How clergy dress sends a message—but which one, and why?

What we wear sends a particular message. But, ironically, the message that conventional clergy attire (clerical collar, cassock, and so on) sends is actually the opposite of what it was designed to communicate. And what message do we actually want to convey?

I was interested to read, two weeks ago, Angela Tilby’s column in the Church Times, How clergy dress sends a message. I think she makes some astute observations about the importance of our attire.

In our class-conscious society, there will be many who regret the association of clergy with “status” and believe that they are more accessible in ordinary clothes. This assumes, of course, that there are “ordinary” clothes. But clothes are always coded symbols. Jeans and trainers send a particular message, as do jackets and chinos, suits and shorts, dresses, skirts, tops, and jeans.

She is correct that our clothing does send a message, and she clearly believes that clerical attire should send a particular one.

In a society that has lost touch with scripture and, with it, all kinds of “habits” of understanding, there is something to be said for the clergy to be visible, even if the first sight of oneself in a clerical shirt causes a frisson of panic.

It is worth noting that the message we convey in Western culture is much less clear that it has been in the past. Going back to the origins of the Church of England, we need to note that Elizabeth I inherited and enforced a long tradition of sumptuary laws—laws regulating what people of different ranks could wear. Their purpose was not primarily economic but social and political: to preserve the visible hierarchy of English society—though they did also sometimes have an economic purpose. (The Statute of Caps in 1571 required every male over the age of six (with some exceptions) was required to wear a cap made of wool on Sundays and holy days. The cap had to be made in England by someone registered in the trade of Cappers, and the law was designed to protect the wool trade.)

Thus, in historical paintings and decent historical dramas, you can often tell what occupation people had by the clothes they wear—you can distinguish shepherds from carpenters from blacksmiths from shop keepers very easily and quickly. Of course, some of these originated as functionally appropriate—but the particular tradition of dress then becomes an end in itself and a marker of identification.

But we have no such laws today! There are often unwritten expectations in different contexts, so if you work in business, you dress in a particular way, and if you are a ‘customer facing’ employee, there will be exceptions. (When I worked in business, in Mars Confectionery in Slough, there was a rather hilarious set of unspoken and unwritten expectations about what to wear in the office. Two-piece suit was fine, but three-piece was definitely frowned upon. And having a beard was definitely taboo!)

So we have moved, over the centuries, from a culture where dress was defined, was hierarchical, and was designed to communicate the social hierarchies of the time. Within this context, where did clerical dress fit?

Angela notes, correctly, the origins of the cassock:

It is, perhaps, worth remembering that the technical name for a Church of England minister is “clerk in holy orders” (hence terms such as “clergy” and “cleric”). The phrase is a reminder that, in the Churches of the Reformation, the clergy are, indeed, “clerks”: those who are “educated” in scripture and are, therefore, capable of teaching the flock and offering pastoral care. That is why the choir dress of the English clergy is a form of academic dress, complete with university or college hood, and usually worn with a surplice.

In fact, its history goes further back than that. The cassock ultimately derives from the long tunics (Latin tunica) worn throughout the late Roman Empire. I remember being struck by this the first time we visited Morocco on holiday a few years ago: all the men appeared to be wearing cassocks! I suddenly thought that, if I wore my cassock, I would fit in rather well! The main difference is colour; where the tunica could be different colours (and in Morocco they still are), at the Reformation black gradually became dominant after the Reformation because it conveyed, sobriety, learning, seriousness, and humility—but it also reflected the dress of university scholars and educated professionals.

As secular fashion gradually shortened and became more varied during the Middle Ages, clergy tended to retain the older, longer style of clothing. This is a common pattern in history: institutions often preserve older forms of dress after the general population has moved on.

So for the cassock, there has been a double preservation—from ordinary clothes, to academic wear, and from academic wear, to the clerical. (I suspect I am relatively unusual in having attended a school where teachers wore an academic gown to teach in the classroom…! But it used to be the norm.)

The key thing we need to note here: the purpose of the cassock was not to be distinctive but to conform—to conform to a particular class within the hierarchy (the educated) so as to be an indistinguishable part of them. When fashions moved on, the institutionalised practices of the Church were cemented, and so the distinctiveness which Angela thinks is a virtue arose completely by accident.

The same is true of the clerical collar. The white clerical collar has a much shorter history than the cassock. Although it now seems quintessentially ‘traditional’, it is largely a nineteenth-century development. Ironically, what many people think of as the timeless badge of Anglican clergy would have been unknown to most English clergy before about 1850.

As you might have discerned from watching Jane Austen adaptations (the 2005 Pride and Prejudice with Matthew Macfadyen and Kiera Knightley remains my favourite) high collars with a white cravat was the distinctive dress of gentlemen. It was to fit in with and be indistinguishable from this class that clergy adopted the same fashion.

During the nineteenth century, men’s fashion changed dramatically. High, stiff detachable collars became common because they were easier to wash than shirts (though, as Angela notes, it was unlikely that it was the men doing the washing or ironing!), they were cheaper to replace, they could be heavily starched. Clergy adopted these collars in black shirts, and eventually, instead of wearing a complete white collar, they began wearing only the visible white front attached to a black collar—which  gradually evolved into the familiar “dog collar.” (The main virtue of this, as any cleric will tell you, is that if you have forgotten to slot one in, you can quickly adapt a plastic washing-up bottle or a piece of white card in an emergency…!)

