Altar Servers

Boys and girls who have received first Communion are encouraged to become altar servers. If you wish to consider this ministry, you or one of your parents may contact the Parish Office at (207) 217-6740 Monday through Friday between 8:00 am - 5:00 p.m.

Bringing children up in the faith today is difficult. This program seeks, more than anything, to encourage the young to fully engage our faith through their service to the Church as ministers of the altar. Serving at the altar gives the young a hands on, personal experience of God’s work in the liturgy. It also can be an opportunity for them to work alongside other children and adults and be edified by their witness of faith. Through their service, youth altar servers provide the parish with an example of service, they witness to the seriousness and solemnity of the liturgy, and they inspire those who come to Mass with hope for the future of our Church.

This program seeks to provide the basic structure for a process of instruction that will allow youth servers to continually progress in their knowledge and love of both the liturgy and the tradition of the Church as they grow older.  It seeks to accomplish this by fostering a community that trains and forms the servers through positive mentoring relationships between youth servers and priests, deacons, sacristans, adult servers, other youth servers and parishioners. 

As they grow in experience and in dedication to their ministry, altar servers will progress through ranks, or stages, that encourage and recognize their progress and allow them to take on more responsibility. There is both an experience and an educational requirement for the server to progress to the next rank; each rank will have specific duties associated with it and will require more commitment from the server and his or her family. The ranks will be titled according to the various ways that servers minister at the altar, beginning with more simple tasks and becoming more complicated as follows:

Servers of higher rank may often be called upon to function in the liturgy according to a lower rank (e.g. a Thurifer may function as Book Bearer at Mass most weekends). However, if at all possible, servers should not carry out the functions of a higher rank until they have reached it.

DOCUMENTS
Manual for Altar Servers