Dear Lovely People,
An alert reader sent me this link to a very endearing post written by blogger Rev. Mama. She’s really a stitch, and I love her observation that no matter who you are, the moment you don a white alb you look like a middle-aged male archeologist (a reference to Indiana Jones — just go read it and you’ll understand what she means).
Aside from my appreciation for her wit and ‘tude, I was very concerned to hear that petite Rev. Mama is being expected by her congregation to wear vestments tailored to fit a man (the previous rector) who is much larger and taller than she. What fresh hell is this, PeaceBang would like to know? I wrote a pushy stage mother-ish response on her blog (for which she was gracious enough to thank me, and to give me permission to scream n’ yell about the issue here), but let’s TALK about this!
Let’s consider a comparison from the corporate world. Say you get a job as CEO of a big company and you show up for your first day at work. “Here, come with me,” says a member of the staff. “Now that you’re the CEO, we expect you to wear John Smith’s suit. He was the CEO before you got here and we liked him a lot, so we hope you’ll wear it in good health.”
They hand you a size 42, and you’re a size 36. How is this supposed to work? How are you supposed to command respect and do a good job while your pants are falling down and your sleeves flopping all over your computer when you try to get the big report ready? Quelle ridiculosity!
I told Rev. Mama that I hoped she would insist that the church have the vestments tailored to fit her, for heaven’s sake. If they don’t, she should take it upon herself to get it done. She writes that she is “only” the associate pastor, and methinks there’s the origins of her hesitance. But my heavens, darlings, if you are up there presiding in a chasuble and stole, it matters not whether you’re Big Cheese Kahunah of the Church, intern, aspirant, novice, associate, assistant or Random Peon. You should not be swimming in your vestments, being literally diminished by them and endangering your safety and the safety of those around you. What if you trip on your stole and hit someone in the head with a flying chalice? How would you explain that to your bishop?
None of us should be officiating in vestments that are perilously small or comically large. Ministry is hard enough work, and sacramental liturgy a serious enough business that either the church, or we, should make it our business to make sure our vestments fit properly. No more dressing up in Big Daddy’s (or Big Mama’s) clothing.
And for the record, PeaceBang would like to affirm her belief that there’s no such thing as being “only” an associate pastor. From what PeaceBang has observed over ten years in parish ministry, associate pastors get ridden just as hard by the Holy Spirit as do senior pastors, and spend just as many sleepless nights. There are no second-class citizens in the Kingdom of God or in the ministry. Remember that, pigeons.
Oh my gosh! I read this post and really liked it. Then I followed the link and realized that I KNOW REV. MAMA! And she totally rocks.
I hear you, I hear you–thanks for the pushy stage-motherish comments–they are good to hear. I actually do a have a nice collection of stoles and I do wear them some of the time. Any even though I have a wonderful custom made alb from Wippells, it is a fact that the whole alb look is frumpy–something to do with lots of white fabric wrapped around you. Which is why, I might add, I loved the form fitting clergy shirts from Sweden! And finally, I agree with you on the ‘only’ an associate bit–I used the quote marks as a wink and a nudge. Thanks for ranting with me on this!
I’m short myself, and luckily a friend of mine made me a set of stoles and chasibules in each liturgical color. I tend to follow priests that were about 6 foot 5, and–imagine the hubris–ordered vestments to fit themselves! I can make the average size work, but not the extra large size. Small churches can’t always order new stuff in all the colors, but there is no excuse for a large church not having vestments to fit priests of all sizes that serve there.
As one of the vertically challenged myself (coming in at a staggering 5’5″), I understand this dilemma. One piece of pratical advice, all chasubles are too long on my arms, so I just fold back about three inches when I walk up to the altar, to keep from dragging fabric through everything. Seems to work.
I am a (female) theology student I just love these discussions. I hope you don’t mind that I put a link to it from our student blog.
oh, me, womyn’s clergy drag… my mother, god rest her, asked me before her alzheimer’s diagnosis, if i would “do” her funeral when she died but she INSISTED that i not wear a alb (“they are so ugly”) and to wear my “tropical wool made-by-a-sewing-person Russian style cassock and silk chiffon ‘angel winged’ surplice.” really. she said this. but this is also the woman, who, when told i had a calling to the ordained priesthood, asked me what i would wear and DEMANDED an answer! it’s a long story but a great one…
the discussion of why no alb when that’s the done thing resulted in one amazing conversation. she said, “albs are ugly and they’re always polyester.” i finally figured out what she was telling me: albs are generally NOT designed for people with breasts, which is why most womyn clergy end up looking awful in them… as do most vestments and clericals, even if juliet hemingray makes beautiful chasubles, they are still not for womyn’s bodies. it was an amazing insight and a gift that changed how i drag as a priest.
