What if the Holy See abolished female altar servers?

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It’s funny you mention that because I just visited the Newman center last Sunday for the first time and wow! It definitely is a lot different. Didn’t appeal to me at all, to be honest, but during the announcements they mentioned a group discussion taking place on a certain day about moral relativism and my ears perked up haha.

I get the feeling many college students and even younger people maybe haven’t even heard of the Latin mass or don’t know the traditions of the Church very well. I didn’t know what a Latin mass was up until last year. I just recently discovered the innovation of female servers…I had thought there had always been female servers.
 
I’m happy for you, but I believe that you’re missing my point. I don’t think that a child should be forced to be an altar server if they’re that uncomfortable about it regardless of gender. But that goes for the girls, it should be the same for the boys. From what I can see in Scripture, Christ ordained male priests, so we should not be pushing for female priests. Christ never instituted the rank of altar server. St. Paul had a female helper, I’m sorry, but if there’s no better reason than we allowed altar girls, now we have a priest shortage, ergo, altar girls must reduce priestly vocations, then I don’t think that it should be “abolished.”

In my home parish (let’s take my senior year of high school), there were maybe 4-5 male altar servers and at least 20 females. That just happened to be how the kids came out, nobody let there kids not serve. At least one of the male servers intentionally would go to Saturday mass if he was scheduled to serve on Sunday and vice-versa. So, like I said, if any of the boys were gone for a week, there wouldn’t have been altar servers.

I’m happy that your small parish didn’t have this problem. But in my Texas panhandle town, and most of the others (several, several towns of less than 2500 people [mine has less than 600]), it didn’t work that way.

Pax
 
misstherese said:
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.
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No-ho-ho-hoho It is not. The only way for the Church to survive, so to speak, is to provide TLM, the Newer styles (with restrictions), and your basic NO. Some of us want the most traditional smells and bells we can get, some don’t. I don’t want rock concert masses, but NO Masses aren’t killing the Church.

Pax
 
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misstherese said:
Why do you say that?
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Because it’s just your opinion. Moreover the EF Mass is far, far younger than the Church itself. To suggest there is something inherently superior about the EF Mass is just not true. YOU may personally prefer it and that’s fine, but that doesn’t make it intrinsically better else the Church would not offer the inferior form of the Mass.
 
SanRafael1102 said:
No-ho-ho-hoho It is not. The only way for the Church to survive, so to speak, is to provide TLM, the Newer styles (with restrictions), and your basic NO. Some of us want the most traditional smells and bells we can get, some don’t. I don’t want rock concert masses, but NO Masses aren’t killing the Church.

Pax
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Go back and change your posting. I did not write that.
 
Okay…maybe I should have reworded it better. There is a clear correlation between younger priests being more traditional. There is a lack of vocations. To try to implement some of the traditions back into the Church would help produce more vocations because younger priests and religious seem to be looking for that.

That being said, that doesn’t go for everyone. But I definitely have seen and done some research on it and have come to the conclusion that with tradition in this day in age, comes religious vocations.

I also know this because I’m discerning as well 😉
 
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Well not the whole world. The Western world would. The Orthodox and Muslim worlds would applaud us.
 
misstherese said:
younger priests being more traditional.
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I think just about ANY priest (on average) would tend to be more “traditional” than priests formed from about 1970-2000. That was truly a rough period for vocations. But being more “traditional” (“orthodox” might actually be a better word) DOES NOT necessarily equate to having a preference for the EF Mass.
 
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No, it doesn’t. I don’t think I said that. I’m not saying the Latin mass is superior or anything; it is my preference though.

But the EF mass is more orthodox/traditional because it hasn’t really changed much. That’s why I like it, because it still retains those traditions. The more common ordinary form mass could help with vocations even more if they implemented some of those more orthodox customs. That’s just my opinion, though.
 
Personally, I wouldn’t care one way or the other.

At my parish the very few girls serving would have to stop.

The many boys and young men would have to take up the slack. It really wouldn’t impact Sunday masses much, but the weekday masses…

At the parish nearest my home, there would probably be a bit more uproar. They are a vibrant parish with packed masses and lots of young families. And many of the girls are servers.
 
Don’t know why it quoted it as you. Consider it corrected though, Dusey.
 
Aren’t orthodox and traditional the same thing? Am I missing something here?

The mass was revised for ecumenical reasons and had a board of Protestants to approve it. Therefore, that makes it less traditional. The EF mass is traditional solely because it has not changed very much. Call it conventional, orthodox, traditional, whatever, that’s the meaning of the world traditional: long-established. The traditions in the EF mass have been going on much longer than those in the NO mass. That’s just fact. Not opinion.
 
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misstherese said:
Aren’t orthodox and traditional the same thing? Am I missing something here?
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No they are not. “Orthodox” in this context would be a measure of whether or not the action(s) followed what the Church actually directed. Were the rubrics followed when celebrating both the OF and EF Masses? If they were, they were both celebrated in an orthodox manner.

That wouldn’t keep someone from legitimately believing that in their personal opinion, the EF Mass is more traditional than the OF Mass – or the reverse of course.
misstherese said:
The mass was revised for ecumenical reasons and had a board of Protestants to approve it.
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That’s simply false. You need to get hold of some honest historical sources.

NB: If you are truly “discerning” I would advise using “OF” in place of “NO.”
 
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I don’t know about historical sources, but I have read of this previously. Here is more information: https://remnantnewspaper.com/web/in...-about-those-six-protestants-and-the-new-mass

I also recommend a Critical Study of the New Mass made by two cardinals before the new mass was set in place. It was actually delayed because of this letter. A Critical Study of the New Mass

What is wrong with using the correct terminology for the new mass? It’s called the Novus Ordo Missae, or New Order of the Mass.
 
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SanRafael1102 said:
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.
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Ahhh, so this is a different take.
 
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