Good Shepherd Lutheran Church

Thoughts on the Divine Service
37. What to Wear

Dear friends,

On August 1, 1993, I was ordained into the Holy Ministry at Valley of Peace Lutheran Church in Hailey, Idaho. As I processed up the aisle that Sunday, my three-year-old niece inquired of her mother, loud enough for all to hear, “What is Uncle Tim doing IN A DRESS?”

With this bit of family lore burned into my brain, perhaps we should take a moment and talk about vestments, the pastor’s “uniform” for Divine Service, before moving on to a new topic. To prevent complete and total nerdiness, I’m sticking with the basics, as we could break the internet before we ran out of variations to talk about.

Let’s start with something that shouldn’t surprise you by now: like everything else in the Divine Service, vestments are meant to point to Christ.

Vestments basically have a twofold purpose: liturgical and universal. Regarding the liturgical purpose, vestments signal that worship is taking place—you won’t find a pastor in vestments at the grocery store, playing golf or riding a scooter down the street, no matter how cool the scooter may be. Regarding the universal purpose, vestments are designed to make pastors look alike: as one of my professors said, you can’t tell if a vested minister is wearing a suit from Sears or Gucci. Personal fashion statements don’t belong when conducting a service, because the person of the pastor shouldn’t matter: what matters is that there is a called and ordained servant of Christ, and you should expect him to distribute Christ’s gifts to you by his preaching, teaching and administering the sacraments.

The basic color scheme of vestments is white over black. In this case, black symbolizes sin and white symbolizes holiness, and white covering black is a reminder that Christians are forgiven for their sin because they are covered (clothed!) in the righteousness of Christ (Gal. 3:27). The pastor usually wears an alb—a simple white robe—for the Divine Service. For daily offices, traditionally a surplice (white robe) is worn over a cassock, a black robe. (I cheat a bit on this one, wearing a white alb with a hood-like collar, evoking something that a monk might wear to matins or vespers in a monastery.)

The stole is a narrow band of cloth, shaped sort of like a scarf, that goes around the pastor’s neck and hangs down the front. It’s meant to evoke a yoke: as a called and ordained servant of Christ, the pastor is yoked to his Lord and may only say and do what the Lord has given him to say and do. If the pastor stops preaching God’s Word rightly divided, he is unyoking himself and going his own way. At Good Shepherd, the stoles match the paraments in color and design, signalling that the pastor is called to preach and teach most specifically at this pulpit and altar. He foremost serves the people of God here.

The last vestment we use at Good Shepherd regularly is the chasuble, which I put on just before Holy Communion. I used to laugh when someone would describe it as a “holy poncho,” but in truth its style originates in the poncho-style outer garments worn by Romans in the times of the early Church. The chasuble is worn by the celebrant, the pastor who presides over the Lord’s Supper. I’m told it’s to remind us of the parable of the wedding feast (Matt 22:1-14): the pastor puts on the extra “wedding garment” to remind all that the Holy Communion is “a foretaste of the feast to come,” namely the marriage feast of the Lamb in His kingdom, which has no end.

As long as we’re on the topic of clothes in worship, what should you wear? Here’s my simple advice: wear what is fitting to come into the presence of Holy God as part of the body of Christ. Remember, after all, that you are drawing nearer to the Lord than did the high priest in Old Testament! This is counterintuitive to the culture in which we live, because our society makes use of clothing to draw attention and express individuality. Vanity and pride overcome modesty and humility. T-shirts carry slogans that make people stare and read. We want to look smart. We want to look good. We want to look attractive, to attract attention. But church is not a place for costumes and fashion statements: it’s where believers gather not as individuals, but together as the Church. Dress as one coming penitently into the presence of God, ready to receive and rejoice in His gifts, letting all the glory and attention go to Him.

Can’t resist some nerdy notes …

• The cincture, or rope around the waist, has no liturgical meaning whatsoever. It functions as a belt to keep billowy robes in check.
• Clergy shirts commonly come in two collar styles. The Roman collar features the square of white in the front, while the Anglican collar features a band of white that encircles the neck (my preference). There’s no such thing as a Lutheran collar: both Roman and Anglican collars indicate that the wearer is a minister (or an imposter, I suppose), so there’s no need to reinvent the wheel. The symbolism here is that the white of the shirt covers the vocal cords: the pastor voices the holy Word of God to all who will hear. Clergy shirts come in all sorts of colors and even some prints. I stick with drab black, both to keep the symbol of sin in need of covering, and because no one’s memory of church should ever be, “That was some wild shirt the pastor had on today.”
• “Surplice” is a combination of two Latin words to mean, “the robe of fur worn over another garment.” In colder climes and earlier times, the minister needed an extra layer to stay warm in the drafty stone buildings, so the surplice appeared as a necessity. My imagination puts me wearing a bearskin rug for the service, but it’s not going to happen.
• Material-wise, the preferred fabric for paraments and vestments is linen because of the cloth’s preparation: to produce linen, the flax must be harvested, broken down and then woven into cloth. In the laborious process, Christians found a theme of life, death and resurrection.