Protecting veil….

Today is a new day, a sunny crisp new day. I've settled by the sea, I feel at home, but then again it's not really winter yet. It's out of London, so it's fine by me if I get flooded out. At least the chances of getting bombed are near zero. I think! Time will tell. This blog will not though, be a daily account of my life. My life is not important enough. This blog will be utilised to comment on the world. My worldview.
From today I am free of the shackles of academia. I am free from 7 years of pleasing the unpleasable. Academia, the last bastion of the unreal world. But no more of that. On to business.
I will publish some of my own essays here as well as commenting on the world, but for today I want to concentrate on the latest manifestation of ideological partiality that has hit Britain – The controversy that has surfaced into the mainstream: The veil or not the veil.
Jack Straw (Leader of the House of Commons) this week put this on the political agenda by announcing that he preferred to talk with his Islamic women constituents without them wearing a veil. He asked, he claims, for the veil to be removed before any discussion takes place. 'Facial body language is so important in any discussion' he states.
Maybe that is so, but I remember many meetings with women (particularly sales representatives) when the length of the skirt or the cut of the blouse and even the scent of the woman, definitely got in the way of my judgements. And I loved every minute of it!
So can this be as simple as dress code. Surely not. Straw seems to have decided, whether by himself or after consultation with others, to face a growing barrier between Christianity (or its equivalent secular veil), and Islam through the metaphor of the veil. Straw is a very intelligent person and has obviously thought this one out long and hard before the statement was made.
There is in any culture a longing for tradition to be maintained. I am reminded of Christianity’s own 'protecting veil' which I discovered by chance after hearing John Tavener's 1989 promenade season recording of the music by the same name. A closer examination of the discography led me to understand the importance of the veil to the Christian world of Constantinople. Further research provided the following notes by Tavener:
'…The Feast of the Protecting Veil of the Mother of God was instituted by the Orthodox Church to commemorate Her appearance in the church at Vlacherni (Constantinople), in the early tenth century, possibly a.d. 902. At a time of grave danger for the Greeks from Saracen invasion, Andrew, the holy fool, and his disciple Epiphanios, saw the Mother of God during an all-night vigil. She was high above them in the air, surrounded by a host of saints, praying earnestly and spreading out her veil as a protective shelter over the Christians. Heartened by this vision, the Greeks withstood the Saracen assault and drove away the Saracen army…'
That interpretation by Tavener, of one of history's celebrated wholly Christian events is a chilling reminder of where we stand in today's secularised western world. The veil then, reminds me that the world division along theological grounds is as strong as it was in Andrew's days and I have to ask who plays the 'fool' now?
What the outcome of this seemingly ordinary event in Straw's constituency will be I do not know, but I do fear the divide widens by the day and the consequences may be dire for both the Islamic and Western worlds. It has if nothing else, put the problem closer to the table top.