
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: THURSDAY, April 14, 1994                   TAG: 9404140360
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL                    PAGE: A6   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: Los Angeles Times
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Medium

VATICAN APPROVES GIRLS SERVING AT ALTAR

In a break with tradition, the Vatican officially has approved girls serving at the altar during Roman Catholic Masses, but stressed Wednesday the decree is unrelated to the church's opposition to women priests.

The church's decision was not unexpected. Bishops in the United States have long voiced support for girls serving at the altar.

Indeed, many U.S. Catholic parishes have had altar girls for years, but their status has been a cause for disagreement among the faithful. The Vatican agreed to consider the issue a year ago.

By unambiguously granting girls the same privileges as boys to assist priests at Mass - the central act of Catholic worship - the Vatican has all but ended the controversy.

Altar servers, generally ages 8 to 14, assist the priest by lighting altar candles, participate in the ritual washing of the priest's hands and present the bread and wine to the priest to be consecrated as the Body and Blood of Jesus Christ.

Archbishop William H. Keeler of Baltimore, president of the National Conference of Catholic Bishops, called the decision "a welcome one."

"I think everyone will accept it. They'll have to accept it," said Father Charles Miller, who teaches homiletics and liturgy at St. John's Seminary in Camarillo, Calif. "No one wants to say little girls are inferior or little girls don't deserve it."

But there was dissent. Women for Faith and Family, a conservative Catholic lay group based in St. Louis, called the decision a "pastoral error" that would cause further confusion and unduly raise hopes that women eventually would be ordained as priests.

An unknown number of Catholic parishes in the United States have had both altar boys and altar girls since the mid-1980s. These parishes relied on a change in canon law in 1983, which, unlike previous church codes, no longer specifically forbade altar girls.

The approval, supported by Pope John Paul II, was not a major innovation, said papal spokesman Joaquin Navarro, who announced the change Wednesday. Rather it is an interpretation that church statutes concerning lay altar are equally applicable to both sexes, he said.

Despite the authorization, local bishops have the last word on whether to allow altar girls in their dioceses.

by CNB