Glamour

In the waiting room of my cardiologist, I couldn't resist the invitation of Glamour magazine to look at the most beautiful people in the world. Wow! Very strong stuff for one with my constitution! But I had to wonder: What is glamour? And is it good or bad? Regularly, in renewing our baptismal vows we renounce "the glamour of evil." Clearly, evil is...or can be...glamorous. But is glamour itself evil? Is everything glamorous bad? The roots of the word are not promising: it is related to the word "grammar" but associated with the language of witchcraft and occult as in the casting of a spell over a victim. For some of us, something magical and powerful and dark like this is operating in the photographs in Glamour or images from the red carpet. The dictionary defines "glamour" as: the quality of fascinating, alluring or attracting, especially by charm and good looks. Less than satisfied with that, I offer my own definition: "The artful enhancement of (usually feminine) beauty." Glamour here is a form of art, a creative action that brings Beauty into our world, a movement that brings Joy to earth and Glory to God. I imagine a woman, of any age, preparing for a wedding or a prom or similar event: she is fastidiously preparing her hair, skin, nails, clothing and jewelry in order to enhance her beauty. Is this a bad thing? Since I am not an iconoclast (as are Protestants, Muslims, Jews and atheists), but a Catholic...and a flaming Balthasarian at that!!!...I am recklessly enthusiastic about anything associated with beauty, charm, and attraction. Glamour is a kind of play...it is a game of beauty: "Let me see how beautiful I can be!" The logic is: "I am beautiful as I am. Just for fun: lets enhance my beauty!" Three year olds "dress up" for fun...so does my 94 year old mother, every single day! Beauty is useless: it does not serve another purpose but is an end in itself. It is frui, not uti...to quote St. Augustine. It is not useful for an extrinsic goal, but is itself an end in itself, like sports, art, learning, love, and worship. Women do not (usually) dress up to seduce or court or entice or propagate or preserve the species. (How I despise Darwinian psychology!) They dress up to be beautiful! Just to be beautiful! It is said that women dress up for other women. There is truth to this because it is mostly other women who will appreciate the beauty. Loveliness, charm, delight, joy...these are transcendental, spiritual (but embodied) realities that transcend the crude simplifications of sexual attraction. And so, there is something heavenly and even divine about being lovely: playful, joyous, purposeless, extravagant, generous and effusive! Imagine a bouquet of magnificent flowers that are haphazard and disorganized. The average woman will admire them and then move immediately to gather, organize and harmonize them in order to ensure the overall loveliness of the entire bouquet. Something like this happens with glamour: everything works together...the hair style, colors, movement of the clothing, jewelry, and so forth. BUT...and this is an enormous BUT...Like all things that are heavenly and powerful and engaging (think food, competition, work, family, alcohol...) too much of a good thing can be...very bad. And so, glamour must be careful to be modest, pure, wholesome, limited, and humble. Glamour so easily can become immodest, impure, corrupted, pretentious and proud. Then it becomes a catastrophe! It is so strong that it can have a magical, spell-like quality...especially upon insecure men. Let me describe one possible reaction. Imagine someone like Joe DiMaggio or Jack Kennedy in the presence of Marilyn Monroe. She is in high heels and a tight-fitting dress with low cleavage, blonde hair is blowing in the wind, she is laughing with sensuous self-satisfaction. She is glamorous! The poor guy is toast! He is fascinated and in awe...she is desirable beyond limits...she is unreachable and distant...a veritable goddess of desire...he is worthless by comparison...it matters not that he is a power-hitter or the most powerful politician in the world...it matters not that he is handsome, smart, athletic, or charismatic...he is nothing, he is emasculated, he is powerless, he is worthless before such a goddess! He wants only to kneel before her in adoration, kiss her feet,and lose himself in a mutual gaze! Such glamour is emasculating, magical, and idolatrous! But let's consider a different scenario: a case of elegance, charm and beauty within the limits of modesty, truth, humility, serenity and charity. Gregory Peck is in the presence of the Audrey Hepburn Princess in Roman Holiday: he is enchanted, but also ennobled, humbled, inspired, and encouraged in his own virility and goodness by her exquisite innocence, purity and loveliness. This is beauty and glamour as iconic, as heavenly, as Joy!