President’s Friday Virtue Message

Good Afternoon Assumption Catholic Schools!

As we turn to the middle of May, it seems we have skipped from early spring right into summer like weather.  It is great to see the sun but stay safe with activities as jumping from the 40s to the 90s is hard.

The virtue/strength of the week is MODESTY.

The strength to be moderate and in control of ourselves
with regard to speech, dress and food.

Opening Prayer

My God, I believe, I adore,
I hope and I love Thee!
I beg pardon for those who do not believe,
do not adore, do not hope
and do not love Thee. Amen.
*Delivered by the Angel of Peace during the First
Apparition of the Angel to the three shepherd
children of Fatima in spring of 1916.

To live the virtue of modesty requires a conscious
effort in the following areas:
• Our actions and behavior which includes manner
of dress, walking, gesturing and how we treat
others.
• Our interior thoughts and imagination requiring
custody of the eyes and our thoughts and
memories – practicing self-control in what we view –
and a guarding of the other senses.
• Our manner of speaking … tone of voice, the
words we use and how we communicate.

From the CCC

#2521 Purity requires modesty, an integral part of
temperance. Modesty protects the intimate center
of the person. It means refusing to unveil what
should remain hidden. It is ordered to chastity to
whose sensitivity it bears witness. It guides how
one looks at others and behaves toward them in
conformity with the dignity of persons and their
solidarity.
#2522 Modesty protects the mystery of persons
and their love. It encourages patience and
moderation in loving relationships; it requires that
the conditions for the definitive giving and
commitment of man and woman to one another be
fulfilled. Modesty is decency. It inspires one’s
choice of clothing. It keeps silence or reserve
where there is evident risk of unhealthy curiosity. It
is discreet.

#2523 There is a modesty of the feelings as well as
of the body. It protests, for example, against the
voyeuristic explorations of the human body in certain
advertisements, or against the solicitations of certain
media that go too far in the exhibition of intimate
things. Modesty inspires a way of life which makes it
possible to resist the allurements of fashion and the
pressures of prevailing ideologies.
#2524 The forms taken by modesty vary from one
culture to another. Everywhere, however, modesty
exists as an intuition of the spiritual dignity proper to
man. It is born with the awakening consciousness of
being a subject. Teaching modesty to children and
adolescents means awakening in them respect for
the human person.

Genesis 3: 6-7
The woman saw that the tree was good for food and pleasing to
the eyes, and the tree was desirable for gaining wisdom. So she
took some of its fruit and ate it; and she also gave some to her
husband, who was with her, and he ate it.
Then the eyes of both of them were opened, and they knew that
they were naked; so they sewed fig leaves together and made
loincloths for themselves.
Genesis 3: 21
The LORD God made for the man and his wife garments of skin,
with which he clothed them.
Notice that God is not satisfied with the garments that Adam
and Eve made for each other after the original sin. The fig
leaves that Adam and Eve made would have only covered them
partially. They would have been immodestly dressed. Thus, God
made new garments for them out of animal skins and clothed
them entirely, or modestly. Because the human condition was
now afflicted with sin and concupiscence, God clearly reveals
that He desires us to dress modestly, to avoid tempting
ourselves and others.

Let’s review how much screen
time, app time, phone time, TV time …
we are getting each day.
Examine what you are looking at, what you are
listening to, the images you are consuming …
Are we living this strength of modesty?

MATTHEW 5: 27-28
“You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall not
commit adultery.’
But I say to you, everyone who looks at a woman
with lust has already committed adultery
with her in his heart.”

“Let your modesty be a sufficient incitement, yea,
an exhortation to everyone to be at peace on
their merely looking at you.”
– St. Ignatius Loyola

The opposing Vice

IMMODESTY
THE WEAKNESS TO LACK SELF-CONTROL AND DECENCY
WITH REGARD TO SPEECH, DRESS AND FOOD.

SOME SELF-REFLECTION
Immodesty is the act of drawing undue attention to
ourselves.
It’s pride on display by what we wear, what we say,
how we act and how we eat.
Some questions to ask ourselves:
Do I dress immodestly? Is what I wear at times too
low, too short or too tight?
Do I talk immodestly? Is my tone of voice too loud,
arrogant or boastful?
Do I eat immodestly? Do I stuff my mouth, talk with
my mouth full, fill up my plate to the brim? Do I
serve myself too much and then throw it out?

CLOSING PRAYER

O Most Holy Trinity, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, I
adore Thee profoundly. I offer Thee the most
precious Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity of Jesus
Christ, present in all the tabernacles of the world, in
reparation for the outrages, sacrileges and
indifference by which He is offended. By the infinite
merits of the Sacred Heart of Jesus and the
Immaculate Heart of Mary, I beg the conversion of
poor sinners.
*Delivered by the Angel of Peace during the Third
Apparition of the Angel in October 1916. The Angel
appeared to the three shepherd children holding a chalice
in his hands, with a Host above it from which drops of
Blood were falling into the chalice.

In Christ’s Peace

Daniel Minter

President

Assumption Catholic Schools