Altar Girls in Cassock/Surplice

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At age 8, one thing you’re pretty sure about: you don’t want to play with girls.
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It’s pretty funny when liberal dioceses wail about low vocation numbers. They think “What can we do to attract men?”. Perhaps they don’t think what they might be doing to put them off.
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I agree, eight year old boys don’t want to play with girls. However, eight year old boys and girls, to serve on the altar, need to understand this isn’t about playing. They are old enough to understand their role on the altar and they are old enough to understand that boys grow up and may become priests, and girls can not. As sacristan at my parish I am around these altar servers and they do understand their role. They serve side by side with one another in a very mature manner. My parish has more than 3/4 boys serving, and we have no girls expressing a calling for the priesthood.
 
TempleServant said:
That’s right, make him work with those whispering, bossy girls. Keep up the pressure for years. Let him cringe and grind his teeth in the sanctuary. If he doesn’t like it, it’s HIS fault!

Way to foster a vocation.

But you never know.

He might become a nun!
😃
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Oh, so the sole/main purpose of altar servers is as a recruitment tool. Silly me thinking it had something to do with celebrating the Mass. As for cringing and grinding teeth, if serving at the altar with girls causes this, the boy in question has more important issues to deal with then deciding if he should enter the priesthood.
 
Armyvet007 said:
Oh, so the sole/main purpose of altar servers is as a recruitment tool. Silly me thinking it had something to do with celebrating the Mass. As for cringing and grinding teeth, if serving at the altar with girls causes this, the boy in question has more important issues to deal with then deciding if he should enter the priesthood.
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Yes, that’s what I said, all right. And it’s the boy’s fault if he doesn’t like serving with girls. All of those boys. They have issues.

:confused: 🤷
 
TempleServant said:
That’s right, make him work with those whispering, bossy girls. Keep up the pressure for years. Let him cringe and grind his teeth in the sanctuary. If he doesn’t like it, it’s HIS fault!

Way to foster a vocation.

But you never know.

He might become a nun!
😃
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One who actually serves at the temple would know that altar servers typically keep their mouth shut and do what they are told by the priest or deacon.

As a 48 year old altar server with two children who serve, I can attest to that.

Mass isn’t the school playground during lunch recess and the kids understand that. Any parish where kids didn’t understand that has much bigger problems than boys and girls altar serving together.

-Tim-
 
TimothyH said:
As a 48 year old altar server with two children who serve, I can attest to that.

-Tim-
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This is a replay of the old logical error:* “My two boys do X, therefore ALL boys will do X”. *

It really makes me scratch my head that a Church can put up with this level of experimentation for decades. Especially in an era of such fast communications. But perhaps the internet will finally help people put the pieces together.

Or, it’s the case that the majority of people with power to change the status quo actually like the way things are, more or less. They are content.
 
TempleServant said:
This is a replay of the old logical error:* “My two boys do X, therefore ALL boys will do X”. *
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No more a logical error than this statement from the other side.
TempleServant said:
I knew an ancient MC who backed up this ‘assumption’. After decades on the job, I’d guess he’d know.
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It really makes me scratch my head that a Church can put up with this level of experimentation for decades. Especially in an era of such fast communications. But perhaps the internet will finally help people put the pieces together.
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Or, it’s the case that the majority of people with power to change the status quo actually like the way things are, more or less. They are content.
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Or maybe you are making the classic post hoc ergo propter hoc logical fallacy.
 
TempleServant said:
That’s right, make him work with those whispering, bossy girls.
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Or make him work with the pleasant and unobtrusive girls…?:confused:
Keep up the pressure for years. Let him cringe and grind his teeth in the sanctuary. If he doesn’t like it, it’s HIS fault!
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What kind of psycho child is in question here? Someone so miserable to be in the presence of girls that literally every second is painful?
Way to foster a vocation.
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Altar serving is not only for fostering vocations, and vocations are not fostered only among altar servers.
 
TempleServant said:
I knew an ancient MC who backed up this ‘assumption’. After decades on the job, I’d guess he’d know.

