Modesty

It is Wednesday, November 24th, 2021, the day before Thanksgiving. For over two weeks, the news media have been obsessed with two current criminal trials, one about the killing of black jogger Ahmaud Arbery (See NOTE 1, below), and the other involving white teenage shooter Kyle Rittenhouse. (See NOTE 2, below.)

I'm trying to draw a parellel here. If you already know all about the killing of Ahmaud Arbery and shooter Kyle Rittenhouse, you can skip all that by clicking here. If not, read on!

In neither case are the basic facts in dispute, namely, that the defendants, who initially were safe and secure in their respective houses, voluntarily took up arms, left their homes, and created or exacerbated situations elsewhere that really didn't concern them, resulting in their shooting and killing the decedents. If they had minded their own business, none of the relevant events would have taken place and the victims would in all likelihood still be alive.

The defense in both cases was that, having interjected themselves into volatile situations which otherwise would not have involved them at all, they found themselves, so they claimed, in fear for their lives. This supposedly justified the use of the deadly weapons which they had the foresight to bring along with them just in case somebody "needed shootin'." Other facts brought up in the news, but not necessarily introduced in evidence at trial, seemed to suggest that the decedents somehow deserved to die. Nobody on either defense team actually stated publicly that the defendants were performing a valuable public service by killing them, but the implications were definitely there.

Ahmaud Arbery was a black jogger who regularly ran past Gregory McMichaels' property. He had been seen at a local construction site looking around, but not doing anything illegal. Travis McMichael, who assumed that was somehow incriminating enough to justify the use of deadly force to conduct a "citizen's arrest," killed unarmed Mr. Arbery by shooting him (twice) with a shotgun at point blank range. According to his motion for bond, he is a white, 35 year old, unmarried high school graduate and father of a three year old boy, Everett. He has lived with his parents prior to his pretrial detention except for nine years in the US Coast Guard, during which he rose to the rating of Petty Officer Third Class. His law enforcement and criminal justice training relates to vessel searches, criminal investigations, arrest powers, and protecting himself and others from hostile threats at sea.

The motion for bond of his father, Gregory McMichael, lists his father's curriculum vitae as well. He reportedly is 64 years old, was a Glynn County Police Department officer from 1982 to 1989 and worked as an investigator for the Brunswick Judicial Circuit District Attorney's Office from 1995 until his retirement in May 2019. One would assume that at some time in his career he was exposed to the provisions of Georgia law regarding when, under what circumstances, how, and, especially, if somebody surmised to have possibly committed a misdemeanor some time in the past should be pursued and arrested, without a warrant, using deadly force, and murdered if he tried to flee. As the father, he might have had an obligation, especially while involved in chasing the suspect, to have passed this information on to his son.

Both might have profited from the Gospel for November 8th, when both trials had begun,

Then said he [Jesus] unto the disciples, "It is impossible but that offenses will come: but woe unto him, through whom they come!
It were better for him that a millstone were hanged about his neck, and he cast into the sea, than that he should offend one of these little ones." (Luke 17:1-2)

NOTE 1: Travis McMichael was convicted on all counts: malice murder, two counts of aggravated assault, one count of false imprisonment and one count of criminal attempt to commit a felony. The malice murders constitute four counts of felony murder, with which he was charged. That applies "when one who has no plans to kill intentionally commits another felony and a person dies as a result." His father Gregory was convicted of all counts except the malice murder.

William "Roddie" Bryan, an accomplice neighbor, provided the convincing photographic evidence of the entire crime that convicted all three. He was acquitted of malice murder and one count of aggravated assault, which automatically acquitted him of one count of felony murder as well. He was convicted of the other charges in a state court. The three were sentenced to life in prison. Bryan will be eligible for parole after 30 years.

On February 22, 2022, the McMichaels were found guilty of all federal charges: using force and threats of force to intimidate and interfere with Arbery's right to use a public street because of his race (18 U.S.C. 245), attempted kidnapping (18 U.S.C. 1201), and using a firearm during a crime of violence (18 U.S.C. 924). Bryan was found guilty of all but the weapons charge. The jury of eight white people, three black people and one Hispanic person took a little over three hours to reach its verdict. The federal sentences were essentially the same as the state ones. The conviction was unsuccessfully appealed on the assertion that the street where Mr. Arbery was murdered was not a public place, and that absence of proof that Greg McMicheal was a racist during his police career should somehow mitigate his conviction as a private citizen for threatening to shoot somebody who was merely exercising his civil rights to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness specifically because he was black. Barring a successful appeal, the trio will remain in prison for the rest of their lives anyway, except that Mr. Bryan might be eligible for parole.

