The Virgin Mary Loves Burqas

And now, the latest in silly debates, brought to you courtesy of France. France recently took a bold step that our politically-correct powers-that-be are only just having to deal with. The French authorities banned the wearing of the burqa, chador, or any other Islamic garb which covers a female's face so as to make it invisible to others or which indicates a "hostile or belligerent" attitude toward secular government or other religions.

Here in the good old USA, we are only now having to come to terms with the genuine dichotomy between freedom and security which the burqa et al aggravate. RealID acts require a photo ID, and a burqa could (and has) obscured the face of many beautiful women, not to mention the beautiful faces of several male terrorists as they tried to skitter away from our military before being captured. Several states have already denied driver's licenses to women who refuse to remove the facial covering, flying in the face of federal touchy-feely guidelines. Who's driving that car--the Phantom? It has long been a rule that masks (and these items are most certainly masks) are forbidden to be worn in public except for "celebratory purposes" such as Halloween, and still must be removed at the lawful request of a peace officer.

So--what's the debate in France? Well, a major well-publicized figure who supports the wearing of the Burqa has announced that the Blessed Mother Mary would disapprove of banning of the strict Islamic garb. As a Lutheran, I very much revere the Virgin Mary, but I had to speak to my devout Catholic friends to see if this sounded as bogus to them as it did to me. After all, we rejected the Marian Doctrine about six hundred years ago, so I'm no expert.

On BBC (perhaps French TV wasn't entirely safe), Chrystelle Khedrouche, who is a 36 year-old French convert to Islam declared: "When God (Allah?) ordered that women be veiled we know that they were already veiled. Look at the mother of Jesus, Mary, she wore a veil and I have never seen an image of her where she is not veiled (uh, see accompanying image). So we know that women were veiled at that time, and if God ordered that women be veiled, it was to add something more to what there was already." I don't get the last part, but why quibble?

My best understanding of both the Bible and the Koran tells me that both books tell women to be "modest." Some reasonable interpretations of Islam which I have seen over the years, suggest that a veil would be a good way to preserve that modesty, but the Islamic scholars I've read unanimously agree that the Koran itself does not say that women must cover their entire heads and faces save only for a slit to keep from running into lamp-posts or falling into sewers.

As one wag has said [seriously] in jest, "Since Muslims also believe that Mary is the sister of Aaron and entirely confused about the body-double who replaced her Son on the cross, perhaps Chrystelle is now re-inventing Mary as an ardent supporter of Shari'a as well." Mary, Mary, quite contrary, how do your veils grow?

Khedrouche says "I'm not so surprised because the French like the idea of everyone being of the same mould and that mould must be ideal. Everything that is not part of their French ideal model doesn't suit them." OK, I'll drink to that, but how did the Virgin Mary get involved in French haute couture? Even French Catholics are known for being somewhat "loose" in their definition of modesty, so I don't see them as the well source that brought on this sudden and horrific attack on Muslim fashion. Furthermore, the French are about as irreligious as any people in Europe, making the Germans and Italians look like regular church-goers.

Her ire is not just aimed at the French infidels, though. Mary apparently doesn't much like Muslim women who merely cover their heads and still dare to show their hair or opt to show their full heads and wear no veil at all. Mary wouldn't like that because "that is not part of our religion. I find it very difficult becuse we know that the wives of the prophet were dressed like this (demonstrating her eyes and not much more), they were fully covered." Does that mean that Mary was one of the prophet's wives? If so, she must have been getting up there in years.

Now I gotta say that as a Protestant Christian I find this all a little hinky and a lot offensive. For those of you who are doing your Rosary while reading this article, I assume it is the same, only more so. Right? But if this debate is going on over French dress prohibitions, can Gary, Indiana be far behind? This is going to get messy, ladies and gentlemen, so I strongly recommend we all take a deep breath, consider the humility, forbearance and suffering of the Virgin Mary, and fight like crusaders to keep cuckoos like Khedrouche from determining what our respective religions and denominations say and believe, and by extension, what they will convince the legions of the politically-correct in the government to believe.