Name: Mary Beth Voelker | Age: 59 | Location: Central North Carolina | Date started covering: Maundy Thursday, 2023

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1) Please introduce yourself to our readers.

I’m a writer, stained glass artist, and deli clerk. I’ve been married for 35 years and have 4 children and 2 grandchildren. Over many years of doing many different things, I’ve been granted the understanding that God put me on earth to make stuff and feed people. I’ve lost count of the number of hobbies and crafts I’ve tried, but stained glass is the first one that shows a real prospect of turning into a profitable business.

2) Where do you attend church? Tell us a little bit about it. Do others practice head covering there?

I attend Grace Church, a large non-denominational, evangelical, contemporary church in central North Carolina. My husband and middle son are employed as tech staff, primarily serving at one of the multi-sites where our youngest son also volunteers as tech crew and I serve on the hospitality team. My job is feeding the volunteers. It  makes for a long day, especially for the tech-and-worship workers, as they don’t rotate out between services (unlike the greeters, ushers, and the children’s team).

We’re a Gospel-focused church with the formal mission to “Fill the city with Jesus.” We’re very conservative in many ways, such as only ordaining male ministers. But in a racially and ethnically diverse area where we focus on reaching those who don’t know Jesus at all, we’re very casual and low-key about dress code expectations and other trappings that would be familiar to people who grew up in mainline churches.

I may or may not be the only person covering among 200-300 people attending either the multi-site where I serve or the Thursday night service I sometimes attend. I don’t know about the 800-1000 or so people on Sunday morning at the main campus since I haven’t been there in a number of years, though I do remember one particular lady in the children’s ministry who always wore cute hats. I don’t know if she was covering religiously or just liked cute hats.

Head covering is not a topic that has ever been addressed from the pulpit. I hate to say it, but getting the young guys out of their ball caps might be more of a priority if the topic were to ever come up. Read more