Altar Server Concerns

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alexl437

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Hi all,

I am an altar server at my parish and usually get to church an hour before to set up for mass before everyone gets there. One thing I am responsible for is to put the tabernacle key into the tabernacle so it is ready. When I do this, I only touch the key and the veil, NEVER the tabernacle itself. My question here is should I as a lay person be doing this and even be touching the tabernacle key. I am not an instituted acolyte or something, just a normal server. I am probably worrying about nothing, but when I am putting the sacred vessels in the safe after mass I sometimes notice that the tabernacle key has been put on the paten or inside the chalice itself. In these situations I simply remove it and place it to the side in the safe. Should I be doing this? I always try to minimise contact with the top of the paten and inside the chalice. Also, are there any restrictions when it comes to handling sacred vessels and items used for mass?

Sorry if I’m sound stupid, I just wanted to know if what I am doing is OK!
 
Interesting question.
At the risk of stating the obvious, have you asked the priest?
 
I should have mentioned: we haven’t had a stable parish priest for the past seven months. Different priests fill in at every mass.
 
Lion_IRC said:
Interesting question.
At the risk of stating the obvious, have you asked the priest?
Click to expand...
I should have mentioned: we haven’t had a stable parish priest for the past seven months. Different priests fill in at every mass.
 
alexl437 said:
I should have mentioned: we haven’t had a stable parish priest for the past seven months. Different priests fill in at every mass.
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Just ask the next priest you serve for. What you’re doing seems fine to me, and makes sense in terms of ensuring that the key is visible and someone doesn’t think it’s missing when it turns out to have been inside a vessel. In my last 3 parishes, servers routinely handled sacred vessels such as to bring them to the altar, or back to the sacristy after they had been purified by the priest or deacon.
 
alexl437 said:
Hi all,

I am an altar server at my parish and usually get to church an hour before to set up for mass before everyone gets there. One thing I am responsible for is to put the tabernacle key into the tabernacle so it is ready. When I do this, I only touch the key and the veil, NEVER the tabernacle itself. My question here is should I as a lay person be doing this and even be touching the tabernacle key. I am not an instituted acolyte or something, just a normal server. I am probably worrying about nothing, but when I am putting the sacred vessels in the safe after mass I sometimes notice that the tabernacle key has been put on the paten or inside the chalice itself. In these situations I simply remove it and place it to the side in the safe. Should I be doing this? I always try to minimise contact with the top of the paten and inside the chalice. Also, are there any restrictions when it comes to handling sacred vessels and items used for mass?

Sorry if I’m sound stupid, I just wanted to know if what I am doing is OK!
Click to expand...
NOT "STUPID"AT ALL

PIETY IS A VERY PERSONAL THING

WHAT YOU ARE DOING IS FINE; YOU’RE SERVING OUR GOD:thumbsup:

GOD BLESS YOU AND THANKS FOR YOU’RE MINISTRY!

Patrick
 
I don’t believe it to be a problem since where I went to college, we had a small tabernacle and depending on who’s praying in the same room as the tabernacle would open it or close it.
 
It’s fine for you to touch the tabernacle.
WHY in the world would think this is somehow wrong?

:confused:
 
alexl437 said:
Hi all,

I am an altar server at my parish and usually get to church an hour before to set up for mass before everyone gets there. One thing I am responsible for is to put the tabernacle key into the tabernacle so it is ready. When I do this, I only touch the key and the veil, NEVER the tabernacle itself. My question here is should I as a lay person be doing this and even be touching the tabernacle key. I am not an instituted acolyte or something, just a normal server. I am probably worrying about nothing, but when I am putting the sacred vessels in the safe after mass I sometimes notice that the tabernacle key has been put on the paten or inside the chalice itself. In these situations I simply remove it and place it to the side in the safe. Should I be doing this? I always try to minimise contact with the top of the paten and inside the chalice. Also, are there any restrictions when it comes to handling sacred vessels and items used for mass?

Sorry if I’m sound stupid, I just wanted to know if what I am doing is OK!
Click to expand...
What you shouldn’t be doing (and I am not suggesting you are) is sticking the key in the tabernacle and then leaving the tabernacle unattended with the key in it. That’s bad form. The “sign value” of that says loads – all bad. Leaving the Blessed Sacrament unsecured is even worse.

We had BATTLES ROYALE at my parish where people would do just that or worse, they would open the tabernacle before Mass, exposing the Blessed Sacrament in the process to “make things easier.” It probably took close to 2 years to put a stop to that at all the Masses.
 
There aren’t any restrictions per se. Prudence is the name of the game. I serve at an Extraordinary Form Mass and what we usually do when it comes to sacred vessels is to pick them up with a cloth or something. A Chalice usually already has a covering of some sort. Obviously, if you can’t find a cloth, we take the vessels back to the sacristy without one but we try not to if we can help it. It’s more an act of piety. There would be no sin involved with touching them though.

As far as tabernacle keys go, I’ve always touched it to bring it back or forth. Never opened the tabernacle though. Priest thing.
 
If you are setting up for Mass (btw, a wonderful service, especially with different priests), one thing you might need to know is how many hosts are in the ciborium in the tabernacle to help gauge how many to put out for Mass.

It sounds like you might be overly concerned, but I think it’s better to care to much than care too little.
 
After retirement, I started serving daily Mass at a local Church and regularly serve funeral Masses at my home parish. I also provide a Communion service several times a month which requires one of the laity to open the Tabernacle to obtain the Consecrated Hosts for distribution to the faithful. A genuflection is called for before removing the ciborium and after placing it back in the Tabernacle. My parish priest chooses not to purify the Sacred Vessels on the alter, so the Alter Servers regularly handle the paten containers following communion. The Tabernacle should not be left open for convenience, except perhaps if it is void of any consecrated hosts during Mass.
PS glad you asked!
 
I can tell you one from from a Traditional viewpoint: no layman is allowed to touch the sacred vessels. When I set up for an EF Mass, I have to wear white gloves to handle the chalice. This is to show respect for the Priest’s anointed hands in that he’s the only one allowed to touch sacred vessels. This is a very ancient practice.

However, I’ve been allowed to change the tabernacle frontal several times. I’ve never been instructed to wear gloves. I always thought that the tabernacle wasn’t classed in the same way a a chalice and a paten.
 
Dempsey1919 said:
I can tell you one from from a Traditional viewpoint: no layman is allowed to touch the sacred vessels. When I set up for an EF Mass, I have to wear white gloves to handle the chalice. This is to show respect for the Priest’s anointed hands in that he’s the only one allowed to touch sacred vessels. This is a very ancient practice.
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The hands of the deacons are not anointed but they handled the sacred vessels in the vetus ordo.
However, I’ve been allowed to change the tabernacle frontal several times. I’ve never been instructed to wear gloves. I always thought that the tabernacle wasn’t classed in the same way a a chalice and a paten.
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Fortunately, today, with our contemporary dispositions relative to these issues, the matter is handled according to much sounder thought. If the person has physical contact with the Sacrament, they can have physical contact with what merely bears the sacrament.
 
What about the case of an Eastern Catholic priest consolidating a Mass at your parish? What would they do as their hands are not anointed?
 
That’s kind of what I was thinking. I mean, piety is good, but common sense prevents legalism. Someone has to actually clean the Church after all. Every bit of it, at least occasionally. I note our cleaners, which rotate, manage to respect where they are and still touch all they need to clean.

I like the way the first poster is thinking though. It is always good to keep the real presence of Christ first in our mind.
 
You don’t sound stupid at all. You sound very considerate and respectful 🙂
 
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