When Christianity Becomes a Dress Code

Where I am going with this, since it’s long: dress codes force us to be hypocrites, except when the dress code is what we’d be choosing to wear anyway. They force us into being something that isn’t quite who we really are, unless they line up with our own intuitive and creative and moral choices. When churches add Dress Codes to Christianity, those force people who want to be Christians at that church into pretending to be what they are not ie hypocrites, the very thing Jesus hates.

So – I was chatting on zoom to my amazing friend Jim Henderson the other day and he laughed when I said “I’m going to be eating my lunch while we talk, by the way”. He mused about how we’ve all become more relaxed about the whole zoom call thing. For example, we sometimes walk around with our computers, rather than feeling we need to be chained to a desk during our video calls.

People do usually have different dress codes for work video calls than social ones. And they take advantage of meetings being remote rather than in person: they leverage that by throwing on a business casual shirt over their T-shirt and shorts just before a work video call begins. They would not show up to an in person work meeting in shorts but, there’s no need to change out of them for a meeting in which only their top half is visible. People don’t like Dress Codes when they are arbitrary and uncomfortable so they do the minimum required in order to comply.

Shoe Dress Codes for women: that’s an example of something arbitrary which generally causes suffering to women. When shoes fit and are comfortable and an attractive style we like, we don’t have a problem wearing them. We love wearing those! Speaking for myself this is a rarity: for my whole life I have had to go to dedicated shoe stores which have ‘extra extra wide’ shoes in order to get shoes that simply fit and are comfortable. Finding ones that are fashionable as well is a stretch goal. If you don’t believe me, look at a shoes website and then select on extra extra wide. See what’s left and consider what just went away. I think you’ll see my problem if you do that.

For what it’s worth, I don’t know if men in general even stop to consider the shoe related suffering that is a part of most womens’ lives. When I was working, it felt borderline unacceptable not to wear high heeled shoes with narrow toeboxes to work. Because that was the dress code. I feel fairly sure that most women even with normal sized feet do not have triangular shaped feet that end in a point. These shoes are clearly not foot-shaped. Then add to that the high heel which means gravity constantly forces your toes forwards into the triangle part of the shoe. These shoes stress your body because it’s hard to walk on a tiny heel. For me it was impossible to wear shoes like that and not my feet hurt by the end of the work day.

I thought that was bad enough but I had no idea how much worse it has been for some women in some societies. I had no idea what other women had suffered, for the sake of some arbitrary standard of beauty for womens’ feet in their culture. I was horrified and heartbroken the day I learnt that some societies used to routinely bind the feet of little girls, literally breaking the bones in their feet so that they grew to be very misshapen, causing them much pain and lifetime mobility problems. I thought I had it bad that the shoes I was supposed to wear to work were uncomfortable. I’m sure that it was the adult women who bound the feet of the little girls, knowing they were causing them extreme pain, because they had been through it themselves. Maybe it made them seem like harsh mothers and grandmothers because they had to turn away to stop themselves crying over the pain they were inflicting on the daughters they loved. I expect they felt they had no choice because they did literally have no choice. It would not have been an option to say “hey maybe let’s not do this to our own daughter”. That was probably like saying “hey let’s make our daughter unmarriageable and doom her to a horrible life.” Maybe it was literally true that the pain of bound feet in that society was better than the pain of a lifetime of being ostracized for having feet that were considered unacceptably ugly. Although they were simply natural feel, essentially the same feet it was fine for men to have. If anything they were a bit smaller and daintier. But not small and dainty enough, evidently.

Anyway so, arbitrary standards of beauty and dress codes can do a lot of harm. Sometimes they are mostly harmless. Sometimes they are evil and cause immense suffering.

They also force people into being not who they are ie hypocrites. If there’s one thing clear from the synoptic gospels it’s that Jesus hated hypocrites. The word ‘hypocrite’ is most often defined as someone who doesn’t practice what they preach ie they tell me to do something but don’t do it themself. Interestingly the word is derived simply from the word ‘actor’ meaning someone who plays a part. In this context it means meaning someone who is pretending to be what they are not, in a way which hurts themselves and others. Jesus’ complained in the strongest terms about the hurt caused by the leaders’ suffering.

