Wearing Hoods In Church?

[Crispy]

I have a question about wearing hoods in church. I have been taught that women can (or should?) cover their heads in church. I have also been taught that men should not wear hats in church. I know that Paul mentions this in one of his letters, but is there any other reason for this tradition?

And what about hoods? Are they the same as hats? I ask this because I have seen religious from various orders (bendictine, franciscan, dominican) wear their cowls up when praying. I have no reason to believe that they were doing something wrong, I think they were allowed to do it. They were wearing them during personal prayer time, but I don't know if this is an important distinction.

I have found times when I was in a chapel praying on my own and it was cold. Is it wrong to wear a hood in a church because I'm cold? Is it wrong to wear one for the same reason as religious?

[Thy Geekdom Come]

I'm not certain of all the answers to your questions, but I can tell you that my [i]opinion[/i] is that the Lord doesn't want you to remove your hood if you're cold any more than He would have wanted Moses to remove his sandals if the holy ground had been made out of hot coals. The conditions regarding attire and hats, veils, etc., have nothing to do with climate control.

God bless,

Micah

[Aloysius]

St. Thomaas Aquinas's commentary on 1 Corinthians 11.

[quote]1 Cor. 11:4-7 Any man who prays or prophesies with his head covered dishonors his head, but any woman who prays or prophesies with her head unveiled dishonors her head...
....
593. -- The following objection is raised: For many with heads covered pray in church without any disgrace, as they wish to pray more secretly. The answer is that prayer is twofold: one is private and is offered to God in one's own person; the other is public and is offered to God in the person of the entire Church, as is clear from the prayers said in the church by priests. It is these latter prayers that the Apostle has in mind here.

594. -- There is also an objection against a Gloss which states that prophesying is called unlocking the Scriptures. According to this, anyone who preaces prophesies. But bishops preach with their head covered with a miter. The answer is that one who preaches or teaches inthe schools speaks from his own person. Hence even the Apostle (Rom 2:16) calls the gospel his own, namely, on account of the energy he used in preaching it. But one who recites Sacred Scripture in the church, for example, by reading a lesson or an epistle or a gospel, speaks from the person of the whole church. This is the kind of prophesying that the Apostle underrstands heere.

595. -- Then there is an objection about those who chant psalms in choir with their head covered. The answer is that psalms are not chanted as by one singly presenting himself to God, but as by the whole multitude.[/quote]
taken from: [url="http://www.aquinas.avemaria.edu/Aquinas-Corinthians.pdf"]http://www.aquinas.avemaria.edu/Aquinas-Corinthians.pdf[/url]

593 and 595 seem to address your issues from Thomas Aquinas' perspective; in the first, in private prayer a man may cover his head but not in public prayer such as the mass; and second, that religious monks who chant as a whole community may symbolically present themselves as one (and thus need not concern themselves with each of their own heads) in the multitude; to me, this is similar to how each individual monk is a man but a whole monastary is still called a "mother house". This is merely St. Thomas Aquinas' opinion, but I personally find it to be a solid and sensible position.