first: find an adam kochlin catalogue. look at the incredibly beautiful “mary of nazareth” chasuble. also the “joseph’s coat” shawl kind of thing. i had a tailor here in panama create a design similar to these but still different and made for my body.
i spent a few days researching vestments and when i found the russian orthodox ones, i knew i was home! i had cassocks made in that side-shoulder russian style; i had asian-collar/nehru collar style coat dress cassocks made. and that’s what i wear for the daily drag. i’ve been searching and searching for the italian deigner’s “Cardinale Coutoure” done for ava gardner: if anyone has the “little priest’s” dress, please email me.
i searched and researched all over st gregory of nyssa, san francisco, website for the creative dress of fathers rick and donald: note the umbrella; it’s a great touch!
african designs are also great. and one can always go back to greece and spin the original
i live in panama now and hope we’ll be outta here soon for the experience is horrible. and those great “panama” or “cuban” shirts that are so popular with men–those little tiny pleted shirts that look so great all starched–well, that make a great design as a dress. it’s the other thing i wear.
today i took all the pointy collars off my favorite shirts and from my husband’s panama and other favorite shirts, which leaves me with that “collarless” look. NOW i have to try to come up with a pattern to make a collar a detachable or velcro’d or buttoned or snapped or something collar…. anybody have any suggestions. i did find, however, a site that teaches one how to make a plastic detachable collar out of a clorox bottle. good grief! and i broke out in a heat rash just thinking of plastic in this environment where the ONLY comfortable fabric is tropical wool. linen absorbs the moisture and after an hour of sweltering and hot-flashing in a menopausal panamanian tropical non-paradise, i can assure you that your linen alb (or chasuble or surplice or whatever) will weigh two or three or more pounds and dragging all that around is more than you’d ever want to think about it’s so awful. of course no one sells light weight enough tropical wool here, so it goes round and round.
we need to start thinking about looking really good in men’s clothing or men-looking drag for women’s bodies for our holy drag OR recreating the old stuff for our bodies… i’m happy with my decisions thus far. i’ll keep working on that collar design and let you know how it goes
and as for the curvey swedish women’s clergy look: oh, yes, it’s great!
i seem to recall that russian orthodox cassocks are called rassas or razzas. their cope/cloak/mantle thingie is pretty awesome; the pleats are a bit much but i had several made without the pleats and the train as a kind of “jumper” that i wear over cool sleeves here, almost like a verger cloak/long coat; one is closed; the other connects with those pretty “frog” thingies.
the marvelously talented artist martin grizzell, san francisco, made me these incredible collars; they are worn OUTSIDE and over, almost elizabethan as they literally fit over shoulders and are panels of fabric petal-ing over one another; they are also reversible. i even have one with a soft soft white leather collar; the petals are mud-cloth reversed and the opposite side is this amazing silk! i can’t describe them well. my bishop doesn’t like them but i think they are fabulous. if anyone can find martin grizzell in san francisco or oakland and convince him to make your drag, go for it. his vestment designs are soo incredibly beautiful and unique and look like nothing else out there!!
good luck to all
oonagh+
b
The problem is not with tailored albs and surplices which can be done quite easy, and fairly inexpensive, but things such as stoles and chasubles are very expensive, and are not meant to be altered.
A good, fairly ordinary, chasuble in a Swedish church usually costs around $4000 and is meant to be used by all, and can be used by all. Altering it would effectively destroy it, and it may even be a few hundred years old…
[how fascinating! And a good point! Much love to you in Sverige, one of my favorite countries with the most beautiful people. – PB]
stoles are absolutely simple to make. fabric can be expensive, of course. and designs take time. still, the basic stole is easy to construct, albeit time-consuming.
oonagh+
if anyone out there is a good tailor or sew-er or knows someone who is or wants an idea for fund-raising, here is the piece of clericals that, as far as i know, does not exist: a clergy shirt for breast-feeding clergy-moms. in a perfect world, there would be TWO clergy shirts: one for pregnant clergy mamas who then breast-feed–same shirt used for both. 2nd blouse/shirt: for breast-feeding and then forever after. i am thinking velcro in the seams then after nursing and forevermore, the seams could be sewn down. i tried like mad to get a group of sewing women here in panama interested; i bought fabric; taught people to make collars and buttonholes; nada. sigh.
for me, the problem of clergy shirts, even converting a man’s clergy shirt to my body, is the stupid ugly awful fabrics. soo much polyester everywhere. ugh.
oonagh+
Yes, the historic vestments of the Church are not tailored for women (let alone womyn!). That’s because the apostolic ministry was always held by men. There have never been vestments tailored for women priests because there never were women priests, despite the flawed arguments of a few so-called scholars). The very concept of a female priest or bishop is a novelty not grounded in the Holy Scriptures or the Great Tradition of the Church Catholic. It is an invention of the modern feminist movement. Rev. Mama ought to take the over-sized vestments as a sign– a sign that women and priesthood are not a good fit.