This afternoon, I went up to an ordination in Canton (congratulations, Rev. Megan Lynes!), at which Carl Scovel preached the ordination sermon. I always enjoy hearing Carl Scovel preach, even when I find myself in complete disagreement with him — he’s that good a preacher.

And this afternoon, I found myself in complete disagreement with one thing Carl Scovel said in his sermon. He said that in the New England church tradition, a pulpit robe is the outward mark of an ordained minister. Well, that may be true for some New England ministers, but it is not true of all New England ministers — it is certainly not true of me. I think there’s a case to be made for ordained ministers not wearing any distinguishing clothing at all. In brief, my arguments against robes for ministers run roughly as follows: (1) robes are expensive, like $500 and up, and I’ve got better things to spend my money on; (2) the typical pulpit robe dates back 500 years to John Calvin, which by now, for us, is merely an arbitrary date — why not go further back and wear an alb, or come forward a few hundred years and wear a business suit?; (3) robes are, well, idolatrous — they’re the sartorial equivalent of graven images; (4) to paraphrase Henry Thoreau, any job that requires you to buy a new set of clothes is a job you should be wary of; (5) I spent too much time with the Quakers, really started to believe in the plain-dress-living-simply thang, and robes are definitely not plain dress; (6) um, hate to admit this, but pulpit robes look silly.

Now I admit that I do own a robe. I bought it used, at the used robe place in the basement of Sheehan’s in downtown Boston, and it cost sixty buck ten years ago (they told me they got it from a monk who had died). It’s an alb, which dates back two thousand years, cause if I’m gonna be even vaguely in the Christian tradition I might as well take the historical re-enactment thing all the way back to Jesus’s time; and if I think of it as historical re-enactment, then it’s not idolatrous. Besides, I never wear the thing except when once in a while for the occasional wedding.

That’s my take on ministers’ robes. Now excuse me while I duck behind this stone parapet while other ministers, the ones who like robes, throw things at me. Or, more likely, leave strongly-worded comments below….

Randy reminds me that this is the year of the Elliot Carter centennial. Randy went to one of the concerts at Symphony Hall in Boston this week, and wound up witting behind Gunther Schuller (who told Randy about playing Harry Partch’s big marimba, but that’s another story). Anyway, if you’re like me and can’t make it to one of the concerts, there’s still the Elliot Carter centennial Web site.