Tuesday, March 31, 2009

Take RELS 410

Clement of Alexandria, second century Christian theologian, believed that every moment of your life should be lived in devotion to God.  Thus anyone should be able to tell from your smallest action that you were a Christian.

Clement developed tons of guidelines for every imaginable situation, so that a good Christian would know how to act.

For example, if you were a lady at a dinner party, and your toga, not being the most reliably fastened garment, were to slip and bare a part of your arm immodestly, and a man were to comment inappropriately on the beauty of your arm, a good Christian woman should respond:

"It's not public property."

Once when I was 14, I was wearing a camisole and a guy tossed a penny down my cleavage, so I then had to fish at it and wriggle to get it to drop out the bottom of the built-in bra and get it out of my shirt.

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I think I told him to please not do that again.  I can't remember if I laughed it off or just got stony-faced or went somewhere else.  I know he apologized sincerely after reading about how I felt (dirty, uncomfortable, uncertain, embarrassed) about the incident on my blog.  


But it strikes me that Clement is still relevant.  

What do you say?

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