Hijab

I'm watching 'Jersey Shore' in Florence, trying to comprehend American sexuality. It's very sad. We expose our bodies not passionately but desperately, indiscriminately. There is no spiritual mystery beneath the physical phenomenon, nothing left to anticipate, no space for imagination to play its life-giving role as half the world we see and touch.

But a transformation is coming. The headscarf will become fashionable in America. We'll cover the flesh in flowing fabric, instead of wasting it in public spectacle. Modesty will become cool.

But modesty is only cool when it is a choice. For this, I thank the brave self-liberating women of the Arab Spring.