So how does this make it a fact??? I know a priest who disagrees with you…now what?

Here is a list of reasons given in this thread that girls shouldn’t be altar servers:
  • the vatican didn’t want to allow it but made a concession
  • boys will not serve if they have to serve with girls
  • boys who do not serve probably wont discern the priesthood
Every single one of these reasons is not based on facts but assumptions. I think this is why these threads go on forever.
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TempleServant said:
This is a replay of the old logical error:* “My two boys do X, therefore ALL boys will do X”. *

It really makes me scratch my head that a Church can put up with this level of experimentation for decades. Especially in an era of such fast communications. But perhaps the internet will finally help people put the pieces together.

Or, it’s the case that the majority of people with power to change the status quo actually like the way things are, more or less. They are content.
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Didn’t we go through this before? I’m having deja vu all over again.

I said my daughter was a server and that I was looking forward to the day when I serve with her. You replied that you were looking forward to the day when my daughter was told that she could no longer serve.

Seriously, didn’t we have this conversation before? I recall the “Locical error X Y” remark in a thread about this same topic a while back.

-Tim-
 
Love these guys!!!
I live about 45 minutes away from the Abbey so I try to get there a few times a year for Mass- always very spiritually uplifting!
And they make the best bread ever!!! 😃
ByzCath said:
Great picture of the monks out at the Abbey of the Genesee. I used to go there for spiritual direction while I was discerning religious life/priesthood.
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TimothyH said:
:rotfl::rotfl::rotfl::rotfl:

Ha, nuns with beards. 😃

http://saligaoserenade.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/03/monks.jpg
Tim-
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Oneofthewomen said:
Love these guys!!!
I live about 45 minutes away from the Abbey so I try to get there a few times a year for Mass- always very spiritually uplifting!
And they make the best bread ever!!! 😃
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Hard as nails too. Real men. Up every day at 3:45 AM. Not afraid to work.

I’m about a 1.5 hours from the Cistercians out at the Monastery of Our Lady of the Holy Spirit in Georgia. I went on vocations retreat there and it changed everything for me. If I didn’t have children I would have asked to stay, at least for a little while.

timhollingworth.blogspot.com/2010/10/weekend-of-peace.html

Anyway… off topic. Sorry to take everyone away from arguing with other members of Christ’s body by bringing up such unholy and irreverant subjects as monks and bread.

Please resume arguments now.

-Tim-
 
DaddyGirl said:
YES! It only makes sense to have unisex wardrobe for economy and sameness. They do perform the same roles, do they not? The male altar servers are not somehow “higher” in stature than the female altar servers? With a higher title and more important role? If not, it makes sense for them to be covered up in sameness.
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Finally! Back to the OPs question!

The whole point is that cassocks and surplices have traditionally been clerical garments. Even now, they are required to be worn by priests for some occassions.

The only real quesion is whether, IF a priest chooses to have female altar servers, does he decide to 1) put all the altar servers in albs, 2) the boys in c/s and the girls in albs or 3) all in c/s. The only one that is problematic is the last choice because of the close association of cassocks with clergy. Not forbidden, just visually confusing.

And there is alway choice #4 - just have them wear dress clothes. 🤷 There is no rule that servers must wear special garments - it’s just a tradition.
They do perform the same roles, do they not?
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Sometimes yes; sometimes no. At our parish there are some roles reserved for only boys. If a parish had differentiated roles, this might be something to consider when chosing the garments.
 
Corki said:
Sometimes yes; sometimes no. At our parish there are some roles reserved for only boys. If a parish had differentiated roles, this might be something to consider when chosing the garments.
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But that does not change the fact that the boys are not performing a different function than girls would be if they were permitted in your parish.
 
Baelor said:
But that does not change the fact that the boys are not performing a different function than girls would be if they were permitted in your parish.
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Girls ARE permitted to be altar servers in my parish. It’s just that they are not permitted to do everything the altar boys do.

The point is only that differentiated garments might make more sense if there are differentiated roles.
 
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