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I want to ask a few simple questions about head coverings. I do not want to debate this topic in this thread. Rather I just want simple, straightforward answers to the following questions:

Are there Conservative Anabaptist Churches (or other churches for that matter) that teach and practice that the head covering is only required to be worn during worship services? If so, are such churches found within a particular denomination/conference or are they more independent? In general, how do other Conservative Anabaptist churches feel about churches that teach that the head covering only needs to be worn during worship services?

Apostolic Christian Church and ACC (Nazarean) teach and practice this. My observation is they are gradually moving away from the veiling at all.

Church of the Brethren taught this in the first half of the 20th century and then transitioned away from the veiling, outside of a half dozen or so congregations who still technically teach this but veil most of the time outside of church.

Holdeman women wear a smaller symbolic cap outside of church and then wear a much larger head scarf to church.

There is someone who started wearing a head scarf a few months ago to an MC USA church, and once she did, a number of other women and girls spontaneously did too. That's not a teaching position at all tho.

When I was part of a Bible study this was a teaching I advocated for. That group still exists, one woman there now wears a head scarf anytime she thinks she might pray (basically all the time), another girl wears it to any Bible study or church.

I hope someone else can accurately describe how Hutterites and Amish approach the veiling.

The Ontario Old Order Mennonites and the Pa. Groffdale Conference seem to have a fairly open policy for younger single church members on wearing the covering. The covering seems optional outside of church services. Married women and older singles would seem to wear the covering more consistently than they did fifty years ago when it seemed acceptable to not always wear the covering. Today some kind of covering seems to be worn 24/7.

My understanding is that about 70 years ago many Mennonites women in Oregon did not wear the veil much outside of church services. I believe my grandmother may have only worn it to church and not at home. And then some of the young women began to wear it regularly, and then their mothers (my grandmother) began wearing it regularly as well. I think this was in the 1950's or 1960's. All of my memories of my grandmother is of her wearing it all the time.

However, at some point in the transition (1950's or 1960's) my grandparents changed churches also. My understanding is that today the church which they left (which would have been the one that she didn't consistently wear it) does not seem to require it at all. Only a few older ladies would wear something, and then mostly to church.

Just after my wife & I married we lived in South Dallas for one school year, while she finished up SIL (for the non-WBT people, that is the linguistics training course). We attended a Plymouth Brethren congregation, and the practice there was that the women who did not wear a hat (or a veiling like my wife) put some type of head covering on when they came in, or for those who covered their faces as well, only for prayer. (I don't know a great deal about this group as a whole, so I don't know how they would fit in terms of being anabaptist.)

I never understood why Mennonite women in our area (and we have many types of Mennonites) who wear a head piece 24/7 because they might pray at any point in the day, have husbands that don't go without a hat 24/7 for the same reason. The women could easily pull out a head piece of sorts when they were to pray outside of church just as easy as a man can remove his hat when he wants to pray outside the church. Seems there is two sets of practises for men and for women involving the same topic. To be consistent men should never wear a hat to be ready to pray at all times like the women.

There are at least 3 of the largest Mennonite groups in our area that do not, as a group, wear a head covering. Our MB church being one of them. But those individuals who chose to wear one are not a problem. Treated more as a Romans 14 issue.

I have asked the question about men being covered more than once; I always feel as though I should not wear my hat when driving so I am free to pray. I am told that our hat does not count - it is a weather protection. If we need to pray, there is nothing wrong with praying with our hat on our head. I am still not comfortable with this idea of praying while covered.

Sudsy wrote:There are at least 3 of the largest Mennonite groups in our area that do not, as a group, wear a head covering. Our MB church being one of them. But those individuals who chose to wear one are not a problem. Treated more as a Romans 14 issue.

Why not make it a 1 Corinthians 11 issue?

Sudsy wrote:I never understood why Mennonite women in our area (and we have many types of Mennonites) who wear a head piece 24/7 because they might pray at any point in the day, have husbands that don't go without a hat 24/7 for the same reason. The women could easily pull out a head piece of sorts when they were to pray outside of church just as easy as a man can remove his hat when he wants to pray outside the church. Seems there is two sets of practises for men and for women involving the same topic. To be consistent men should never wear a hat to be ready to pray at all times like the women.

There are at least 3 of the largest Mennonite groups in our area that do not, as a group, wear a head covering. Our MB church being one of them. But those individuals who chose to wear one are not a problem. Treated more as a Romans 14 issue.

The book Glories Seen & Unseen: A Study of the Head Covering provides good perspective on the issue of 24/7 wearing of head coverings by women and uncovered heads by men.

Hats Off wrote:I have asked the question about men being covered more than once; I always feel as though I should not wear my hat when driving so I am free to pray. I am told that our hat does not count - it is a weather protection. If we need to pray, there is nothing wrong with praying with our hat on our head. I am still not comfortable with this idea of praying while covered.

But hats in the OOM setting are more than a weather protection. I heard one of your ministers preach on 1 Corinthians 11 at a wedding. He made quite an issue about the need for men to wear the black hat. [I can't remember how he managed to work that into that scripture -- it was a pretty lame connection as I recall.] Someone approached me afterwards about it, since he knew I didn't wear one. This is the thought I went to -- if you are going to teach it from that perspective, it is no longer a mere weather protection, but a sign covering. And I feel it is wrong for a man to wear a sign covering.

If it is cold enough for me to need a hat here in the west, I want something a lot warmer than those black hats are.