Given his employment experience as a police officer, the elder McMichael might have an especially hard time in prison. He and his son requested to be incarcerated in federal prison, which is supposedly better run and more safe, because they feared that a fellow prisoner might murder them for who (or perhaps what color) they are or what they did on the "outside," even without subsequently doing anything wrong. The federal judge was not persuaded by the argument, and remanded all three to the state correctional system. Each of the two McMichaels may well eventually decide that it would have been "better for him that a millstone were hanged about his neck, and he cast into the sea!"

Kyle Rittenhouse is a "little one," or at least was when he shot and killed two people. He might eventually have felt the same way. In his case, he left his home in Antioch, Illinois, with a rifle he got from his friend Dominick Black, to attend an ongoing riot in Kenosha, Wisconsin. His stated purpose was allegedly to protect a car dealership from being vandalized and to provide medical aid, in spite of the fact that he was not professionally or educationally qualified to do either. The facts of the case appear to indicate that he basically caused the altercations in which he killed two people and grievously wounded a third. That's why children shouldn't have guns! "Self defense" doesn't apply if the danger was caused by the defendant. Young Mr. Rittenhouse seemed to have been the sole source through whom the deaths and injury in this case occurred.

NOTE 2: The jury disagreed, however. On November 19th, Kyle Rittenhouse was found "not guilty" on all counts.

Our preacher took the Gospel for November 8th about causing "one of these little ones to sin" as an opportunity to twist the subject around to his personal obsession with women dressing "scandalously" and "causing" (presumably adult) men to have what he called "bad thoughts." Frankly, I was kind of shocked! I didn't see any relevance between the "little ones" that Jesus was talking about and filthy-minded lecherous adult perverts that seemed to be the subject of the preacher's tirade. Thinking is a very personal, individual and private activity. Any man who has "bad thoughts" should think about something else!

In place of "bad thoughts," a pious man might well give some consideration to Scripture, possibly about how our relationship with women makes us an image of God, the assertion that they were specifically created to be helpers for us, without whom it is not good for us to be alone, the very bone of our bones and flesh of our flesh. One might also consider how beautiful they are, what great goodness must have designed and created them so. Like us, they have been made a little lower than the angels, and are fearfully and wonderfully made to conceive, bear, nourish, nurture, teach, guide, and care for us, and every other human being, all our lives! He might possibly find some inspiration in the exploits of Deborah, Esther, Hannah, Huldah, Susannah, Yael, and the Blessed Mother and other women in the Bible. Perhaps he might consider what a tremendous blessing it is to be appointed by Almighty God to be the defenders, providers and protectors of such marvelous and fascinating creatures, by whose love, dedication, sacrifice, labor and pain we become fathers and patriarchs!

It might also be appropriate to think about whether an attitude of judgment or love (Matthew 5:43-46, 7:1 and following, Matthew 19:19 and 22:39; Mark 12:31-33; Luke 6:27, 32, 35 and 10:27; John 13:34-5 and 15:12, 17; Romans 12:9-10 and 13:8-10; Galatians 5:6 and 13-14; Ephesians 4:2 and 5:2; Philippians 1:9; 1 Thessalonians 3:12 and 5:8; Hebrews 10:24-25 and 13:1; James 2:8; 1 Peter 1:22 and 3:8; 1 John 3:11, 18, 23, 4:7-8, 11-12, 20 and II John 1:5) is an appropriate response of a righteous man toward his neighbor, regardless of how she chooses to dress, or where.

I thought we had stopped blaming women for male sexual perversion long ago. Maybe not. It seems to me that the person with "bad thoughts" is doing the same things young Mr. Rittenhouse and the McMichaels did, blaming someone who is simply minding her own business, exercising her civil rights, for evils for which the person assigning blame is totally responsible.

