My eldest child was Master of Ceremonies today at High Mass celebrated by Fr Finigan at Our Lady of the Rosary (Mac, who is far defter at taking photos than I, has some lovely ones on her blog). For an 11 year old he's racked up a fair bit of serving experience, so he was much less nervous than might be expected: he started serving Holy Mass in the Novus Ordo after his First Holy Communion in May 2010 and started serving the Vetus Ordo a few months later. He served low Mass at the Altar of the Transfiguration in Saint Peter's Basilica last year when we were in Rome for the Una Cum Papa Nostro pilgrimage, in France with the Institute of Christ the King and in various other parishes on our travels. MC is a different job though, complicated, detailed: not only does he have to know where everyone on the sanctuary needs to be at any given moment in the Mass, he also needs to remember all the responses in Latin and find the right pages in the missal at the right moments to ensure that everything happens when it should: a massive responsibility on those small shoulders. It's funny, I look at this little boy, who loves his Lego Hobbit set and his pet mice and who spends his days climbing trees, up there on the sanctuary: utterly capable, completely absorbed in the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass and I thank God for the many blessings in our lives: our parish, our priests, our friends, our return to the Faith, our marriage and our family. Deo gratias!
The young MC is to be congratulated, as is the Senior server who trained him and had faith in him. I find news of this kind very heartening.
ReplyDeleteSimply beautiful!
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