Once more, something that was intended to be a sign of conformity to a particular class became a sign of difference, since fashion moved on, whilst the Church stayed still.

It turns out that this dynamic—of institutional conservatism in contrast to societal change—is found in all sorts of institutions and organisations. Judges’ wigs are a good example (and are also the subject of a similar debate). In seventeenth-century England, wigs were simply fashionable men’s wear. Judges, barristers and gentlemen all wore them. When wigs went out of fashion in the late eighteenth century, lawyers kept wearing them because they were part of professional dress, they marked continuity, and they came to distinguish the legal profession. But the original reason lawyers wore wigs was simply that everybody respectable did!

(Soldiers’ ceremonial uniform is similar. The bearskins of the Guards have a complex history! Soldiers normally wore wide-brimmed hats, but grenadiers (who threw grenades) needed something to allow free movement of their arms. They thus wore ‘mitre hats’, first adopted by the Prussians, and these developed into tall hats that looked imposing and made soldiers seem taller and more intimidating. The British guards adopted them after they defeated Napoleon’s Imperial Guard at Waterloo—they basically stole them as a trophy of victory! Now, of course, they have no practical function.)

This is how the process goes:

1. Everyone wears X because it is ordinary.
2. Fashion changes, but one institution is conservative.
3. That institution continues wearing X simply because it always has.
4. X becomes distinctive.
5. Later generations ask, “Why do we wear X?”
6. Symbolic or theological explanations develop. These explanations are entirely post hoc and actually have nothing whatever to do with the origins of what is worn.

So let’s return to Angela’s original question: what message does distinctive clerical dress now convey?

She was prompted to write, because this is ‘ordination season’, and those ordained will be wearing—for the first time—distinctive clerical dress. This has a significant psychological impact, since when a caste has a distinctive dress, adopting that dress has a powerful psychological effect in a person’s induction into that caste. That is why ordinands wearing cassocks feels so important.

I had a similar experience when working at Mars. After a spell in the national office, I ran a production line in the factory, and for that you had to wear ‘whites’, a clean white work shirt and trousers, with black DMs, which was provided for you for the purposes of food hygiene. But everyone had their own name sown on to the whites. I can still remember the feeling of opening my locker for the first time, taking out the whites, and seeing my own name stitched on them. I suddenly felt like I really belonged!

And there is no doubt that distinctive dress has an impact on the sense of identity for those who are ordained. Social identity theory tells us that wearing distinctive clothing increases a person’s sense of belonging to the group, increase role salience (people become more conscious of acting consistently with the role represented by the clothing; this is sometimes called “enclothed cognition”), and encourage conformity—uniforms tend to reduce individual variation and reinforce institutional norms.

Whilst there are clearly some benefits to this—is this what we want in our clergy? Greater institutional conformity?

And what impact does distinctive dress have on those outside the group? How does it affect perception of others? Angela notes that, if you wear a collar, then sometimes people feel able to talk to you, and it is possible to say and do things (as a member of a ‘respected’ profession—though this is increasingly less the case) that you otherwise would not.

But it also can create distance, and put other people off, especially those who have a lower view of the Church and the Christian faith in general. Besides, I personally find that smiling and saying nice things to people is perfectly sufficient to open up trust and conversation!

The creation of distance is especially pronounced when clothing is ornate. From a psychological point of view, human beings are remarkably sensitive to costly signals. Expensive clothing communicates authority, prestige, wealth, power, and institutional importance. This is sometimes discussed in terms of the Costly signalling theory (yes, there is such a thing!): because elaborate dress is difficult or expensive to acquire and maintain, it signals high status or commitment. This then makes people perceive that the person dressed expensively and elaborately is elevated, remote, and ‘not one of us.’

More seriously, there is clear evidence that such dress also creates ‘authority bias’. Research consistently finds that people (quite unconsciously)  attribute greater competence and authority to individuals dressed in expensive or formal clothing. Again, this results in increased compliance, greater deference, and a reduced willingness to challenge.

Dear reader, as you have got this far in the article, I am sure you are asking yourself ‘Why hasn’t Ian talked about bishops wearing mitres yet?!’ Well, that is a whole other subject, and there are very good reasons for bishops to throw away their mitres, because they are simply not historically Anglican, because they are derived from dubious symbols of power and dominance—and also they look silly.

But they fit exactly, psychologically, with the aspects of expensive dress I have listed above.

A confession: I have generally been a fan of wearing a dog collar, and I don’t mind wearing cassock and surplice (though I find them hot and not very comfortable). But the more I reflect on their origins, their first meanings, and their impact today, the more I am inclined to think again.

Does Jesus call us to be distant, in a hierarchy, and set apart socially from those around us? Does he ask this of those called to distinct ministries? I remember once reading a father of the church say ‘I would rather people knew I was a bishop by my lifestyle rather than my dress’; I cannot now find the quotation, but it is a good instinct.

And within the Church of England, with its excess number of leaders, and trust at a low ebb, do we really need more institutional conformity and a greater culture of deference?

Angela is right: we need to think about how clergy dress sends a message.