It appears to me that this is primarily a biological and cultural issue. After all, the Bible says that our maleness and femaleness is how we resemble God. Biologically, physical attraction between men and woman encourages the responsible making of babies, which seems to me to be it's desirable purpose. In cultures where women can do pretty much as they please, such as Hollywood, California, women get to choose for themselves the manner, circumstances and degree to which they endeavor to attract the attention of sexually mature men or not. In repressive cultures, such as in the Middle East, the men get to decide that, and to assault, rape, mutilate, torture and murder women who don't comply. There is an obvious, and very strong, correlation between the repressiveness of the culture and the means and extent to which women in that culture are forced to cover themselves in public.

The fact is, exhibiting their attractiveness in various ways, including nudity, to attract the sexual attention of potential fathers of their children is one of the things that women do instinctively; it's part of their nature. Women have an "unalienable right" to wear, or not wear, anything they wish to attract men, anywhere, as long as they are not violating any applicable law. Such a law, if there is one, should be established by women, "deriving its just power from the consent of the governed," just like it says in the Declaration of Independence!

This right is one of those "endowed by their Creator." The more potential sexual partners a woman can attract, the more options she has to select the most appropriate fathers for her children, and the more likely it is that the selected man will remain faithful to help raise them. In this way, women instinctively insure the existence and survival of their children and the continuation of human evolution. It's healthy, normal, natural and fun! Like every social activity, its effectiveness improves with training and practice. To deprive any woman of this basic biological activity, by whatever means, is to interfere with the mandate of Almighty God, frustrate its basic purpose, restrict it to partners already available or chosen for her, limit her absolute freedom of rational selection in humanity's most fundamental vocation and reduces human romantic activity to the level of animal husbandry!

Evidence for this truth includes the well-known disability of men in societies that repress the sexual freedom of women to act civilly and rationally with anyone, including each other, their neighbors, and the world at large.

Rational control of their natural, healthy, built-in response to female attractiveness is a moral duty imposed upon male humans by reason of their nature. The men who freely choose, for whatever reason, not to accept this responsibility and instead consider their own intrinsic inclination toward contribution to the perpetuation of the human species to be bad, evil, immoral or sinful are free to shut themselves up in their cloisters, avoid women entirely, and perhaps find interest in activities with other men!

Actually engaging in procreation activities is a loving, wholesome and culturally necessary activity. It requires the willing cooperation of both parties, among other things, to be morally commendable, but the desire to do so is no more lust than sitting down to a full meal after a hard day's work is gluttony. getting a good night's sleep afterward is sloth, working hard to get a better job is envy, or doing the job in the first place to make money is greed!

One wonders where we should draw the line. The Taliban require their women in public to dress in little tents with a screen to allow them at least partially to see out, but nobody to see in, so their men wouldn't get "tempted" beyond their feeble, poorly exercised power of moral restraint! The ladies tend to get hit by cars and military vehicles (driven by men) a lot, though, because they can't see or, in some cases, even hear them. Maybe the Taliban men ought leave the women alone and concentrate on resolving their own legendary moral depravity.

My line is to follow the local rules, but sometimes I don't understand what they are, or who has attempted to impose them. The idea that a religious, political or any other group of individuals should have the authority or the ability to determine how other people should behave based on what that particular group believes is moral or appropriate seems to me to be incompatible with logic and common sense, and certainly with the fundamentals of a democratic, heterogeneous society. The proof is that it causes social catastrophes like wars and the Reformation. Body anxiety does not appear to be conducive to human happiness or any other benefit, whether it is self-assumed or imposed by others.

I had an attractive teenage friend who might best be described as "voluptuous." Like me, she was propagandized by our clergy to believe that her natural physical attractiveness was somehow immoral, evil and shameful. Perhaps as result, she habitually came to school dressed as a business professional in suits and high heels while the other girls were wearing poodle skirts and saddle shoes. Fortunately, she moved to Australia, where public nudity is specifically permitted in prescribed areas by law, to a home near such a prescribed area, a "nude beach." There, she has been able, by taking a morning dip in the ocean before dressing for work, to rid herself of the unnatural burden of body anxiety shamefully imposed by male church representatives who irresponsibly abused their religious authority during her formative years.

One day, she encountered a group of fully clothed people standing in the surf, apparently engaged in a baptism ceremony. To avoid offending them, she charitably turned around and went back home, foregoing her morning swim. I think she did the right thing, but I suspect evil motives of the baptists, to say no more. Australia has over 37,000 miles of coastline, about half again as long as the circumference of the Earth, only a small part of it clearly posted "clothing optional" areas. The probability that they accidentally chose one that any rational person would recognize as a controversial place for people known to be offended by nudity to hold a religious ceremony is vanishingly small. Whether they intended to or not, they were interfering with my friend's civil rights. Shame on them!

