Homemaking (or Homemakers) Monday – a growing trend?

Mountain Housewife (@mtnhousewife) on Twitter shared this lovely image and posted,

“Imagine a day when the ordinary mother caring for her home is held up as an ideal again. This stamp celebrating the homemaker was issued by the U.S. Postal service in 1964.”

That was just a year before I was born! Back when there were only slightly over 2 billion people on the whole planet (there are something like 7.3 billion, now, and the number keeps growing), America was proud of its identity as a Christian nation, and my mother was equally proud of her membership in the Homemakers Club.

[These still exist, by the way, although they’re not as large, active, or prominent as they were in her day. Traditional Homemakers Clubs “are generally grouped by location and focus on homemaking skills, personal growth, socialization, volunteer efforts and improving the community,” just as they did in the 1950s – 80s. But, as I say, they are not as widespread. I could not find reference to an active one in Maryland, unfortunately. When they exist, they are usually – as they were then – under the auspices of the Agricultural Extension Service of the local land-grant university. The link is to the University of Kentucky!]

[UPDATE: I take that back! There do still seem to be a few active clubs in Maryland, including one in Frederick County, not too far from me.]

But when I looked up “Homemaking Monday,” thinking it would be an annual observance, what I found surprised me – and pleasantly so! Quite a few blogs of homemaking women, “Trad Wives”, etc., seem to be viewing “Homemaking Monday” as a weekly occurrence, a time to celebrate the art of the housewife. That is encouraging, in my view!

That said, though, see “Why tradwives aren’t trad enough,” for a discussion about the limitations of this approach (which typically takes the very historically and economically exceptional 1950s as its template), and some suggestions for possible solutions to this dilemma – one which closely tracks my own thinking on the subject (think Proverbs 31:10-31). I’ll probably write more on the subject at a later time.

But for now, let me just celebrate the fact that at least a growing number of women are rejecting the idea that they should emulate Industrial Revolution (and post-Industrial Revolution) men, and work outside the home to find their fulfillment. I don’t even think that’s a good idea for most men, and I certainly don’t think it’s a good idea for women. But as I say, I’ll write more on that subject anon.

In the meantime, kudos to those women who are at least keeping the skills, arts, and qualities of the homemaker alive. We can re-weave some of the broken strands of truly traditional home and family life later on. Survival and preservation is an important first step, and I doff my hat to these women!

 

Just a reminder:

 

Image Source: ArchitecturalRevival

 

What Princess Charlotte’s Portrait Teaches Us About Raising Adults | Intellectual Takeout

Is it possible that in treating children like children – both in the way we dress them and the activities we allow them to pursue – we will better prepare them for a natural, responsible transition to adulthood some day in the future?

Source: What Princess Charlotte’s Portrait Teaches Us About Raising Adults | Intellectual Takeout

Annie Holmquist, Editor of Intellectual Takeout, often has good things to say, and this is no exception. This essay is a few years old, but that does not make it any less apropos. She notes a Spanish clothing designer – Spain being one country where traditional clothing for children is much more common than it is here in the US, or apparently in the UK – as commenting,

“The style is much more classic for children, with Peter Pan collar shirts, soft colours, floral prints. We keep the essence of timeless clothing for children and enjoy seeing our children look like children.”

(See also this earlier essay on the subject.)

The Anglophilic Anglican is a hopeless traditionalist – and darned proud of it! – so needless to say, I agree. But it may be more than merely an aesthetic preference. As Holmquist continues,

“I can’t help but wonder if the Royals have caught onto an idea that’s been completely overlooked by all of us commoners across the pond… after reading the ideas behind the Spanish approach to children’s dressing which the Royals follow, I had to ask myself if the American habit of dressing children as mini-mes has helped to fuel the rise of immature and incapable adults.”

Well worth a read!

Robert Ruark: Something of value

“If a man does away with his traditional way of living and throws away his good customs, he had better first make certain that he has something of value to replace them.”

— Robert Ruark

And on a related note… Be a rebel. Save society.

Yes. This.

Settle down, raise a family. This is going to take a while.

“The real way to leverage your time and make a lasting difference is exponential and generational: get married, have children, practice your faith, raise liberty-minded children, be active in the community, serve your family, homeschool your children, give them a real education, and teach them to be self-sufficient, well-read, healthy, and wise.“

The quote above is an excerpt (I’d say, the key excerpt) from a friend and fellow Christian clergyman’s Facebook post this morning. Here’s the whole thing:

“What’s the best way for young people to fight for human liberty in the west? A podcast? A blog? Go on a speaking tour? Run for office?

