The eCrozier

A priest in our Diocese recently told me the story of a young woman she met in the town where she serves. She said the young woman was distraught because she had been asked to leave the Church she belonged to. The reason she was invited to leave? She apparently was not appareled appropriately. I recall the priest telling me that the young woman had told her she was dressed quite casually and that did not meet the standards of her home church.

And we wonder why some young adults have given up on church.

Now, I am no clothes’ horse. On a good day both my socks match. Besides, I wear a uniform most days so my haberdashery is pretty much set. I grab the suit closest to the closet door, get dressed, and go. I don’t give much thought to my clothes. I do, however, think that what we wear does matter, but only somewhat. In a clergyperson’s case, it signifies her/his office. In the context of the Eucharist, the vestments we wear offer a similar signifying of office and role in the liturgy. The vestments are actually meant to make our individuality subservient to the role we are serving in the liturgy. So, rather than drawing attention to the wearer, they are supposed to be directing attention to the worship of God.

People wear clothes for all sorts of reasons, most of them harmless. They like the colors. They like the way particular clothes fit on them. Or, sometimes there is the obligation to wear what a loved one gave you as a gift. And, yes, some people wear clothes they think will attract attention to themselves or make some sort of statement about who they are (or what their status might be). This, cultural anthropologists tell us, is part of some primitive mating ritual that we’re all still trying to understand.  Some people, of course, due to lack of financial capacity, are greatly limited in their choice of clothes. They have to wear what they wear.

Jesus tells us in Matthew 6:25-34 that life ought to be more than about what we wear. He equates our anxiety over things such as that of striving for the wrong things in life, or at least as having a striving that is disordered. He lets us know that God knows we all need something to wear to protect our bodies. But, he tells us, we ought to be striving for God’s Kingdom and God’s righteousness and the rest of the stuff, like clothes, will be ordered behind that.

I don’t know what possessed a person to tell a young woman she was not welcome in church because she was too casually dressed. My heart went out to her. So I wrote her and said: “Although I have no authority over the people or the church where you experienced such rejection, please let me apologize anyway on behalf of all Christians everywhere. If you were rejected that way, then all Christians in a sense suffer from the negative image that creates. You are always welcome to come as you are to any Episcopal Church. Please do not reject God simply because some pitiful and thoughtless person rejected you.”

+Scott