Oh, Christ. I mean Jesus Christ. As in, the actual Jesus Christ.
Jesus, could you please join me on stage here for a moment while we talk about the problem with this “I’m discovering my clergy identity and am so happy I can wear cool sweaters and not suits” article at The Christian Century?
It’s here.
Jesus and I are going to stand up here and just look at at our audience of ministers for awhile. Jesus is looking at his watch, because he has way more important things to do than to hang around a conversation about clergy image but I asked him to be here for moral support.
Jesus, I am really, really tired of people invoking You when they talk about how they make their decisions about how to dress themselves OVER TWO THOUSAND YEARS AFTER you walked among us in bodily form. Could you please hold my hand? You don’t have to say anything.
Jesus, you’re wearing a tunic and beat up sandals. You have never taken a shower in your life. You have never owned deodorant or had a professional haircut. You do not shave. You have never owned a tissue. Can you please explain to your people that they should STOP looking to you for guidance on attire? Like, can you PLEASE tell them that all your spiritual teachings are SPIRITUAL and that they should stop pretending we live in anything even remotely resembling the world you lived in?
You’re not going to say anything? You’re just going to stand there patiently in your tunic and let me say it?
Fine, then, I will. Yes, go get some coffee. It’s over there against the wall. No, I don’t want any, thank you. Don’t trip on the mic wires.
Katherine Willis Pershey starts her essay by describing her first years in ministry, when she wore an ugly, unflattering black suit and frumpy clothing that didn’t feel like her.
Yes, many of us can relate.
I can certainly relate!
It takes time to grow into our clergy identities and to develop a look that works for the multi-faceted work that we do.
However, my frustration with this article — and the many almost exactly like it — is that it stops at “Wow, I’m not someone who looks good in traditional suits” and concludes with what is actually a lazy analysis of how we should dress : namely, to express ourselves.
Jesus, can you please hit that buzzer? WRONG!
Dressing professionally for clergy isn’t merely a matter of individual comfort and preference and what makes us “feel like a million bucks.” Our responsibility as those who represent the Church and the ministry is dual: to our work first and to ourselves a very close second.
This means that we have to try harder and go deeper. First, where are we spending our time on any given day, and what do we need to communicate non-verbally while we’re there?
“I feel great” is not enough. “I am creative and interesting and fun” is fine to communicate if FIRST you have met your obligation to represent the church and the ministry appropriately.
Priorities, people. We have a fascist on the verge of becoming president of the United States. We have a man in the running for the highest office in the land who brags about committing sexual assault and getting away with it because of his celebrity. We have a potential Groper In Chief ascending to power — even if he is not elected, this cat is out of the bag — who is a proudly white supremacist, xenophobic aspirational dictator. He calls women pigs and commits wage theft against workers and brags about evading taxes and is generally contemptible, and PEOPLE LOVE HIM.
Some of them are in your congregations.
So seriously, you’re going to get dressed in the morning with no higher goal than to look like a cool, creative person?
No. Not acceptable. Find a suit that suits you. How dare any of us put our comfort before the necessity of looking like people whose perspective and moral authority matter in this nation?
Oh, and by the way? The guy who owns Anthropologie is a fundamentalist Christian who gives lots of money to causes that restrict our freedoms as women. Yea, their clothes are really cool, but he’s using our desire to look like a beautiful Bohemian soul to fund rightwing initiatives and policies that hurt people. You could say that most companies exploit humans in some way, but Anthropologie is so heavily marketed to liberal chicks, I like to inform them where their hard-earned money is going when they purchase those gorgeous peasant blouses and tough-sexy cowgirl prairie skirts.
Not owning a suit is nothing to brag about. What is says is that one willfully rejects the idea that she will be called upon to make a serious statement in the halls of power or anywhere where important people gather and do their business. It is irresponsible and self-marginalizing.
And we wonder why people smile indulgently at members of the clergy, shake our hands, use our titles with more respect for our former, rather than current, status in society, and promptly ignore our recommendations or admonitions.
Jesus, I’ve changed my mind. I’d like a cup of coffee after all. But could you turn it into wine?
Actually, could you turn it into bourbon?
I love this so much. and thanks for the intel on Anthropologie. Keep that info coming!
Love you,
CC
[Love you back! – PB]
“I clothed myself in a black wool sweater from the clearance rack at Anthropologie. It was flowy and funky and, to me at least, full of meaning…it communicated that ministry, for me, is a creative profession. I don’t have to dress like a banker. I can dress like an artist” This is more self-indulgence than I thought one paragraph could hold. I can dress like an artist? Sure you can. Go full-on Goodwill on their behinds. Because you won’t last 10 minutes in a church that requires a grown up at the helm.
