Preparing for the feast

Twenty-Eighth Sunday in Ordinary Time

God’s guest list to the heavenly banquet includes those you expect as well as some surprising characters. Every guest, however, should come prepared with the proper intentions, attitudes, and dispositions for the feast. The point is not about your fashion choices but how you’ve prepared your heart for God’s gift.

On the other hand, as visible leaders of the assembly’s liturgical prayer, we do have to pay attention to what we wear. Start with basic common sense and courtesy by wearing clothes that reflect the solemnity of the celebration and the dignity of the work we do. Keep in mind some principles if your pastoral staff discerns that music ministers should also wear some kind of liturgical garment.

The General Instruction on the Roman Missal says that “acolytes, altar servers, readers, and other lay ministers may wear the alb or other appropriate and dignified clothing” (339). Music ministers would fall under this category. Sing to the Lord: Music in Divine Worship adds choir robes as an option, “but always in clean, presentable, and modest clothing” (33).

It also advises that cassock and surplice are not proper because they represent the ministries of those who are ordained. Furthermore, if different choirs serve together in one liturgy, they should all be vested alike to show their unity of liturgical function.

This post was first published in “GIA Quarterly: A Liturgical Music Journal.”

Image credit: Photo by Free-Photos–242387 on pixabay.