George Carlin observed, “Have you ever noticed that anybody driving slower than you is an idiot, and anyone going faster than you is a maniac?” The same principle applies with clothing. People make lots of different choices about clothing—how much money to spend on it, what style to go for, how much time to spend putting together an outfit on a given day, etc.—and those that make different decisions than we do are either slobs or snobs.
So, in an effort to get beyond thinking of each other as a bunch of slobs and snobs, here are a few different New Church perspectives on clothing.
Why did I choose to wear the clothes that I’m wearing today? Why do I like certain clothes and not other ones? I’d like to think that it’s just my sense of style, but a couple of passages indicate that it’s the spirits with us. Swedenborg reports that:
There are spirits who constitute...craving.... A kind of craving causes us to desire numerous things, such as baths, the clothes we like to wear, and so on.
One spirit longed so much for me to put on a certain suit that unless I did so, according to him, he could hardly live. And when I was dressed in it, he got such enjoyment from it that nothing could have been more enjoyable. He begged to be left in that joyful state. (Spiritual Experiences 1563-1564; cf. Spiritual Experiences 817)
Considering that all of our thoughts and desires come from the spirits with us (Arcana Coelestia 5977), it makes sense that our thoughts and desires about clothing do too. I usually forget about this, but I think it could be helpful to remember when I find myself overly focused on what I’m wearing or what other people are wearing, or find myself really wanting to have a certain piece of clothing.
Though we may be bothered by thoughts about clothing during our natural lives, there is hope that we’ll be able to leave these behind once we die.
A person is able to know for himself that when he passes into the next life he leaves many things behind him. He knows—since they have no place there—that he leaves behind, for example, anxious cares over food, clothing, accommodation, and the acquisition of money and wealth, as well as anxious cares about his promotion to positions of importance—matters to which a person gives so much thought during the life of the body. (Arcana Coelestia 3957:4; cf. Divine Providence 220:5)
Man reflects upon the various things wherewith he may array, and with which he does array himself; and this variously. Neither do spirits do this. Garments are given them according to their state; and they do not know whence and at what time, nor do they care. (Spiritual Experiences 4716)
We can stop having anxious cares about clothing after death because everyone is given food, clothing, and shelter according to the uses they perform (Apocalypse Explained 1226:2; Heaven and Hell 393:3).
Sometimes it seems as though people after death consciously decide what they’re going to wear (Heaven and Hell 181) but most of the time they “do not know where their garments come from; they are clothed without their knowing how” (Arcana Coelestia 10536)—“in an instant [their clothes] are put on, replaced by new ones, or transformed” (Last Judgment Posthumous 331).
Because the Lord provides us with clothing after death, we will have the opportunity to stop obsessing about clothing but that doesn’t necessarily mean that we will. If we’re obsessed with having the “right” clothing in this life, chances are that we’ll still be obsessed with it in the next life (Arcana Coelestia 3957:3). The irony is that, if we are obsessed with external things like clothing, we will end up having clothes that are “drab and torn” (Arcana Coelestia 10536) because our spiritual clothes reflect what we are like on the inside.
Just because, in the life after death, people’s clothes change quickly does not mean that what they’re wearing is random and doesn’t matter. The clothing that is given to people is “determined by the changes of state they undergo in respect of truths. In short, the character of their understanding is what is revealed and represented by their garments...” (Arcana Coelestia 10536).
The clothing that angels wear so reveals and represents their character that “anyone...may recognize the character of...angels simply from the clothes they are wearing” (Arcana Coelestia 2576:2).
Clothing performs this same function in the natural world. The clothes we wear say something about who we are—“I’m a professional;” “I don’t care how I look;” “I support this cause.” In the natural world, though, a person’s clothing doesn’t necessarily represent what he’s like on the inside. And what a person is trying to communicate about himself with his clothing can be misinterpreted. A guy may be wearing a business suit and tie to say, “I’m a professional. You can trust me,” but the farmer he’s meeting with may interpret it as, “He’s a city person. He doesn’t know what he’s talking about.” In the spiritual world, though, a person’s clothing represents clearly to everyone who he is on the inside.