This entry was very unkind. Your tone is incredibly condescending and I’d be pretty hurt if I was the author. I hope she doesn’t see this. Your work is important and your voice still matters, even if someone has a different view than you. I wish you were a little more willing to embrace a spectrum of opinion. If that’s not possible for you, I wish you’d at least respect how hard we all struggle and not choose to tear a sister in ministry down.
[May I direct you to Rev. Gidget’s comment? She and her St. Louis congregation have held 100 vigils since the killing of Michael Brown, and she has been extremely active witnessing for Black Lives Matter. Her reaction to the author’s self-indulgence supports my own strong feeling that this is not the time for white lady fragility. We can’t afford it. We have power, authority and privilege and need to look like it. I used to give more consideration to these criticisms of hurting someone’s feelings. At this point, it’s not about our feelings but about serious danger that we are called to respond to with all our strength and power. I spend a lot of time encouraging, lifting up, styling, advising and supporting clergy. I, more than anyone, am aware of how challenging it is to find a working professional image. I say so constantly. – PB]
I don’t love wearing suits. I am a prof at a Christian-affiliated college. So I wear dresses, and sweaters, or dresses and blazers. I have actually talked with my students about clothing (to prep for interviews) and they get it more than some of my colleagues. It’s not about what you wear to make you feel good, it’s about projecting an image! I wear earrings that make me feel good, a scarf, whatever… but I wear decent clothes to make me look like I’m in charge.
Also EW about anthropology. EW EW EW.
Granted that the CC post seems to be intended to be lighthearted and not a statement of that minister’s approach to everything ever–if your own comfort and individuality are your highest priority, I have a hard time imagining you encouraging your congregation to step outside their own comfort zones and look beyond their individual pleasures, which would seem to be a significant part of the ministerial calling.
I get the rhetorical trick where you want to make this about Trump or Black Lives Matter or whatever makes you feel noble in your tearing down of a fellow female clergy. But it really just reads like sour grapes that you didn’t get to be the expert on this. Your first comment on her article was “come look at me instead.” That doesn’t speak to keeping a view on higher issues, that speaks to keeping a view on your website/click through traffic. I’m sure Rev. Gidget does incredible work (I wouldn’t know that from her comment which also just focused on tearing down a clergywoman by dismissing her entire career.) And you presume a lot when you assume that nobody who prefers sweaters over suits can do deeply meaningful social justice work. It’s mean-spirited and pretending to couch that mean-spiritedness by co-opting the movement is cynical and gross. I’m a black millennial clergy. I know about BLM. I know about people policing my identity. And you don’t get to use my labor and pain to do it to others.
[I’m clarifying my earlier response. I am not co-opting any movement. I am not using your labor and pain in any way to “police identity.” Saying that a clergyperson has a responsibility not to show up with her creative, flowy comfortable side foremost in the work of social justice is not policing someone’s identity. Is comfort her identity? No, of course it isn’t. I did not imply that you don’t know about BLM, but the optics of comfy-sloppy clergy standing up against police officers in uniform is one I have written about extensively and one I believe is absolutely, inexcusable clergy failure to visually represent spiritual and moral authority. If you feel that a clergy woman’s “identity” as a creative person supercedes her identity as one ordained to represent the Church’s prophetic mission, then peace to you. I will never support that opinion. -PB]
I believe it’s possible to look completely professional while also feeling comfortable and attractive. It might take a while to figure out, but it’s possible. (And I admit that as a tall-ish white, cis-gender woman with good hair, this might be easier for me than for some people… but it’s possible!) And that magic combination will help any professional woman own her power and authority.
While you’re at it, I’ll have some bourbon, too.
One of my friends directed me back here. You didn’t clarify your response, you changed it. That means you recognized it was out of line but didn’t bother to apologize. The first edit dismissed my comments because I was one of those people, whatever you meant by that. Again, it’s something I’ve heard a few times in my life. You’re claiming to be an ally, you’re causing harm, and I’m really tired of this pattern in white feminists. It would be great if you could learn something from this but either way, best of luck with your ministry.
Good to know that info on Anthropologie… But shaming people on what their wearing is not feminist either. The most important thing is that people are comfortable in their own skin and authentic to themselves… And that doesn’t mean all women will dress in a power suit. Empowering women and feminism means that they are being their truest selves. Then they will feel like they have agency to go out and change the world. Additionally, the culture in which we live and serve influences us on how we dress. Not all of us live in the same part of the country or belong to the same race/ethnicity.
I just wish I could understand why women are so unkind to each other. KWP put herself out there in open honesty and you raked her through the coals. You’re better than that.