Of course, I believe that we should all respect the fact that other people have irrational fears and try reasonably not to frighten or provoke them, as an act of charity to the emotionally handicapped, if nothing else. It seems logical to enact laws that impose appropriate fines reasonably to regulate public display of anything that is likely to terrify large numbers of them, whatever it might be. But too many societies have gone way too far! Savagely beating to death a woman minding her own business, such as Iranian Kurd Mahsa Amini, or Persian teenager Armita Geravand for not "covering their hair properly," as just two examples, is just plain WRONG, no matter who does it or from what motive. I think that it is a sign of respect for the works of our Creator for their Persian sisters to find ways safely to protest that will make the depraved, degenerate perverts grind their teeth in frustrated, helpless fury! Like this, for example!

Our preacher was probably talking about modesty rather than scandal. Modesty is associated in Catholic teaching with the commandment against coveting one's neighbor's wife, which is based on Exodus 20:17. My dictionary defines "scandal" as "actions or events regarded as morally or legally wrong and causing general public outrage, the outrage or anger caused by such action or event, or rumor or malicious gossip about them." I wonder if our preacher actually felt that somebody's clothing was so morally or legally reprehensible that it actually caused public outrage or anger. ("Controversy," "discussion," "prurient interest" or "private lust," possibly. "Outrage" or "anger?" I don't think so!) I watch the news a lot, and I didn't hear about it. I am still confused about what the concept of "little ones" has to do with exclusively adult kinds of sins.

From a moral point of view, the Catholic Church sees scandal as an attitude or behavior which leads another to do evil (of any kind, not just sexual). The person who gives scandal becomes his neighbor's tempter, damaging virtue and integrity. It is a violation of the commandment that forbids causing the death of another, in this case spiritual death, based on Exodus 20:13 and Deuteronomy 5:17. Gregory McMichael's attitude and behavior certainly led his son Travis to commit the evils of threatening and killing Mr. Arbery. Their actions definitely provoked public anger and outrage as well.

One might give scandal by enticing others to do things that cause them to have "bad thoughts," about murdering somebody, interfering with his or her lawful rights, or using a dangerous weapon to threaten to do these things. Such thoughts are the creation of the thinker, rather than whatever it is he's thinking about. One could conceivably give scandal by convincing a susceptible teenager that healthy sexual attraction is sinful, thus leading him to commit a sin if he considers asking a pretty girl for a date. I tend to get scandalized by clergy who use the pulpit and worship services to promote their own, and often controversial, personal and political opinions, such as, for example, that a Catholic cannot vote for someone who believes differently than he does, but I'm having to get used to that lately!

I'm assuming that "bad thoughts" associated with the way women dress are those associated with perversion of the healthy, affectionate, loving and respectful relationship that should exist between all men and women, given that our maleness and femaleness is precisely how we are made in the image of God. (Genesis 1:27 - Look it up!)

Justification for condemnation of women for the sins of men is difficult (!) to find in Christian Scripture, and has nothing whatever to do with "little ones." Jesus NEVER suggested that "whoever looks at a woman to lust after her has been forced by her to make him commit adultery in his heart!" (Matthew 5:28). He also NEVER maintained that "if thy right eye offend thee, beat up or kill whomever thou art watching!" (Matthew 5:29, 18:9 and Mark 9:47). Catholics are taught that modesty "guides how one looks at others and behaves toward them." This appears to impose a duty on Catholic men, such as, for example, our exclusively male clergy, not to blame their prurient interests on other people who may not even know they are involved, but to practice self-control and modesty in their own thoughts and words, what they do, and what they fail to do, through their own most grievous fault!

Other religious have different standards. Sura Al-Noor, in the Koran, for example requires that "believing women" "not reveal any parts of their bodies, except that which is necessary" in the presence of other than family members. In the case of 22-year old Kurdish Mahsa Amini, who died two days after she was arrested by the Iranian "morality police" for "unnecessarily exposing" some of her hair in public. The police claimed that she died from preexisting causes, but she was apparently healthy, and the brain injuries she sustained are consistent with having been savagely beaten to death. The arrest and murder were supposedly justified in a BBC interview by a morality police officer who claimed that "They told us the reason we are working for the morality police units is to protect women, because if they do not dress properly, then men could get provoked and harm them." I wonder if our Christian preacher espouses similar reasoning. "Protecting" women by beating them to death does not appear to me to be a Christian concept. Maybe our preacher would feel more at home as an imam! What do you think?

