"Why are clergy the worst dressed people in church?" said a lay friend of mine the other day. "I know they shouldn't try to be too transcendent, but do they have to dress aiming to look like hobos?" he said.
It got me thinking. I must say I think he's onto something. Commonly, but not always I am pleased to say, in my experience the clergy dress worse than the lay people. Not as a question of casual versus formal. There is a way of dressing casual that looks really good. There is a way that looks positively daggy and scruffy.
I wonder why this is. I guess one of the reasons is that overall now we are a much more informal society and that means that a Sunday best really doesn't exist. A good guide is to just look at television. The Sunday presenters are dressed more casually than the weekday ones, and that should be a model, of course, to the clergy if they are not wearing more formal robes. Although there is a way of dressing casually which looks quite smart, there is a way of dressing casually that looks like you just don't care.
It may also be because clergy work out of their home and therefore don't have a clear delineation between the domestic sphere and the work or professional sphere. It's easy just to confuse the two, to hang around at home in your at home gear which then becomes your normal church gear.
It's not a good look. Especially for unbelievers and outsiders who may come along to church, particularly for special occasions, and find the minister frankly unimpressively dressed.
It also could just be some kind of strange overreaction to perceived but unreal threats of clergy holding some inappropriately "priestly" role. However, it is time we got over these hang-ups. It's the least of our problems in the Diocese of Sydney.
My own judgement is that ministers should dress appropriately to the congregation style, perhaps just a tad slightly higher, appropriate for their leadership role, neither standing out at the top nor at the bottom.
I know that worrying about what you should wear is something our Lord warns us against and so probably this whole blog is misguided.
Although if clergymen dressed better, I would be one and my friend another who will worry a little less about it too.