I linked to this from your comment on the CC article to check out the “treasure trove” you’ve established–and instead found this? We all have moments of pettiness, but please save it for the bourbon with your girlfriend. We’re called to lift up the body of Christ, including our sister clergy.
I am kind of shocked to see the comment thread here. Have we forgotten what our sister’s site is called? “Beauty Tips For Ministers.” She is doing what she does best, commenting with her opinion on matters of clergy appearance. If someone tells me I have a stain on my shirt, are they lowering my self-esteem? No. Sorry, PB, I know you can defend yourself, but there it is. and if you ever come to Ohio, I have some frozen bourbon slush with your name on it.
[Thanks, Ruth. It’s been awhile since I’ve seen this kind of whining on here. It crops up every once in awhile. – PB]
To say that some people in society have jobs that warrant suits–banker, congressperson, lawyer–or special and important uniforms–doctors, judges, military personnel–and then to say that the clergy need not bother with either suits or special uniforms, is to admit that clergy don’t have and shouldn’t have as much authority as bankers, congresspeople, lawyers, doctors, judges, or military personnel. I always wear a suit on Sundays because that communicates the mission of the ministry in my setting to be professional and at least as dressed up as the people in the pews. I know that in other settings other clothes might be appropriate–a clerical collar, for instance, or outdoor wear for outdoor ministry. But to get dressed in the morning to go to work for God and have the primary goal be self-expression instead of representing the mission of the church is to concede that your work doesn’t matter very much. If you were a judge, you would serve the mission of the court by wearing your robe every day and a suit underneath it–why is ministry any less important?
Can you picture Jesus in a suit? I think he’d be more of a jeans guy. Jesus is not here for your elitism or your tearing down of fellow clergywomen. [ Lazy reactionary remarks are so disappointing and lazy. I think I said lazy twice. Because really? – PB
Later: Thanks for your awesome letter. It was nice talking. – VW]
I’ve been a regular reader for a few years now and I keep coming back to this confusion that people have between dress style and identity. All the usual complaints about inauthenticity and self-expression and so forth. Had a piece of this conversation with a peer colleague recently and I keep tumbling it around and I know you have been doing this since before I decided to go back to church (which wasn’t all THAT long ago.)
I think the word we are missing here is register – as in, level. Usually refers to formality or intimacy. People who haven’t worked out how to comfortably express their authentic selves in a wide range of registers tend to get locked into the register where they are comfortable — often one that’s too casual for formal situations. Most of us are not raised to expect power and authority. (I’m working on figuring that out for myself, at this arc of my orbit.)
What I mean is, like this: if your identity is an artist, and that’s coming out in your appearance, then… in the studio, you might have on paint spattered sweatpants and no makeup whatsoever. At a gallery opening, you could be wearing a classic cocktail dress with some over the top costume jewelry or a hand-crafted scarf — formal style, but showcasing some of your artistic flair. And so on.
A minister has at least as complex a public function as an artist, probably more so. Nobody cares if you write your sermon in your home office wearing last week’s yoga pants and a sweatshirt full of pet hair. Probably not the best choice for preaching it, though.
There’s nothing wrong with the CC poster’s boho sweater (except, maybe, Anthropologie’s owner’s politics) for the things you wear a sweater for. I bet it’s great with skinny pants for a pastoral call. But it’s the wrong register for a higher-formality event like all but the most casual weddings or funerals. Or advocacy at the state legislature or city council. Or a job interview. And so on.
Authenticity is not the opposite of formality. We all have registers where we’re more comfortable and registers where we’re less comfortable. Part of learning the trade is learning to work it and -get- comfortable in those higher-powered registers.
The idea of registers and voices is wonderful -we use our full instrument, our brain, body, voice attitude -every thing, not to keep ourselves as clergy merely comfortable and safe but to ensure we are helping to create space for God (how ever you understand that) and for that power to be present wherever we find ourselves professionally. I think C articulated all this far better than I. Thanks PB!
Back in the seminary days, I remember one of our professors asking our first-year class where the symbol of God was when we were visiting with our people with no Bible, no communion kit, no prayer book. Where was the symbol? (Insert blank look of students here.) It was US. We were the symbol of God’s presence in that moment.
When we take on the clergy life, we take on being a symbol, all the time. At the birthday party my kids attended yesterday, most people knew me as pastor, even if not their pastor. Did that affect how I dressed? Yep. Because like it or not, I am a symbol.
This is why I have faithfully followed this blog since I was a bona fide newbie at all this. My style is still my own, but what I represent is so much more important than I am. Paying attention to how I live into that reality in my wardrobe is part of the way I show respect for the calling with which I have been called, for the people among whom I live out this life, and for the God who has seen fit to bring us together.
Thanks, PB, for your commitment to helping us live into who we are.