Why do some priests and nuns never wear religious clothing

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I would like to know if anyone thinks they understand why some priests and sisters never wear religious clothing. I have known a number of them.
 
Dioscecen priests are not required to where their clericals at all times and so there are some who don’t when they are out with friends, on vacation, etc.

Some religious orders no longer have specific habits either. Religious sisters/brothers in those orders just wear simple, practical clothes that are appropriate to their work. In fact, many original nun habits where just simple clothes that ordinary people at the time wore. Especially for active (not cloistered) orders, wearing a habit was a safety measure also. And certainly having everyone wear the same thing was a savings in money.

All that said, there are some very powerful reasons for wearing a habit/clericals. One obvious reason is that it is a sign to us lay people and helps us to remember to pray for vocations or even inspires vocations.
 
Sr_Sally said:
Religious sisters/brothers in those orders just wear simple, practical clothes that are appropriate to their work. In fact, many original nun habits where just simple clothes that ordinary people at the time wore.
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Yes, I had a couple sisters tell me that what they wore was their habit, even though it was not distinctively Catholic. The idea, apparently, was to blend in and not to stand out from the people they were helping.
 
Fr John Corapi tells some stories about receiving horrible abuse from passersby when out in his clericals. I’d imagine these days a lot of priests and nuns get the same treatment. Sadly, that makes it a little more understandable that some of them might not want to be a target for such abuse.

Not to mention there are many of the people they help who would be intimidated or otherwise have a bad reaction to uniform clothing of any kind - be it police, military or religious.

Mind you, just this morning I was out shopping and saw a priest from our nearby Maronite parish in full regalia - it was an awe-inspiring and heartlifting sight. So I can see there are plenty of arguments pro as well as con.
 
I saw my former pastor in a Roman collar 3 times in 4 years. The new pastor wears his whenever he participates in ecumenical events (ministerial meetings, ecumenical services, etc). Although they both belong to the same Religious Congregation, they were trained in different parts of the world.
 
All of our priests wear their clericals when they are around the parish, even when it is not their duty day. But when going out with friends or on their day off they usually dress down. When I went on pilgrimage with two priest friends of mine they didn’t wear them at all the whole two weeks (They wore shorts or chinos and t shirts most of the time as it was way too hot) although they did bring their albs and stoles to celebrate Mass daily with us.
 
The parish priest of my old high school wore his collar every day except when he joined us for the senior trip to Disney World. He was a fun guy, too…
 
The priests at my parish are Franciscans, and the only time I’ve seen one of them not in his habit was when he was out jogging.
 
Cluny said:
I can assure you that the garb of holy poverty can be VERY expensive.

See this site for an example:

conventofsaintelizabeth.org/apparel/monastic.html
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On the other hand, Mother Teresa told her nuns never to have more than two habits (one to wear while the other was being washed). If you think of it that way, it compares favourably to the amount most of us spend on our multiple changes of clothing. And unlike us, their fashions don’t change every year or two 🤷
 
I always compliment a nun for being visible in her habit. The priests in my current parish almost always are “in uniform”, unlike my former pastor whom nobody can recall ever seeing in clerical attire.
I have had to say, “No sir, I am not a priest, this is a black turtleneck sweater from Old Navy.” 🤷
 
The priests in my Latin Rite parish tend to wear clericals (black shirts and collars) whenever they are doing parish work. They tend to not wear them “off duty.” My Melkite pastor always wears clericals and a cassock when he is doing anything related to being a priest – although on his day off he does not. When serving as a Melkite deacon I wear clericals, but as a Latin Rite deacon I do not.

We have several orders of sisters in my area. Most do not wear formal habits (although three orders so). The Sisters of St. Joseph wear a distinguishing broach (a stylized cross) that reflects their calling to religious life, but other than that they wear simple clothing.

Deacon Ed
 
in the case of religious sisters or brothers it is best to assume, that unless you definitely know otherwise, whatever they are wearing is what has been prescribed by their order for the activity in which they are engaged–teaching, nursing, leisure time etc.

In the case of the priest, again the order or the bishop tells them what to wear for liturgy, for official meetings and duties, and in their leisure time, so unless you know definitely to the contrary, assume they are obeying their guidelines.

As to why any individual priest or sister chooses what to wear, I assume the answer is they have chosen what is appropriate and permitted for whatever activity they are doing.
 
Having been raised in a time where all nuns had a distinctive mode of dress that immdeiately identified them as members of a specific order, one needs to realize that the garb they wore was designed, in some cases, literally centuries before and modifed very little over those centuries. I was schooled by nuns who belonged to the the order SNJM, and they wore what looked like a blinder; if you were to take a piece of paper about 20" long and about 6" deep, and with the middle on the top of your forehead, bring the sides down, you would approximate what the “blinder” looked like. It was at best hazardous for any nun who was driving. In short, the dress most often was heavy, cumbersome, and styled decades and centuries before.

That is not to suggest that a nun has a calling to be a fashion plate. But Rome consented to allow the orders to revise their mode of dress, and the result was that it occured at a time that the whole western Church was going through a whip-snap. The result was that the baby was thrown out with the bath water. The habit was much less the issue than the sypmtom. At about the same time, many if not most of the orders were going through a re-grouping about what their charism was. Teaching orders found that they could no longer subsist with below minimum wages; schools who no longer had a relatively “free” labor pool were shut down; orders started to decline in numbers and increase in age (this is all taking place over forty years or so), and we ended up with nuns who used to live in community and pray in community breaking that community up. A lot of the orders who are struggling now are those with little or no identification as to who they are and what they are about. And the habit is only symptomatic of a much deeper problem.

And to anyone who says “if they had just kept their habits”, you have no clue about form over substance. The change was not about the habit; the loss of the habit was simply emblematic of the change.
 
Canon 284: “Clerics are to wear suitable ecclesiastical garb according to the norms issued by the conference of bishops and according to legitimate local customs.”
 
Cavaille-Coll said:
Canon 284: “Clerics are to wear suitable ecclesiastical garb according to the norms issued by the conference of bishops and according to legitimate local customs.”
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Which perhaps explains why there are pictures of Ratzinger as an adult in a suit and tie.
 
otjm said:
Which perhaps explains why there are pictures of Ratzinger as an adult in a suit and tie.
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There is one picture of him with his brother relaxing at home in a suit. Older Germans tend to dress formally even around the house, and even popes are not expected to wear clerical garb in their own home. He does not, however, wear a suit in public or wear street clothes, as do those who are the subjects of this thread.
 
Maybe I’m shallow, but I wouldn’t want to be a priest if I didn’t get to wear the collar!

That thinking could be the reason why I’m not called to be a priest.
 
Cavaille-Coll said:
There is one picture of him with his brother relaxing at home in a suit. Older Germans tend to dress formally even around the house, and even popes are not expected to wear clerical garb in their own home. He does not, however, wear a suit in public or wear street clothes, as do those who are the subjects of this thread.
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There are dozens of pictures of Joseph Ratzinger wearing a suit and tie all over the Intenet. And not just at home. Pictures of him as a professor at the different universities he taught at, as well as during many vacations with his brother. It was the custom in Germany for secular priests who worked in a university not to wear clerical garb. I’ve actually read comments on some blogs from a few of the more radical traditionalists who saw these pictures make the claim that by wearing only a suit and tie, it was proof that he is a liberal, modernist heretic etc. Take your pick! The usual well-informed comments.
 
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