Why We Started Veiling

So a couple weeks before Advent started we received our veils in the mail from Veils by Lily.  Obviously, the journey to veiling begun a while before that.  A friend of mine sent me and some of our friends a video via email about veiling and asked what we thought.  After watching the video, my response was, "Let's all start doing this together for Advent!"  Most of us go to different parishes, but the solidarity of knowing others are doing something bold and a little bit intimidating at first along with you certainly helps.

When I first converted to Catholicism, I knew nothing of chapel veils.  I did, however, feel like I needed something to help me focus in prayer.  I found a pattern for a prayer shawl that can be pulled over your head when you pray.  I was very drawn to the idea, but never got around to doing it.  I have seen ladies here and there wear a veil in Mass, but really never gave it much thought or did any research as to why they chose to wear it.  This video shed a whole new light on veiling for me.  It really touched my heart.  Reverence and focus is exactly what is called for in the presence of Jesus.  If the chapel veil helps me to attain that, how can I deny it's need in my life?

The only reason I could think of for not veiling is that it would draw attention to me that I didn't want or make people think I think myself holier than they.  Those are both silly reasons.  To address those issues in reverse, I most certainly do not think myself holier than anyone.  So that one just isn't true.  As for the other reason, I already have attention drawn to me at Mass because of our larger than normal family size.  If it truly does draw extra attention to myself, I hope that it is like an arrow pointing people to the One who is deserving of all our attention at Mass.