Categories
Pastor's Life

How Pastors Should Dress

Listening to NPR today, I learned of the blog "Beauty
Tips for Ministers" run by Victoria Weinstein who calls herself
"PeaceBang" on the blog.  The Boston Globe also did a story in February
about it.

PREACHING FASHION: Minister advises clergy on style
Boston Globe – Feb 18, 2007

See especially the audio slideshow with photos of some do’s and don’t.


And the
interactive graphic "Preaching fashion" where you can put clothes on the clergywoman.

The following series of five posts on "Beauty Tips for Ministers" from
August 2006 are particularly interesting because they begin to get at
the philosophy/theology/rationale behind "how we dress." 

PeaceBang’s philosophy is that "if we do not project an image
intentionally, we will project one unconconsciously."  She argues
for responsible, well-dressed clergy in order convey respect for other
people.  Rev. Bluejeans writes to her arguing that "If I could wave a
magic wand, I’d institute mandatory casual dress at every church in the
country."  He wears jeans so that he can relate to common people. 

  1. PeaceBang’s Friendly Nemesis (Part I In a Series)
  2. My Response To My Friendly Nemesis (Part II In A Series)
  3. PeaceBang and Rev. Blue Jeans Continue (Part III)
  4. So Then I Said (Part IV In A Series)
  5. And Then He Wrote Back… (Part V Of A Series)

Rev. Bluejeans writes,

The entire thrust of the life and teachings
of Jesus is away from religiosity and toward an interior life of faith
. . . whatever he wore was low-key enough that
fit in just fine with lepers, prostitutes, and a ragtag bunch of
fishermen from the Galilee. And then there’s that whole “life is more
than food, the body more than clothes…consider the lilies of the field”
thing.

PeaceBang’s summary comment:

Because to me, dressing all humble when you have the means to afford
perfectly swell clothes is an expression of false piety — but my
correspondent there is saying that dressing UP is an expression of
false piety.

Interestingly, dress was a hot topic of discussion after I wrote "Image Isn’t Everything: the uneasy conscience of a GenX pastor" on Leadership’s Out of Ur blog in April 2006.  I argued that
emerging church pastors intentionally try to convey an image. 

People were agitated by these lines in my article:

[Emerging church pastors typically] . . . plan and prepare like crazy late into the night with the most
talented people they can find (musicians, technical folks, presenters,
set designers, chefs).  When it is event time, they put on their jeans (frayed and faded when
purchased), mess up their hair, stick on their tight t-shirt, have a
coffee in their hand, and saunter into the room as if they didn’t have a
care in the world. When people are amazed at the profundity and power
of what they experience, the pastor just shrugs and tells them, “I guess it worked.
It just happened.”

I wrote this in the comments:

People’s comments have mostly focused on “what pastors wear.” People
agree that we should spend more time caring about people than picking
out our wardrobe. However, there is a range of responses about how
seriously to take image management. On the one side, there are people
who think that church leaders should simply “be themselves.” Your green
plaid jacket may initially repel people but eventually people will be
won over by your sincerity. These people suggest that trying to do
“what’s cool” is bound to backfire because cool changes so quickly and
people will be turned off by what they perceive to be “fakeness.”
Furthermore, promoting a certain image will subtly communicate to
people that cool people are more welcome in the community. They contend
that Jesus and Paul were truth-conscious not image-conscious.
 

On the other side, we have heard from an image consultant and many
other pragmatic voices. They have argued that we have no choice but to
project an image. We might as well be aware of what we are
communicating. They argue that some people are naturals at fitting into
their surroundings but most need a spouse (or an image consultant) to
help them pick out what to wear. They would probably advocate
researching your target group and trying to take small steps towards a
more attractive image. They would admit that what is “appropriate”
(perhaps a better word than “cool”) changes. And so this target image
will probably continue to evolve and so you will probably have to keep
changing your image to fit. They would contend that Jesus and Paul were
certainly truth-conscious but were also image-conscious in adapting
their outreach to their hearers.

 

Two conclusions:

First, I think most agree that we should at least try to manage our
image by trying to keep body odor in check with regular showers and
deodorant. Most of us also agree that we should not use thousands of
church dollars to hire image consultants to conduct polls about whether
people perceive us to be “hard-working” if our sleeves are rolled up.
(I heard President Bush’s image consultants told him to do that). It is not wrong to be image-conscious. But
the key question is resources. How much time, money and focus are we
putting into our image projection? How much is too much?

