Anyway, to add to our earlier report of His Grace The Archbishop, the Most Rev. Malcolm McMahon, "genuflecting in the right direction" during the sung Latin Credo of the 2014 (Novus Ordo) Midnight Mass of the Nativity at the Liverpool Metropolitan Cathedral of Christ the King, we'll record another positive word about the suddenly improved attire of the regular altar servers at our mother church (albeit a seemingly endless array of girls and the token-presences of clearly bossed-about young boys).
You can find representative images of the cathedral's altar serving team via the following photo link (taken at the 2015 Mass of the Lord's Supper on Maundy Thursday):
https://www.flickr.com/photos/liverpoolcatholic/16468454083/in/album-72157651436631289/
We'd show one here but the photo "sharing" facility within the "Liverpool Catholic" account has been disabled.
Anyway, in come simple black cassocks and white surplices, whilst out go the tatty off-white "monks' robes" that appeared some time in the mid-to-late 1990s – possibly in the wake of the quite misguided 1994 Holy See communication which basically left the question of the use of altar girls to the discretion of local bishops. To think that many warned that – similar to the previous post-conciliar episodes regarding the introduction of the vernacular into the Mass texts, or the case of "Communion-in-the-Hand", or the usage of so-called Extraordinary Ministers of Holy Communion, i.e all optional exceptions that soon became the norm – before long the boys would be swamped by girls, and that altar serving would soon be seen by many lads as an almost exclusively effeminate thing and not at all the type of pursuit they'd wish to be involved in...and so it has proved.
Perhaps the cathedral's fad for the now passé monkish robes was first indulged because it was felt that simple cassocks and surplices were all-too-readily associated with...altar boys! Or maybe our memory-take on that 1990s cottas-for-robes transformation has been skewed by time and possibly there was another demanding reason. Whatever the truth, the robes have thankfully been ditched. In any case, trying to ever fathom the thinking behind the liturgical penchant which drives the choice at the Liverpool Metropolitan Cathedral of the most garish designs and fashions imaginable has long been an impossible task (yes, we know things have become even worse in the first few months of 2015 - and we'll be certainly be highlighting THOSE vestments soon!). For there clearly never has been any good sense or taste to discern, certainly judging by the ever more lurid vestments and (supposedly) sacred ornaments and objects that are part of the cathedral's commonplace day-glo-cum-rainbow (maybe it's a Noah thing?), colour-chart theming.
Yes, quite. We know exactly what's troubling you there.
Anyway, it was at least a welcome surprise that some time in late 2014 – i.e. the first few months of His Grace's archbishopric – the altar serving team suddenly reverted to donning simple black cassocks and surplices. Far smarter, far more fitting (quite literally) – even on the girls (we wince!).
We assume, therefore, that this welcome development was at the direct request of His Grace. If so, then it's another small positive to record.
But yet another confusing signal.
As we will more than allude to in future posts.
