girls and women veiling in the sanctuary. In fact, I really didn’t know what it meant to wear a veil at all—only that it was of old Church tradition, that devout elderly ladies sometimes do it now, and that I knew it would be acutely embarrassing for me to have to do likewise. The old cringe, agony, help routine.

Thus I arrived at the threshold of my twenties. At this point, my two younger sisters had quietly slipped into the practice of veiling their heads during every Mass and Eucharistic Adoration hour. Inwardly, I admired them. Nothing like having devout sisters. They were certainly one of a very few at our parish and weren’t afraid of being asked what they were wearing on our heads (from a distance, someone initially thought my sister had dyed her hair. That made for an interesting conversation.).

Yet I continued to recite with flushed and anxious fervency my private Litany of the Non-Mantilla Wearer. I did, after all, serve as a regular Mass cantor, and wearing a veil at the ambo surely just wouldn’t do. That’s why I don’t wear one. Amen.

But then everything changed.

My family and I began our love story with the Latin Mass (where, I reasoned with a burst of generous pragmatism, I would wear a veil since every other woman and girl would probably be doing the same), but before we began regularly attending it, one small thing happened that swept the rug out from under my feet and snatched my Non-Mantilla Wearer Litany out of my nervous hands forever.

I was on a certain Catholic Instagram account, indulging in a relaxing browse with no special object in mind, when a particular snapshot blossomed before my face. It was a selfie of a mother and daughter, both shrouded in beautiful veils. Their faces were calm and sweet under the lace. They radiated reverence and femininity.

I stared.

In retrospect, I can only attribute this moment to the mercifully stubborn, years-long working of the Holy Ghost, because within ten seconds of seeing this picture, I knew I would veil my head at Mass from then on out. Simple. Sudden. A switch being calmly and permanently flipped in my soul. It was no longer about lace; it wasn’t about itchiness or self-consciousness; it wasn’t about looking pious or making a fuss; it had nothing to do with agony and I had no need to cringe. It was simply . . . what I must do.

I promptly went and ordered a veil online, and only afterwards did the investigating to confirm why it was I’d changed my mind (or, better put, finally allowed it to be changed for me). To my delight, I discovered profound and moving significance beneath the act of a Catholic woman veiling, and it filled my heart with addictive enthusiasm and rippling peace. One of my main reading sources was VeilsByLily.com, whose FAQ page proclaims:

The veil is a visual sermon, … a public proclamation before the Lord that He IS the Lord and that we love Him and that we are ready to obey him. It’s a totally counter-cultural statement proclaiming obedience in the midst of a culture that is totally permeated with this attitude of ‘I will not serve.’
The veil is a sign of the great dignity inherent to a woman, who has the potential to receive life within herself… both human life and the supernatural life of God. This is an important message the world needs to hear, now more than ever!

If only I had taken the time to wonder why the mantilla existed in the first place. If only I had opened my heart more, instead of hiding behind my preconceived notions, embarrassment and fear. If I had done so, I wouldn’t have missed out on the years I could have spent rejoicing in and benefiting from a practice that, instead of frumpy and outdated, now seemed full of spiritual beauty, reverence and import!

The practice of a Catholic woman veiling her head whenever in the presence of the Eucharist certainly doesn’t stem from “suppression of women” or “patriarchy” as  some would insist. Rather, the beautiful purpose of veiling springs from an awed recognition–both by men and women–of the woman’s own dignity, both as an individual, and as an image of Christ’s Bride, the Church.

As it has been pointed out many times by many people wiser than I, the sacred should always be veiled, whether it’s the Holy of Holies, the Tabernacle, or the human body. A woman who wears a veil in the Sanctuary rejoices at the sacredness of God’s creation that is woman; and she also represents the submissiveness of the Church to her Bridegroom—Our Lord Jesus Christ.

But above all, when she veils her head, she effaces herself and instead becomes a visible sign that the Lord of Heaven dwells Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity in the Eucharist, and that we are in the courts of the Divine King whenever we step into His sanctuary.

These discoveries left me reeling, and well as wondering why in Heaven’s name had I come up with a litany of reasons not to do this? No wonder veiling left girls and women radiant! Thus, after years of resistance, I surrendered and resolved to wear the veil. And in many ways I knew it wouldn’t be a difficult transition, now that we would be attending Latin Mass where veils were much more common. And yet (that inevitable phrase that always comes when a faulty human resolves to do something . . .) I knew that I had to veil for the truth behind veiling—I had to do it for Christ alone. And since Our Lord was certainly as fully present in the Eucharist when I attended the Novus Ordo Mass, it surely meant I should be veiling there as well as at the Latin Mass . . .  even if I was cantoring, as I was scheduled to do that very weekend (we were phasing out, as it were, from our commitments to our Novus Ordo parish, so I still had several weeks’ worth of cantoring left before we would be solely attending the Extraordinary Form).

I admit there were a few moments needed to gather my resolve that Saturday evening. I repeatedly pushed away straggling lines of the Litany of the Non-Mantilla Wearer and instead begged for grace (after asking my family to pray for me as well . . . they knew I needed it!). I pinned on my veil, and entered into the sanctuary.

I’ll be a distraction.
I’ll be distracted . . .

But even as they rumbled to life in my head, the words abruptly faded. I moved my eyes to the Tabernacle—and that was enough for me. He was enough for me; and He has been ever since.

Now, thanks be to God, it’s second nature; I honestly feel naked without the mantilla if I am in the sanctuary and in His Real Presence. In my heart, I feel convinced it is truly right and just for me to hide, to efface myself, to bow down before him under the veil, to be a small witness to His Eucharistic Majesty. Despite all my weaknesses and vanities (and there are a whole lot of those!) I know I will never walk into His Presence without it, as long as it is in my power to do so.

The mantilla has reminded my heart of Who Christ Is, and that He is worthy of my adoration, of my humbling myself even a little under the veil. It is not a matter of feminine inferiority to men, but rather of my inferiority to God; and in the light of thousands of years of holy tradition having asked Woman, with her matchless beauty, mystery and inherent sacredness, to veil before the Source of her beauty and mystery–who am I to dispute that?

After all, if He has effaced Himself under the appearance of the Host . . . then what is a small piece of lace over my hair in comparison?