Work Dress Codes are a sort of game; albeit a game that has mostly hurt women more than men; but still a game that we implicitly agree to if we accept a job.

When Dress Codes are added to Christianity, I suppose you could say it’s a game that people agree to. But it isn’t really, because the implication is that this is truly God’s Dress Code and if you don’t comply, at best you are displeasing God. At worst you could literally be choosing to go to hell. Now, by definition humans are not omnipotent. Christians tend to say God is beyond our understanding. However the same Christian often then say with certainty “so here’s Gods’ mandatory Dress Code”, even though they know they are not omniscient and they just said they don’t understand God fully.

One caveat at this point: there is a story in Matthew 22 in which a person who shows up to the King’s wedding without observing the dress code is – using the Bible’s terminology – literally sent to hell for that. Here’s the passage

But when the king came in to see the guests, he noticed a man there who was not wearing wedding clothes. He asked, ‘How did you get in here without wedding clothes, friend?’ The man was speechless. “Then the king told the attendants, ‘Tie him hand and foot, and throw him outside, into the darkness, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.’ (Matt 22:11-13, NIV)

I never understood that because, why does a dress code even matter? To God? Rereading this now, wow, the King starts out super-kind, he gives the man a chance to explain and even calls him ‘friend’! Then, just because the man didn’t answer the King then goes all super-mean and literally sends him to hell. (As a Christian I was taught that this outer darkness state is eternal hell aka eternal torment. It’s not just a time-out. It’s not “come back when you’ve thought of a better answer than nothing at all”) Anyway there are obviously levels to this story which I am missing since I have no idea why the King seems to be a different person entirely after simply not getting an answer to his question.

Anyway, examples: here are some Specific Dress Codes of Christians. Some US churches imply a dress code of Be A Republican. I’ve actually been given ‘how to vote’ cards at church in the past and had political candidates say words from the pulpit, which should be illegal. Anyway I find Be A Republican very unfair. I know from growing up in another country that there’s at least one country in which if the churches do have a political dress code it’s Be A Democrat. Evidently Christians sincerely disagree on how Jesus would vote. It’s unhelpfully invalidating to make political choices a dress code rather than trusting other Christians to prayerfully and thoughtfully make their own decisions on which candidate Jesus would vote for.

Churches do tend to have literal Dress Codes. A person who violates them in a moderate way is not likely to get kicked out (they probably would be kicked out if they showed up naked). The moderate dress-code violator is allowed to stay but might be judged as a less ‘serious’ Christian because they didn’t strictly adhere to the dress code. They are likely to suffer for their choice not to toe the line.

Honestly, I think the issue of womens’ roles in churches that limit them may simply be a Dress Code. Because it makes so little sense that women are allowed to teach young boys the Bible, but once those boys get to a certain age it is a sin for the women to ‘teach’ them? How could it be less sinful to teach young impressionable minds than adults who can think for themselves about whether what they are taught is true? In reality it seems rather convenient to have women allowed to teach children in Sunday School. If only men were allowed to teach boys they’d have to forgo hanging out with other adults in order to do that. Fortunately the women are allowed to do it so guess what, go enjoy doing what you do the rest of the time – go look after the kids. While I hang out with other adults and have fun.

Ok I got a bit off track there. Seriously though. When a Dress Code lines up with what is convenient for you or preserves your privilege, how do you tell the difference between a dress code and what God really cares about? How do you know he really wants it rather than it’s convenient for you and preserves your privilege? Yes it could be a both/and, but what if it’s not and your dress code is really hurting other people?

I don’t think I tied in the hypocrite part very well. Here’s one more go: please don’t add Dress Codes to your church which force your members to pretend to be what they are not, ie hypocrites? Please don’t have Dress Codes which make Christians be, in actuality, what Jesus hates most ie hypocrites.