 

Second, I think we should think long and hard before picking our
“target.” Typically, we pick high school youth, punks in a club, or the
golfing business owner. This is where we often make the mistake. We
tend to change our image to look younger or cooler or richer. God may
actually have intended us to reach someone else who we are now
alienating by our new image. We need to ask ourselves, “who has God put
in my life to reach? How can I serve them?”

A few interesting posts from PeaceBang’s "Beauty Tips for Ministers":


Two other resources:

  • Men’s Health: I have occasionly read the magazine Men’s Health at the gym and have enjoyed hearing their take on "style."  Here is the link to their style page. 
  • ChurchMarketingSucks.com
    has a similar function to "Beauty Tips for Ministers" in that they try
    to help churches promote themselves more effectively.  Like PeaceBang,
    they believe that pastors sticking their heads in the sand about image
    backfires longterm.  Churches who resist thinking about image still promote themselves but just
    poorly. Both blogs hope to alleviate that. 

Final editorial comment:

Jesus writes in Matthew 6:25-33 (i.e. So do not worry, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’ For the pagans run after all these things
. . .)  But Jesus saying we shouldn’t worry about these things does not
mean that there are not no ethical and theological considerations
involved in eating, drinking and "wearing."  There are.  For example,
dressing like a prostitute would not be appropriate.  We see in 1
Corinthians 11 women not wearing a headcovering in that culture which
was like coming to church topless.  (See 1 Corinthians commentary by
Richard Hays.  Gordon Fee agrees).  Or what about 1 Timothy 2:9 "I also want the women to
dress modestly, with decency and propriety, adorning themselves, not
with elaborate hairstyles or gold or pearls or expensive clothes." 

There are better and worse ways to eat and drink and yes get dressed in
the morning.  Now, these are not essentials of the faith but they are
part of living this human life well.  How do we in our culture dress
"with decency and propriety" (1 Tim 2:9)?  It is ok to talk and think
about it.       

11 replies on “How Pastors Should Dress”

It strikes me as particularly odd that pastors (or church attenders) would think that dressing casually is a good way to identify with the poor. I remember the summer I spent in West Africa while I was in college. *I*, the wealthy American, was easily the worst dressed person in the congregation in my khakis, golf shirt, and sandals. Men, women, and children dressed in their finest: suits, ties, the most beautiful African fabrics. Everyone went to great lengths to look beautiful for church. And all this at a time when Sierra Leone was one of the poorest countries in the world!

I would be interested in an anthropologist’s take on this odd phenomenon in our culture. I would not be surprised if ours was the only culture in human history that purposely dressed *down* to worship God.

Wow, John really wanted us to hear what he said, huh John? 😉

Of course the silly thing is to imagine that making an effort to dress and groom well and mindfully will keep you from GETTING TO THE DYING IN TIME. This is the sort of caution that, with all respect to John, cracks me up. Mostly what we’re talking about is educated, privileged people looking like messy frumps because they think that, as a spiritual leader, they’re somehow exempt from making a visual impression. Not to pick on you, John, but I couldn’t understand your first sentence to save my life. What did you mean?

The multiple postings took place because those anti spam numbers and letters kept on appearing. On most blogs they go away once you enter them correctly.

You ask what my first sentence meant. A colleague of mine recently had knee surgery. The only pants he could wear where short pants. One day his wife helped him visit a church member in the hospital with her pushing him in a wheel chair dressed in very nice conservative short pants and good clean shirt. That night, he received several phone calls blessing him out for how he was dressed.

Those people cared more about how he was dressed than they cared about him. Now the person he visited was not bothered by the pastor’s attire at all.

People have this image of Rev. perfect Superstar which we clergy have largely created. Many pastors learn to follow “Dress for Success” and keep themselves looking photo ready.

Put them in a relaxed isolated rural farming area or small coastal fishing village and they look strange. People in those setting often find ‘the perfect image’ pastor condescending because their attire out classes them greatly and thus makes them feel bad.

On the other hand, if your attire in a more sophisticated city church does not equal that of your professional business people, you are seen as a slob.

Yes, we must take care of keeping our bodies, teeth, clothes and shoes clean. We don’t need to cut the grass in our Sunday suit but we don’t need to in sloppy looking clothes that even Good Will would not take.

A UMC DS told me this one day when he raked me over the coals for dressing like a 50 year old man who had it all together when I was only 26. Well, what was wrong with my pin stripe suit with Brooks Bother shirt (bought from a discount store), polished wing tipped shoes, a new London Fog over coat and a Dobbs hat? His problem was it did not fit his image of those who went to seminary outside of NC.

