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Corki
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I am not sure what you mean by that. We have a Spanish Mass too and the altar service is exactly the same. I have visited Mexico and lived in two South American countries and the altar service is exactly the same.
Phoenix Arizona Diocese Cathedral Won't Allow Girls Serve On Altar
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rlg94086
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It’s called humor.Really charitable…
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Corki
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Is there a Ladies’ Auxillary?I’m a charter member
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rlg94086
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That is an incorrect conclusion. As the Vatican states, female altar servers are allowed, if there is a good reason. They leave that reasoning up to the Bishops. Male altar servers are still the norm, because of the vocation aspect.If they thouroughly disagreed then they would not allow any female altar servers…which they have not done as of yet. Maybe they know something you or I don’t…
That is a straw man argument. No one has claimed that altar serving is the “ONLY way to a vocation.” In fact, the class of 2011 priests in the US includes 29% who were not altar servers. (I did the simple math to figure that out, as the report says 71% did serve.
)Okay.I don’t even know why there is all this arguement…I don’t agree with it but I will/and have defended a priests right to use only male altar servers but I don’t think it’s a bad thing when a priest does not utilize that right.
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rlg94086
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So, out of 1200 families, you don’t have 70 boys between 5 and 20? That just sounds odd to me, but I’ll take your word for it.
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rlg94086
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That is a false assumption. The direct decision is to not take the Vatican’s option to have female servers if needed. If the Bishops/Priests don’t believe it’s needed, it makes sense to stick with the norm.
Because the Vatican says that male servers are the norm, and it encourages vocation to the priesthood. It’s pretty simple, and it has nothing to do with fear or an unwillingness to share (I didn’t include your “change/grow/move ahead” because I dont see how female altar servers is growing or moving ahead).
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Corki
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There are lots of reasons a Bishop or pastor might decide to have all male altar servers. The Bishop in Phoenix gave several in the announcement that started this thread.
Redemptionis Sacramentum, in fact, says that while girls may be allowed, boys are to be encouraged to altar service. Maybe the Bishop believes that one way to encourage boys to altar service is to make it an opportunity for only boys. Maybe the ethnic make-up of the parish makes an all-boy altar server group more appropriate. Maybe the Bishop has plans for the youth in the diocese that make all male altar servers a better choice. Maybe there are plenty of opportunities for girls in the diocese but few for boys so the Bishop wants to leave altar service for the boys. There are dozens of good reasons a Bishop may decide to do this.
Seriously? Have you read the posts in this thread? Many people, men and women, have expressed a preference for all male altar servers yet **not one **has expressed anything approaching “fear” or unwillingness to change. And altar service is not something “deserved”.
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mlund
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To help the inspiration and formation of vocations to the priesthood, obviously.
Religious-minded girls who want to take part in the Mass should get used to being in the pews, the lectern, or the choir - like the rest of the laity does - religious or otherwise. There are plenty of apostolates that need the laity to act as Christ’s hands and feet.
- Marty Lund
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HerrZJA
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I didn’t read the last 28 pages of posts, save for enough to understand the topic has moved far enough away from the OP itself and onto the subject of whether or not girls should serve at the altar.
As someone else has stated, girls/women have served at Vatican and Papal functions. I know that, in my parish, girls occasionally serve at least at the Sunday Mass. In general, it seems like either the boys serve or the girls… I’m not sure if that’s a hard-and-fast rule, or just the way it works out. I don’t see any reason why it would have to be arranged that way.
I have no real problem with it. I think it’s great that young girls can have that opportunity, since the people who serve as Altar Servers are, in general, too young to serve as lectors, and we don’t have a choir. I myself have been asked to take up being a lector, but I’m not ready to go that route. Nobody’s ever even hinted at service.
I think girls being allowed to serve does not present anything objectionable. In fact, I think it may help vocations to religious congregations for them, in much the same way that I’m relatively certain (having no data to compair) that it helps with vocations to religious life or priesthood among boys.
