In Roman Catholicism, a black veil is a symbol of the most complete renunciation of the world and adoption of a nun's life. On the appointed day the nun goes through all the ritual of the marriage ceremony, after a solemn mass at which all the inmates of the convent assist. She is dressed in bridal white with wreath and veil, and receives a wedding ring, as a "Bride of Christ". Afterwards she presides at a wedding breakfast, at which a bride-cake is cut. She thus bids adieu to all her friends, and having previously taken the white veil, the betrothal, she now assumes the black, and forever forswears the world and its pleasures. Her hair is cut short, and her bridal robes are exchanged for the sombre religious habit. Her wedding ring, however, she continues to wear, and it is buried with her.
In Lay circles, a triangle- or rectangle-shaped cloth or lace veil, also known as a mantilla, is worn by Catholic women while attending church Mass. This practice has fallen into decline since the 1960s among those who attend the revised rite of the Mass, but traditional Catholic women who attend the ancient Latin Mass still wear them.
Famous quotes containing the words black and/or veil:
“Standing to America, bringing home
black gold, black ivory, black seed.”
—Robert Earl Hayden (1913–1980)
“I am afraid that old women are more skeptical in their most secret heart of hearts than any man: they believe in the superficiality of existence as in its essence, and all virtue and profundity is to them merely a veil over this “truth,” a most welcome veil over a pudendum—and so a matter of decency and modesty, and nothing else.”
—Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900)