Body language

Christian Century, Jan 16, 2002 by Stephanie Paulsell

Joan Brumberg tells a story about the women's history classes she teaches. As they studied the lives of girls and women in the 19th century, her students, dressed comfortably in sweatshirts and jeans, lamented the constraining girdles and corsets worn by women of the previous century. As the conversation moved to contemporary life, however, the subject of pubic hair removal came up. This is necessary, her students insisted, so that you can feel confident at the beach. Brumberg was amazed that these young women, with all their freedoms, felt the need to "strictly police their bodies." The greater freedom to bare their bodies on the beach brought with it a set of anxieties that not only constrained but also created a market for more body products. "Progress for women," Brumberg notes, "is obviously filled with ambiguities."

Another kind of constraint, a serious violation of freedom relating to clothing, is the reality of sweatshop practices, including child labor, to make many of the clothes we wear. How and with what we adorn ourselves often has implications for the literal freedom of others. Horror stories crop up from time to time: new immigrants to the United States enslaved by those who provided their passage, and forced to sew around the clock; children in the Third World working long hours in the garment industry for almost no pay, making clothes destined for this country. Enslavement to the commodification of adornment makes this other, more terrible slavery possible. God intends for all of us to be free. The practice of honoring the body requires habits of adornment that make us vigilant about the effects our choices have on others.

"Is not life more than food and the body more than clothing?" Jesus asks in Matthew's Gospel. Like my mother, wishing me to be unencumbered enough to travel quickly and lightly toward the most important destinations, Jesus urges us toward freedom. "Why do you worry about clothing? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow; they neither toil nor spin, yet I tell you, even Solomon in all his glory was not clothed like one of these." Are your habits of adornment a burden or a pleasure, a source of anxiety or confidence? Do your clothes free you to be yourself, or do they constrain you by forcing you into an identity that, however fashionable, you would not have chosen? Did the production of your adornments constrain the freedom of another? These are questions that might guide us in our clothing and our adornment, to help us develop our own ideas of what is beautiful, and to allow the daily practice of getting dressed remind us that we are children of a God who desires our freedom.

Several years ago, having miscarried a cherished pregnancy on the day after Christmas, I found myself seemingly screwed to my bed with depression, unable to work, read or pray. I was, however, able to talk on the phone. Day after day I wore out my friends, especially my friend Kay. The year before, Kay had left behind job, salary and colleagues to spend a year in prayer and silence. Violating her dearly bought solitude again and again, I cried on the phone, "I am so depressed that I can't even pray. I try to pray, but I can't." A few days later, a package arrived from Kay. It contained a simple beige jumper and a note that read, "I have prayed in this dress every day for a year. You don't have to pray. Just wear it. It is full of prayers."