That being said, I don’t think it’s necessary, either. I think it’s just for the Pastor/Bishop to decide.
As someone else has stated, girls/women have served at Vatican and Papal functions. I know that, in my parish, girls occasionally serve at least at the Sunday Mass. In general, it seems like either the boys serve or the girls… I’m not sure if that’s a hard-and-fast rule, or just the way it works out. I don’t see any reason why it would have to be arranged that way.
I have no real problem with it. I think it’s great that young girls can have that opportunity, since the people who serve as Altar Servers are, in general, too young to serve as lectors, and we don’t have a choir. I myself have been asked to take up being a lector, but I’m not ready to go that route. Nobody’s ever even hinted at service.
I think girls being allowed to serve does not present anything objectionable. In fact, I think it may help vocations to religious congregations for them, in much the same way that I’m relatively certain (having no data to compair) that it helps with vocations to religious life or priesthood among boys.
That being said, I don’t think it’s necessary, either. I think it’s just for the Pastor/Bishop to decide.
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mlund
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Allowing a girl to serve at altar where the position would otherwise be filled by a boy of sufficient interest and qualification is objectionable. The dearth of interested / qualified males to serve at the altar on the path to becoming acolytes is certainly objectionable - but a sad necessity in some parishes. It is thankfully not necessary in the basilica here in Phoenix.
While participation is certainly beneficial to the faithful, serving at the altar is a necessary function of acolytes and even deacons on their way to Priestly Ordination. Presiding Mass at the altar is a unique faculty of the Priests and Bishops.
Likewise serving as an Extraordinary Minister of Holy Communion is a noble service, but in an ideal world it would be a service that no one was called to perform. Only a severe shortfall in the supply of Ordinary Ministers has made the employment of Extraordinary Ministers necessary. If that deficiency is corrected then it would be proper to no longer call upon the services of the EMs.
And likewise while any of us could Baptize a child outside of grave necessity the Sacrament is supposed to be performed by a Bishop or Priest (or Deacon in the Latin Church) under normal circumstances.
Under normal circumstances altar servers should be young men open to the call to a priestly vocation.
- Marty Lund
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Brendan
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So are girls to always get what they want if their pastor doesn’t approve?
FYI, for St. Peter’s Basilica and St. John Lateran in Rome, the Pope has elected to have only altar boys.
catholicnews.com/data/stories/cns/0604581.htm
So is the Pope in error in his own parishes? If a diocese (or even parish) followed the example of the Holy Father himself in this matter, would you would find cause to object?
After all, +Benedict has made a decision to keep girls out.
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HerrZJA
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Italics mine. This is not necessarily the case, as you present it. I have it from the parish DRE that very few boys or their parents come forward offering to serve, and even less girls. Without the young girls, it would be difficult to always have two servers for each mass. I know that at my relatively recent Initiation, there was only one young boy as a server, and the other server was an older gentleman who was the head of the local KofC.
Nobody is asking anybody but the priest or bishop to preside over the mass. Further, not all deacons go on to become priests; many men feel called to become permanent deacons. What’s more, not every parish has instituted acolytes and spare deacons at its disposal. Sometimes the laity participates out of necessity.
After all, the role of the Lector is properly that of a Deacon. In my diocese, there are perhaps six deacons, for well over seventy parishes. Having a layman, or just as often, a laywoman, give the readings is the only practical way to have a mass at every parish on every sunday.
This, I agree with, with the caveat that the need yet persists. EMHCs are a different topic, if not somewhat tangentially related, however.
Excellent, save that it is my understanding that two altar servers are required at minimum for mass to proceed, and it seems to be a chore for my parish to put together that many on anything more than a once-weekly basis. Father P has often said he would offer a daily mass were it not for a lack of available servers through the week. For example, at the 10:30 AM Wednesday mass, often the only one in the week… should we pull the young boys from their classes to come serve? Or make do perhaps with faithful outside the demographic of males from 5-20?