What are you trying to say about yourself with your clothing? What do you think your spiritual clothes look like right now?
So, if we want to have nice spiritual clothes, do we have to donate all of our clothes that cost more than $20 to charity and resolve never to shop anywhere but thrift stores and stores that end in -mart? The answer to that question is in this lengthy but great passage:
Some people are of the opinion that anyone who wishes to be happy in the next life ought never to indulge in bodily and sensory pleasures, but ought to renounce all such things. They say that such bodily and worldly pursuits are what deter and withhold men from spiritual and heavenly life. But people who think in this way and who willingly reduce themselves during their lifetime to a miserable standard of living are ill-informed of the truth of the matter.
Nobody is in any way forbidden to enjoy bodily and sensory pleasures, namely the pleasures of possessing land and wealth; the pleasures of positions of honor and of service to the state; the pleasures of conjugial love, and of love of infants and children; the pleasures of friendship and of social intercourse; the pleasures of the ear—the sweet sounds of music and song; the pleasures of seeing—things of beauty, which are manifold, such as nice clothes, attractive homes together with their furniture, beautiful gardens....
That the pleasures mentioned above are in no way denied anyone—indeed, far from being denied they are for the first time pleasures when they flow from their true origin—is also made clear by the fact that very many people who during their lifetime had power, position, and wealth, and enjoyed in abundance all pleasures of the body and the senses, are now in heaven among the blessed and happy. And with them now interior delights and happiness are living because they have had their origin in goods that stem from charity and in truths of faith in the Lord. And since these have originated in charity and faith in the Lord, they have looked upon all their pleasures from the point of view of use, which has been their end in view. To them the use itself has been exceedingly delightful, and from this has come the delight inherent in their pleasures. (Arcana Coelestia 995:1-2, 4)
It’s good to enjoy having nice clothes as long as the reason we enjoy them is because they allow us to be useful. I’m going to try to remember this and keep use as my end in view when I’m thinking about clothing.
Now, if you’re like me, you could use this principle to talk yourself out of ever buying any new clothing. “Do I really need this shirt to be useful? I could probably be just as useful with a cheaper shirt or with the shirts I already have.” There are spirits who try to get us to “take a conscientious stand on issues that are not vitally important. ...[T]hey make meticulous enquiries into matters into which no such enquiries at all ought to be made” (Arcana Coelestia 5386). It seems like these spirits would love to get us to think far too much about what clothes we wear or don’t wear, or buy or don’t buy.
How do we use the principle of focusing on the use of clothing as the end in view as a tool for getting ourselves more in line with heavenly priorities, rather than a way of getting ourselves tangled up in guilt and justification? The trick, I think, is to use it as a way of shunning evils rather than doing good.
The Heavenly Doctrines teach in many places that if we work on shunning an evil the Lord will be able to give us the opposite good (e.g. Doctrine of Life 18, 67-73). One passage that makes this point concludes by saying,
Cease, therefore, from asking in thyself, “What are the good works that I must do, or what good must I do to receive eternal life?” Only cease from evils as sins and look to the Lord, and the Lord will teach and lead you. (Apocalypse Explained 979:2)
If we work on rejecting selfish desires that have to do with clothing, then the Lord will be able to teach us and lead us to love the use of clothing. Here’s my list of clothing-related evils to shun. Please leave a comment if you think of some more.
This is my attempt to have a New Church perspective on clothing. Does it work for you? I know that the teachings of the New Church can help us, even with things like our issues around clothing. I also know that I haven’t covered everything that can be said on this topic, so please let me know where you think I’ve got it right and got it wrong and left something out so that together we can have a fuller and fuller New Church perspective on clothing.
Malcolm Smith is in his final year at the Academy of the New Church Theological School and will be heading to South Africa in a couple of months to be the Assistant to the Pastor at New Church Westville. He has a blog that he updates fairly regularly called New Church Thought (www.newchurchthought.org).