What if your pastor announced that from now on all new altar servers will be girls?

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Well, lemme just say that baad things would happen…

Only boys serve at my parish because a few older women don’t like girl servers. I remember a good, oh…four years ago, during a school Mass, the seventh graders who had planned the Mass and done the readings, picked the songs, etc. didn’t have enough male servers. Therefore, they had a girl carry the cross. As I recall, the principal didn’t care, the pastor didn’t care, the teacher didn’t care, the girl didn’t care, the rest of the student body didn’t care, and a few old women in the back of church about had an all-out heart attack because it wasn’t all boys.

So all girls would probably send them into a coma…😛

I can see the reasoning at times for why a particular parish might remain boys-only for serving, but when there is a direct need for more servers and there are few people against females helping to fill that need, is when it becomes, not unforgivable, but certainly questionable. I remember a few years back when I served by myself for a good eight weeks consecutively, and it hasn’t gotten much better. There are plenty of girls that would be perfectly capable of serving in the parish and they aren’t being allowed to due to the wishes of a few vocal parishioners. Meanwhile, I no longer enjoy serving as much as I could because I’ve about gotten burned out from it. Its gotten better, but not by much, and I hope that someday females are able to serve as well.
 
I am a female altar server, and I would be vehemently opposed to that proposition. My brother is an excellent altar server, as are many other boys who serve at my parish. That proposal is the exact same form of sexism some servers encounter at churches that only allow boys to serve God. All are created equal…

P.S. osmondfan puts it just right. Thanks, Emily!
 
I too would be opposed to that suggestion as i think it should be something thats open to both boys and girls my son serves alongside girls and both do an excellent job are very focused and enjoy and take pride in what they do.
x
 
I chose ‘Other’, though I would actually lean more on ‘opposed’.
Granted, I grew up seeing, aside from Lectors and EMHCs, men in the Altar (thus I’m quite uncomfortable seeing women serving at Mass or something). Serving is a ministry open to both genders; why would a pastor restrict serving to women?
 
spellinggirl said:
I am a female altar server, and I would be vehemently opposed to that proposition. My brother is an excellent altar server, as are many other boys who serve at my parish. That proposal is the exact same form of sexism some servers encounter at churches that only allow boys to serve God. All are created equal…

P.S. osmondfan puts it just right. Thanks, Emily!
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Really, so Pope John Paul II was a sexist? He only allowed boys to serve in St. Peter’s. +Benedict has also kept that rule.

Also, +John Paul II allowed any priest to refuse the use of altar girls, even if the bishop approved them.

Was he sexist to do so, why would the Pope allow sexism?

Perhaps you misunderstand what sexism is. (the Latin root simply means ‘to categorize’ or to note differences between)

But in the modern sense, it means any unjust denial of rights.

Neither boys or girls have a right to serve at the altar. No lay person does.

So there can be no denial of rights where there is no right to do something in the first place.
 
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