We have ears on both sides of our heads, so we can't help hearing what is around us, such as lying, slander, blasphemy, false prophesy and the like. On the other hand, we have eyes on only the front of our heads, pointed in the same direction, and movable within a wide arc away from the direction of things we don't want to see. In addition, we have eyelids to cover them, neck muscles to turn the head, and the ability to turn our whole bodies if the neck isn't doing the job. As an emergency measure, we can put our hands over our eyes! Anyone who sees something he shouldn't is looking at it! He's doing the same thing the McMichaels did; deliberately getting involved in something that is none of his business, creating a sinful situation by doing something intrinsically immoral, and then blaming somebody else for it! Shame on him! What did Jesus say about hypocrites?

Perfumes and colognes worn mostly by women are advertised and intended to appeal to the sexual responses of adult men. Unlike visible sources of sexual stimulation that can be always observed and recognized, and thus avoided, the arousing effect of scent is conducted by the recipient's olfactory pathways directly to the brain. It is unmediated by intelligence. This makes it impossible for healthy men to be unaffected by, and sometimes even to be aware of, them. (Children are attracted by sweet and fruity scents.) Our preacher didn't talk about these sources of "bad thoughts" at all! I wonder why?

The priests at my all male high school used to warn us about the possibility of girls sending us all to hell by "causing" us to have "bad thoughts!" They included such paragons of virtue as William Wiebler, Lawrence Soens and other child molesting priests who eventually bankrupted the Catholic Diocese of Davenport, Iowa with the court-imposed damages it had to pay to their victims. My considered opinion is that they were probably not the most reliable authorities about what causes "bad thoughts," or why, or, indeed, even whether, they might be "bad."

Although modern women have more options for elective functions than at any other time in history, their basic biological function has always been, and continues to be, being the bearers and nurturers of the children of our species. Women, rather than men, are the divinely designated custodians and nurturers of human life. Men, in turn, are the designated guardians and protectors of women and their children, by violence and bloodshed, if necessary. The history of mankind is conclusive proof that is it the men who overwhelmingly exhibit this characteristic also as warriors, cutthroats and murderers! Given the huge investment necessary for their creative activity, and the difficulty mothers are consequently likely to experience hunting and gathering for themselves and their children, it is not surprising that they cannot even conceive children unless a man is involved. The father's natural function is to provide for the needs of the mother and the children, not dictate what they are. The biological imperative to do that is the natural and healthy emotional and physical attraction he certainly should feel toward the object of his affection which, hopefully, blossoms into the one commandment of Christianity, to love one another.

For this cause shall a man leave his father and mother, and cleave to his wife; And they twain shall be one flesh: so then they are no more twain, but one flesh. What therefore God hath joined together, let not man put asunder. (Mark 10:7-9, Ephesians%205:31)

Our preacher should know that! He is a married man with children and grandchildren of his own.

I maintain that our sacred duty, as responsible men, is first of all to love women as ourselves, not to blame them for our own emotional and sexual shortcomings. That requires that we lovingly appreciate them for what they are, exciting co-creators in the generation of our young, our partners and coworkers, our mothers and the mothers of our children, and the sole and absolute custodians of our unborn. They are also the helpmates Almighty God has given to us to assist us in our masculine quest for salvation. We have a sacred obligation uncompromisingly to defend the rights, privileges, duties and responsibilities to which this lofty identity, conferred directly by Almighty God, rightly entitles them.

It also requires that we recognize and respect their unique prerogatives and authority in this regard. We have a sacred obligation to treat them tenderly as vulnerable fellow human beings of equal dignity and worth, not as agents of sin or slaves or cattle or commodities to be managed, traded or controlled. Men have been blaming, abusing, exploiting and assaulting women, and even murdering them, even those they profess to love, for all of human history, so it must be a sin remarkably easy to rationalize. That doesn't make it one bit less reprehensible!

If we try to justify ourselves with some apparently rational excuse, we might avoid public censure, as Mr. Rittenhouse did, but we will nonetheless be as contemptibly guilty as the McMichaels!

John Lindorfer