Chicago altar girls stir up a hornet's nest

IN A WORI D of male chauvinism in which, alas, the
Church . plays not an insignificant part, the idea of altar girls does not, as yet, seem to meet with universal approval.
Our picture shows the white robed altar girls leading the procession after Sunday Mass at Saint Julian's Church in Chicago. Kareti Garita carries the Cross, followed by Tara Helpin, left, and Carla Plaise.
Saint Julian's is one of a number of Chicago parishes where the parish priests have made it clear that they will continue to use girls to assist at Mass, despite a letter from Cardinal Joseph Bernardin saying that there is a church rule that forbids "girls acting as altar servers". Saint Julian's parish has 33 altar girls, all students in the local church school.
It is common enough for girls to act as altar servers in some parishes in France, particularly where Catholic males are in short supply. I have heard of the delightful idea of whole families, Including girls, serving Mass in some parishes in Canada.
In Britain, one of the leading Catholic schools for girls, which is both a boarding school and has local day scholars, and which is run by one of the finest orders of nuns in the country, has had girl altar servers for some considerable time, allied to a superb girl's choir.
Cardinal Bernardin is Archbishop of the richest diocese in the Universal Church, and carries considerable dollar "clout" in the corridors of power in the Vatican. 1 wonder oh what grounds he forbids girl altar servers? Could it be because of the strong conservative attitude of parts of his Archdiocese which have their roots in Ireland and in Italy?
His Archdiocese in the Windy City is notorious for its Italian gangsters, Irish politicians of doubtful integrity, and Irish policemen of outrageous brutality.
Altar girls are hardly the main problem, when there are the more pressing problems of poverty in Chicago, and the worst black slums in America.