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kslat
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(I’m sorry for not reading all the posts. This may have been addressed already.)You obviously have not read the comments on the Diocese of Phoenix website. There is an excellent one by a young women who served at Mass when she was younger. No, it did not lead her to want to be a priest
I am a woman. I was also an altar server, from the moment I could start until I couldn’t be one anymore, after graduating eighth grade. I volunteered to serve at extra Masses, on weekends and during the school day (although you were paid for funerals and weddings and got out of class on school days, I would have done it for free and on days off school). It very much helped me grow in my faith. I have never wanted to become a priest, and I am definitely not a supporter of the ordination of women. Servers serve, as Christ did. They help with the Mass. They do not consecrate the host and the wine. They do not confer sacraments. They do nothing except help the priest, the deacon, and others at the Mass. While the Mass is the central practice in our lives as Catholics, there is more to being a priest than saying Mass.
While I’m generally a fairly traditional Catholic (not EF traditional, but not liberal by any means), it’s difficult for me to be comfortable with the opinion that girls should not be altar servers. I understand the correlation between boy servers and the priesthood, but that doesn’t mean that women should not be allowed simply because, for men, serving helps them to become priests. In fact, being active in the Church and in Mass would, hopefully, help you to become closer to God and understand the truth His Church professes. By all means, bishops should lead their flock as they see fit.
I definitely pray that the Lord will bless my future husband and me with at least one son whom He will call to become a priest!
Maybe we “don’t need” MORE involvement by women, but we certainly never need less involvement. By anyone. (We could use more involvement by anyone. Secularism, unlike the priesthood, isn’t just for men.)
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Brendan
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When I was an altarboy back in the late 70’s we WERE pulled from class to serve at Mass. We were permitted to be late when we served the 8:30am Mass and we were excused from class when a funeral Mass was said.
It drove home the fact that NOTHING was more important than the Mass.
Not school, not sports. Heck, even sleep. Our parish had a 6:00am Mass as well that we often had to serve.
Would it be wrong to teach boys that?
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qui_est_ce
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Corki
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He doesn’t need an emergency or a serious reason to do what has been the norm in the Church for decades, if not centuries. The Bishop thinks this would be a good thing to do at the Cathedral in his diocese. That’s all the reason he needs. If he was trying to do something novel or against the norms for Mass, he would need a good reason and also probably need permission from the Vatican. But for this, he doesn’t need to justify his decision any more than he has to justify what style of vestments he chooses to wear. It’s his diocese, his Cathedral and this is the way he wants it.
Your need for more of an explanation is not his problem.
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Annabelle_Marie
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When I was an altarboy back in the late 70’s we WERE pulled from class to serve at Mass. We were permitted to be late when we served the 8:30am Mass and we were excused from class when a funeral Mass was said.
It drove home the fact that NOTHING was more important than the Mass.
Not school, not sports. Heck, even sleep. Our parish had a 6:00am Mass as well that we often had to serve.
**Would it be wrong to teach boys that?/**QUOTE]
Perhaps unpractical for the parishes that don’t have schools right next to them…
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Annabelle_Marie
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Or poor taste…especially from one that is going to be a deacon…
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Annabelle_Marie
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Meaning other parts of the parish are done differently for the Hispanics…i.e the Mass once a month for the souls (I think that’s correct). And having never been to a spanish Mass I can’t say what they have (all male servers/all female servers/a mixture…I don’t know). That’s all I meant…I am not sure what you mean by that. We have a Spanish Mass too and the altar service is exactly the same. I have visited Mexico and lived in two South American countries and the altar service is exactly the same.
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HerrZJA
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Not at all… but these aren’t Catholic schools we’re talking about. The nearest one is two towns over. These are public schools, funded on the public dime, with more than just Catholics in attendance. If we let every religious student be excused from his or her duties on the grounds that they have a religious function to attend every day of the week, not only are we shorting those children some class time, but we’re opening ourselves up to the rage/litigation of the parents of athiest children who don’t get “special treatment”.
I’m not saying I’m not for bringing our kids up in the faith. I’m saying the same thing that the School District would tell me if I suggested it.
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