“Maybe.

“But the real way to leverage your time and make a lasting difference is exponential and generational: get married, have children, practice your faith, raise liberty-minded children, be active in the community, serve your family, homeschool your children, give them a real education, and teach them to be self-sufficient, well-read, healthy, and wise.

“And raise each of your children to do the same thing and create strong families of their own.

“Living the swinging single libertarian life and/or having a biologically unfruitful relationship simply neutralizes and nullifies any long-term influence you might have had, and surrenders the field to others who are doing the hard, generational work of raising their own children to promulgate their values. The cultures that reproduce will push all the others out. And if that culture is oppressive and tyrannical, you don’t want them in the majority.

“This is akin to Aesop’s Fable of the tortoise and the hare – only in this version, the rabbit is sterile while the turtle is prolific.

“The west is dying because most young people don’t have the long view in mind, and also because young women do not understand the old adage about ‘the hand that rocks the cradle [rules the world]’ and are thus clueless about what it means to be truly empowered and strong.”

As our Eastern Orthodox brethren would say,

Wisdom! Attend.

Now, if I could just find someone to raise a family with…! *wry smile*

 

Glories of the West / Blighty Boys: London before the fall

Source: London before the fall | Traditional Britain Group – Under Attack

Ah, how sadly the mighty have fallen! Scenes from London in “the good old days,” when it was still an English city (it will not surprise my readers that I wholeheartedly agree with John Cleese on this matter, based not only on news reports, but anecdotes from people I know who either live there, or have visited there over the last few years)…

 

“Why Feminism Is Never The Answer” | Make Womanhood Biblical Again

“Christian women… if you’re going to make anything your gospel, make it THE gospel.” – by Christiana

Source: Why Feminism Is Never The Answer – Make Womanhood Biblical Again

Whether or not one agrees with every point in this essay (and I agree with most of them) or all the views of its author (she seems pretty based to me), it seems to me that this critique is square on, and one which our “woke” and “progressive” world (which, having largely abandoned the Gospel of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, has set up instead an idol of left-wing sociopolitical ideologies – the “Golden Calf” of the 21st century) needs to hear:

“Feminism can never put a stop to sex trafficking, because it cannot stop greed, loneliness, and depravity.

“Feminism can never eradicate domestic violence, because it cannot instill in men a passion to love and lead their families well.

“Feminism can never put an end to pornography, because it cannot satiate lust, addiction, and emptiness.

“Feminism can never cut down the divorce rate and improve marriages, because marriage is not about “equality,” fairness, or sameness; and all the role reversal in the world cannot change the fact that we are daughters of Eve and sons of Adam.

“Feminism can never bring women fulfillment, because true fulfillment is only found in Jesus Christ.

“Feminism can never force men to genuinely respect women by removing sexual distinction…

“Feminism exalts women but can never truly empower them; promotes women, but can never pacify the innate desire to control. It insults women and men alike by insisting that the only real difference between the sexes is physical.”

Amen.

This is not to say that all women should do nothing but stay at home and raise children; some are not suited to that vocation, and some do indeed have gifts that can benefit society most effectively if expressed in the worlds of industry or academia. Furthermore, few traditional women – throughout the centuries and millennia of human history – did nothing but stay a home: they were always active in their local communities.

But that does not change the fact that motherhood is the first and greatest vocation of womankind as a whole; nor that, in the words of the great G.K. Chesterton,

N.B. The videos alluded to in the tags are found at the link, so please click through. Thank you!

 

 

The Civil War on America’s Horizon | The American Conservative

“You accuse us of overturning our patrie by rebellion, but it is you, who, subverting all principles of the religious and political order, were the first to proclaim that insurrection is the most sacred of duties.” — French Royalist rebel to the newly-installed Jacobin government in 1793

Source: The Civil War on America’s Horizon | The American Conservative

I disagree with the author of this piece’s knee-jerk anti-Trumpism, and more generally his assertion of what amounts to moral equivalency between the President’s supporters and America’s radical Left. But that doesn’t mean the essay’s depiction of the situation in which we find ourselves is wrong. Sadly!

But I like better the analysis of both the article and the situation it describes, from Clergy in Support of the 2nd Amendment, which posted a link to this article:

That’s not who we are!

I am The Anglophilic Anglican. But I am also an American; and what goes on in the United States of America, for better or for worse – sadly, much of it “for worse,” these days – is obviously of considerable concern to me. And this, unfortunately, hits the matter pretty square-on!