Involving young people at Mass – an invitation

Enniskeane and Desertserges    ||||||   Family & Youth Group of the Parish Assembly
20th September, 2013

Dear Parents/Guardians,

The Prayers of the Faithful rota for young people in each of the three churches, which began last year, has been a great success. For the coming term, it is planned to organise both a rota for Prayers of the Faithful and for the Second Scripture Readings for weekend Masses in each of the three churches in the parish.
We invite parents and guardians to encourage young people to have an active part in our celebration of Sunday Mass. In turn, this will also help develop young people’s confidence and their appreciation of the Mass.

To encourage involvement of young people, our outline plan is to assign tasks to specific age-groups:

  • 2nd class: gift bearers (bringing up the bread and wine to the altar during Mass)
  • 3rd class: gift bearers
  • 4th: gift bearers / altar servers
  • 5th: altar servers / Prayer of the Faithful reader
  • 6th: altar servers / Prayer of F
  • 1st Year: Prayer of Faithful reader
  • 2nd Year: Prayer of F / Second Scripture Reading
  • 3rd Year: Second Scripture Reading
  • 4th Year & older: Second / First Scripture Reading / Collectors / Ministers of the Eucharist

Naturally, there will need to be a bit of flexibility with this. (Information about recruiting new altar servers will be distributed shortly through the schools.)

In relation to the Prayers of the Faithful, the plan is to have two young people for each Mass (Sat and Sun), each one reading two short intercessions. Texts will be forwarded in advance by email. The texts of the Second Scripture Reading for each week can be previewed at the parish website homepage .

A short training session will be held in Enniskeane Church on Thurs. Oct 3rd at 7pm.
An initial rota will be developed at these sessions. If your son or daughter would like to sign up for either rota, please complete the enclosed form and return it to either the school, to one of the churches or to a member of the Parish Assembly Family and Youth group.

Thanking you in advance,

Family & Youth Group