What if the Holy See abolished female altar servers?

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Duesenberg

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What if the Holy See abolished female altar servers? The Church seems to be largely past highly questionable claims of “if females didn’t serve, there wouldn’t be any servers” that were once so common. Would the Church be better off or worse off abolishing female altar servers, citing the following:
  • The critical role the ministry of altar server has historically played in helping to foster clerical vocations in males.
  • Reestablishing commonality with all Eastern Catholic and Orthodox churches – at least some which prohibit female altar servers.
  • Reestablishing commonality with the rubrics governing the celebration of the EF Mass which limits the ministry to males only.
 
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Some bishops and / or individual pastors do indeed prohibit female altar servers.
My preference is male altar servers because of the historical connection between the role and the minor orders…as well as the potential of fostering priestly vocations. That being said, the Church allows it at the discretion of the local bishop, so I’m ok with it.
 
What if?..If females were banned, some Catholics would cheer, other Catholics would be ticked off, and the whole rest of the world would be screaming, “Misogyny!!!” 🤬
 
BoomerangToo said:
What if?..If females were banned, some Catholics would cheer, other Catholics would be ticked off, and the whole rest of the world would be screaming, “Misogyny!!!”
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The Orthodox do not allow female altar servers to my knowledge.
 
I doubt it would do anything but upset people. In my visits to many churches, I see some female altar servers, but I also see a lot, I would say a comfortable majority, of male altar servers. I don’t get the impression there’s a shortage of boys who are willing to serve.

However, I’m also not convinced that “altar server” is a fast track to priesthood specifically, especially looking at the many, many guys of my generation who were servers in their youth but did not end up priests and sometimes did not even end up as practicing Catholics. An extracurricular activity that takes only a couple hours a week is way different from a lifetime career commitment with a promise of celibacy.
 
My guess of the reaction to a male only altar server policy would be a lot of negativity from non Catholics and a good portion of the more progressive Catholics would be foaming at the mouth. I don’t see how it would help with unity with the Orthodox Church. My current parish has only children as altar servers and both genders serve. Needless to say there are no altar servers at Daily Mass. I would not be upset if the Church ruled against female altar servers.
 
Tis_Bearself said:
I’m also not convinced that “altar server”is a fast track to priesthood
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On the other hand more than 90% of all priests were altar servers as boys.

I do think it meant a great deal more when it was more exclusive, when the sacristy still held mystery rather than being a hang out spot for “insiders.”
 
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Would probably depend in practice on the parish. I have been in parishes where it might be hard to get altar servers - mostly parishes where there was already a shortage (it’s notable that both parishes I’m thinking of used primarily adult servers).
 
MSSheBear said:
I would not be upset if the Church ruled against female altar servers.
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Were you upset back when the ministry was indeed limited to males and some priests/parishes chose to ignore the Church’s directive on this matter?
 
It’s true that some parishes have a shortage of young people in general. A local priest was just talking about how his parish has all the young families registering and it also has a very active youth ministry. By contrast, the next parish over has primarily elderly people and had only had a handful of adult registrations in the past year, no families. It’s not hard to see which parish is likely to end up with tons of young altar servers.
 
I simply don’t buy the notion that there are not enough males (of all ages) to serve, outside perhaps of a convent oratory.
 
Yeah, one of the ones I was thinking of was sandwiched between two college campuses. The attendance was primarily college students, so unsurprisingly there were very few children. Servers were typically college students as well.

The other was just plain a small parish in a small rural town. Not a lot of people in attendance - not a lot of people around in general.
 
I think the Church would be better off abolishing female altar servers. Young people (myself included) clearly are seeking tradition and ritual in the Church…something with meaning. It will help to nurture vocations if the Church just sticks to male altar servers.

My mom recently discovered the Latin mass, after my constant preaching to her about the beauty and ritual of it. The reason she finally submitted to the idea was because she understood after all, that the only way for the Church to survive and keep producing vocations for the young, is if it goes back to the more traditional route. This is when she realized that yes, these traditional things aren’t necessary per say, but are necessary in order to nurture the young in the Church who are used to a lack of meaning in our modern times and are just looking for meaning in what we do and say and pray…if that makes sense lol. All rules have a reason for being rules and aren’t meant to inhibit anyone, but to help people.
 
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There’s a lot of speculation about this concept. Let me outline this for you as straightforwardly as possible. If there were no female altar servers, then my home parish and at least seven local parishes I can think of without any effort would not be able to field servers at all.

Also, I would have never been an altar server had they only allowed the boys. It would’ve seemed awkward and quite frankly boring. Having the girls there made the boys want to be there more.

I do read about the days back before the NO changes in which there were only male altar servers, how that was a chance for young men to get used to the altar, and possibly would inspire them to become priests. If that was the case, then something (besides the gender of the altar servers) has changed. People are leaving the Church in our smaller communities, some are going protestant, others are going None. There are fewer and fewer kids in the pews, that naturally means that there are fewer and fewer boys. So, if the Holy See abolishes the female altar server, then I give up; I won’t stop being Catholic, but dang if they can’t throw us a bone.

Pax
 
I was pressured into being an altar server and let me tell you…I did not like it. I was (still am) shy and awkward, slow at understanding what to do in front of others. Nervous and forgetful…self conscious. We were a small parish, a town of 1,000. We definitely had more than enough boys to serve the altar.
 
I think the Latin Mass is a nice option for the Church to have and it appeals to a segment of people, but I don’t see it as being the only hope for the Church. I live up the street from a Newman Center and its Masses are the polar opposite of the TLM and are always packed with college students, many of whom are also serving in the campus ministries. The priest there is very engaging and they offer many activities, like dinner every Sunday, Catholic Bible study on campus, and Mass at a later evening time when students are more likely to show up than 10 am the morning after Saturday night. I think there’s room for both approaches in such a big Church.
 
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