Annual Mass for the Guild of Saint Stephen

Mass Celebrated by Archbishop Denis Hart
at Saint Patrick’s Cathedral, Melbourne,
on Friday, 19th May, 2006, at 7.30pm

Introduction

My dear young friends,

Tonight I welcome you to Saint Patrick’s Cathedral thanking you for your service of God, your priest and your people as altar servers.

The reverence that you show and the love that shines out from your words and actions in the church, in your daily life and in your family reflect the praise of God that is always to be shown in the liturgy. 

This special experience tonight is a moment when in a sense times stops still so that we can praise and thank our God for his goodness and open our hearts to the choice that he may invite us to make of following him in our life.

Let us call to mind our sins.

Homily

Dear Brothers and Sisters,

Tonight I would like to speak to you about the great action of the Mass.  We have come as God’s family, admitting our weakness, truly repenting and coming to praise and thank him.

We have listened to God’s Word and Jesus, our teacher, guides us.  In a few moments we will pray the Prayers of the Faithful before the gifts are brought to the altar; bread and wine, which will become the Body and Blood of Christ.

As altar servers you are involved in the action of the Mass.  See that your mind and the love in your hearts is reflected in what you do to carry the cross or candles or thurible, to serve the cruets and to help the people to pray.  A server is never a person who draws attention to himself or herself.  A server is someone who directs the attention of the people to what is really happening. 

Therefore, as we pray we show by our attitude, as we listen to God’s Word, when we listen attentively the people are helped.  When we come to the central part of the Mass we remember that it is an action of God.  As servers by prayer and faithfulness and attention we open our hearts to our God.  When we come to the central part of the Mass through the words of the priest, Christ becomes present and we are one with him in offering perfect praise to the Father. 

The real action in the liturgy is not the external things which we do, but the way in which you and I are invited to take part in the action of God himself.  When Jesus was born, lived, died and rose again, we were saved.  In the Mass this is brought to us and we are caught up into the action of Jesus to save us.  In prayer, we want to become one body, one spirit with Jesus.  Our doing comes before, but in our praying with Christ we come to the centre of the Mass and then we receive him in Holy Communion. 

Pope Benedict said, “The liturgy is the transforming power of God who wants through what happens as we celebrate the liturgy to transform us and the world.  In this respect the education of both priests and lay people is very deficient at the moment.”  Again he says, “The true liturgical action is the deed of God, a service which God gives to transform the world.”

My dear young friends, I want you to remember the importance of reverence in what you do and of attention in the way you follow the prayers.  When we come to the central part of the Mass, however, we are filled with wonder at what God is doing in our midst.  That is why the liturgy is so powerful and your part in the liturgy is so important.  You are brought close to God and to his priest and you help lead the people to God and thank God for the wonderful action of Jesus in saving us.

In every parish I want to thank the servers for their reverence and love.  I want to challenge you to go out from here tonight, understanding that what you do is something which is very close to what God does in saving and loving us.  Pope Benedict said in his recent Letter to the Church on 25th January, “God is love.  Whoever remains in love, remains in God and God remains in him.”  And then he quotes the First Letter of Saint John, “We have come to know and to believe in God’s love because he has loved us first.”  (1 John 4:16)

+ Denis J. Hart,
Archbishop of Melbourne.