Vestments
Vestment is the term used for specific clothing worn only when people lead worship services. Most scholars would agree that vestments have their origin in the ordinary street clothes of the Greco-Roman world of the first century, but have resisted anywhere near the kind of change that street clothes have undergone since that time. Today, vestments are designed to be worn over street clothes, serving a variety of practical purposes, including:
- Minimizing the distraction made possible by dramatic or fashionable street clothing
- Setting minimum standards of fashion for people while they worship
- Needlessly personalizing or drawing attention to the persons leading worship
- Declaring that the worship ministers are acting under orders proscribed for them by the community
- Focusing the people on the simplicity, beauty or wonder of God
Vestments in one form or another are in almost universal use in the Christian community. In some cases, churches prefer to use choir dress and in other cases, churches prefer to use Eucharistic dress. There is great variety, also, in who wears vestments in worship: choir only, lay leaders only, or some combination of all.
Vestments are not to be confused with clericals, the term used to denote the street clothing clergy wear. The most distinctive garment is the shirt, most often black, and the collar which comes in two basic forms: neckband or tab-collar. Anglicans most often wear the neckband shirt, although there are no firm requirements to do so.
