Becoming an Altar Server at Blessed Sacrament

Boys and girls can begin serving in the fifth grade. 

Training sessions are held in the Fall and Spring.  

Servers may continue serving through high school.

For more information and to volunteer please contact Khary Cauthen at [email protected].

For altar serving tips, check out the Altar Server Cheat Sheet

Altar Server's Role

Altar servers play an extremely important role in the celebration of the Mass at Blessed Sacrament.  Besides assisting the celebrant, altar servers also assist the congregation in their worship by their reverent and prayerful actions and their presence in the sanctuary.

The General Instruction on the Roman Missal describes the role of the altar server as one who carries the missal, the cross, candles, the bread, wine, water, and the thurible.  This includes lighting the candles and helping set up the altar before Mass, helping to prepare the chalice, corporal, purificator and book (Sacramentary) before the procession and presentation of gifts, to hold the Sacramentary for the celebrant as needed, and to place the chalice, corporal, and other vessels back on the credence table during the distribution of communion. On occasion, servers may assist with incense as well.

These things might seem like little details.  Pope Paul VI (1963-1978) actually talked about this in an address to altar servers. "You might at times think that the liturgy is made up of a lot of minor details; posture, genuflections, bows, handling the censer, missal, cruets, etc. It is then that you must remember the words of Christ in the gospel: "He that is faithful in the smallest things is faithful also in the great." (Mk 10:21) Moreover, in the liturgy nothing is little, when we realize the greatness of the one to whom it is directed."