I’ve seen Duke Divinity school graduates who dress that well in pastoral ministry, but I’ve also seen ones who shock me with their casualness. I also see the same thing when I compare many of my boys’ teachers. To many dress like they are wanting to look like everyone else. Praise God their are still some teachers who dress well and look professional like when I was in school.

When I have a chance, I do enjoy playing church sociologist by attending various church functions where no one knows me. Let me go really dressed up and wow their is a marked difference in how I’m treated than if I come in casual or a bit sloppy. (Sociologists have shown this is true in shopping too. You will actually be offered a better loan with lower rates if you dress well.

On the other hand, it does not matter when I’ve visited several store front churches in the city. Nor does it seem to matter in Roman Catholic churches either.

I do hope you can understand every sentence in my post.

What I expressed about getting to the dying on time is not silly. Our church was doing a dinner theater that week and I was playing big bad John. I did not wear my suit because I also helped with the food before we started and the parsonage was several miles away from this rural church out in a field.

When I stepped off stage, I was told about this man who probably was going to die and the hospital they were taking him to was a 30 minute drive. So, I washed my face, brushed my hair, but left my big overalls and boots on. The family was glad to see me but several church members including those on the PPRC raised cain about how I dressed in that emergency.

Maybe things are different where you were a pastor in Canada, but sometimes as a pastor you find yourself in a catch 22 when trying to minister to someone in a time of crisis. 🙂 Having read The Anatomy of Clergy Abuse by a Canadian pastor, I already know church life is sometimes as toxic there as it is here.

I think the clothes a pastor wears must fit with the identity of the church. I am relativist when it comes to what we wear. I personally have preached in several contexts and I adopted to whatever they wore. I have preached at a boomer church where I wore Kakis and Polos; a traditional church where I wore a suit; my home church where jeans and a t-shirt are acceptable. The place I preached at last was a congregation full of artistic people with dreadlocks, cool hats, woven clothes, sandals, etc. It was the only place I felt out of place. I opted just for jeans and a t-shirt again! As a pastor, my main concern is the preaching of the word; I just want to dress modestly so I don’t get in the way. This is Paul’s argument in 1 Corinthians 11. Woman wear headcoverings like your Greek culture! Prophesying and Praying were the priorities, but their dress was distracting. God and the NT writers give freedom to how we dress. We must not become legalistic about such things.

I think the clothes a pastor wears must fit with the identity of the church. I am relativist when it comes to what we wear. I personally have preached in several contexts and I adopted to whatever they wore. I have preached at a boomer church where I wore Kakis and Polos; a traditional church where I wore a suit; my home church where jeans and a t-shirt are acceptable. The place I preached at last was a congregation full of artistic people with dreadlocks, cool hats, woven clothes, sandals, etc. It was the only place I felt out of place. I opted just for jeans and a t-shirt again! As a pastor, my main concern is the preaching of the word; I just want to dress modestly so I don’t get in the way. This is Paul’s argument in 1 Corinthians 11. Woman wear headcoverings like your Greek culture! Prophesying and Praying were the priorities, but their dress was distracting. God and the NT writers give freedom to how we dress. We must not become legalistic about such things.

September 1, 1999
More Things A Man Should Know About Style
Esquire Magazine
http://www.esquire.com/features/man-at-his-best/ESQ0999-SEPT_THINGS

Style Rules for Summer
Buzz up!

Seasons change, and so should your wardrobe
August 1, 2006, 2:00 AM
http://www.esquire.com/features/instruction/ESQ0806GUIDE_55_3

February 19, 2008, 5:51 AM
The (New) Laws of Casual Style
Buzz up!

Put down the blue button-down, step away from the Crocs, and open your closet. We need to talk.

http://www.esquire.com/style/casual-style-0308

October 1, 2000, 12:00 AM
What to Wear to Work
Buzz up!

The Esquire Guide to Dressing for the New Office
http://www.esquire.com/style/fashion-story/what-wear-work-1000

One understands that men’s life is expensive, nevertheless different people require money for different stuff and not every man gets enough cash. So to receive good personal loans or student loan will be a proper way out.
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BLOG NAME: Wezlo’s Musings
DATE: 10/18/2007 08:41:58 PM
There’s an interesting discussion happening over on Church Leadership Conversations about “appropriate clergy fashions.” It’s interesting to me because the point of the conversation seems to make thr…
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TITLE: What Should Clergy Wear?
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IP: 76.116.67.8
BLOG NAME: Wezlo’s Musings
DATE: 10/15/2007 01:14:31 PM
There’s an interesting discussion happening over on Church Leadership Conversations about “appropriate clergy fashions.” It’s interesting to me because the point of the conversation seems to make thr…

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