"Do We Still Blush?"

“…but since we cannot suppress woman, let us corrupt her…”- letter between two leading freemasons, August 9, 1838.

Freemasons apparently understood that women are the moral compasses of society. The serpent knew this and approached Eve. Even Confucius said that woman is the moral root of society, and the culture will only grow in proportion to the moral strength of its women.

Mixed bathing was often viewed as a place of vanity and moral concern, as it allowed men and women to bathe together, which was considered inappropriate by many societal standards of the time. Mixed bathing was banned in ancient Rome under emperors Hadrian and Marcus Aurelius.

Women bathing outside, would wear sleeves, a skirt, and loose pantaloons below the knee.

Pope Leo XIII would state that some Freemasons “have plainly determined and proposed that, artfully and of set purpose, the multitude should be satiated with a boundless license of vice,

as when this had been done, it would easily come under their power and authority for any acts of daring.”

Humanum Genus Encyclical

She would appear on the 13th of the next five months and would later tell one of the children, Blessed Jacinta Marto, that “more souls go to Hell for sins of the flesh than for any other reason.” This innocent young child may not have fully realized what “sins of the flesh” meant, but the Baltimore Catechism teaches us that these sins fall under the Sixth and Ninth Commandments.

Our Lady of Fatima also said that certain fashions would be introduced “that will offend Our Lord very much.” Jacinta commented later that people who serve God should not follow current fashion trends. Jacinta also said that the Church has no fashions, and that “Our Lord is always the same.”

The next year, Pope Benedict XV expressed his shock that women would embrace the current fashion trends and styles of dancing. He wrote, “One cannot sufficiently deplore the blindness of so many women of every age and condition; made foolish by desire to please, they do not see to what a degree the indecency of their clothing shocks every honest man, and offends God. Most of them would formerly have blushed for those toilettes [outfits] as for a grave fault against Christian modesty;

now it does not suffice for them to exhibit them on the public thoroughfares; they do not fear to cross the threshold of the churches, to assist at the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, and even to bear the seducing food of shameful passions to the Eucharistic Table where one receives the heavenly Author of purity. And We speak not of those exotic and barbarous dances recently imported into fashionable circles, one more shocking than the other; one cannot imagine anything more suitable for banishing all the remains of modesty.” (Encyclical Letter Sacra Propediem, Jan. 6, 1921.)

“Religion does not fear the dagger’s point; but it can vanish under corruption. Let us not grow tired of corruption: we may use a pretext, such as sport, hygiene, health resorts. It is necessary to corrupt, that our boys and girls practice nudism in dress.

To avoid too much reaction, one would have to progress in a methodical manner: first, undress up to the elbow; then up to the knees; then arms and legs completely uncovered; later, the upper part of the chest, the shoulders, etc. etc.”

Detailed instructions on modesty of dress for women had been issued on September 24, 1928, by the Cardinal-Vicar (Vicar General) of Pope Pius XI in Rome, Basilio Cardinal Pompili:

“We recall that a dress cannot be called decent which is cut deeper than two fingers’ breadth under the pit of the throat, which does not cover the arms at least to the elbows, and scarcely reaches a bit beyond the knees. Furthermore, dresses of transparent material are improper.”

In a 1941 address to Catholic girls during World War II, he warned against adopting fashions once reserved for “women of doubtful virtue.”

“Numbers of believing and pious women… in accepting to follow certain bold fashions, break down, by their example, the resistance of many other women… Once these styles have been accepted by women of good reputation, decent women soon follow their example, and are carried along by the tide into possible disaster.”

Pius XII reminded women that if clothing led others into sin, they had a duty not to wear it, and he urged mothers to dress their children modestly.

“The good of our soul is more important than that of our body… If a certain kind of dress constitutes a grave and proximate occasion of sin… it is your duty to give it up.”

“O Christian mothers, if you knew what a future of anxieties and perils… you prepare for your sons and daughters, imprudently getting them accustomed to live scantily dressed… you would dread the harm you are making for yourselves and these children.”

None of the models would wear it in Paris at fashion runways. First to do it was Michelin Bernardini, who was nude dancer in Casino de Paris. 

Catholic countries: Portugal, Spain, Italy would ban it. “Two piece bathing suit which reveals everything about a girl except for her mother’s maiden name.”

That summer, Pope Pius XII said, “Now many girls do not see anything wrong with following certain shameless styles, like so many sheep. They would surely blush if they could only guess the impression they make and the feelings they arouse in those who see them.” (Allocution to Children of Mary Immaculate, July 17, 1954.)

Pope Pius XII recognized that women are the moral fiber of society, and he knew that the culture would implode if modesty were not put into practice. “Society reveals what it is by the clothes it wears,” Pius XII said on August 29, 1954. “… An unworthy, indecent mode of dress has prevailed” without any distinction of place, “on beaches, in country resorts, on the streets, etc. Vice necessarily follows upon public nudity…”