`God's right by your side' // Despite official ban, altar girl feeling special

As her mother sees it, Regina Semmler has always been an"out-of-the-ordinary little girl."

At least on Sundays, when the 13-year-old dons a cassock at St.Barbara's Roman Catholic Church on the Southwest Side. Striding intothe sanctuary alongside the priest and altar boys, Regina is theparish's only altar girl.

"It's special being . . . up there (at the altar)," Regina saidof being an altar server. "You feel like God's right by your side."

Joseph Cardinal Bernardin also may be on the side of altargirls, whose numbers here have grown steadily the last few years.Among the Archdiocese of Chicago's 440 parishes, the number usingaltar girls has increased from about 10 in 1983 to 111 today.

Although Bernardin said he still recognizes the Vatican'sofficial ban on altar girls - and asks his parishes to obey it - he lent somelegitimacy to altar girls here recently when he said that, for thetime being, he will not discipline parishes that use them.

But area Catholics who look to Rome are criticizing Bernardin'sindulgence as yet another step away from the Vatican's rules - andanother step toward the eventual ordination of women priests.

"The broader issue is a matter of obedience, not only theobedience of the laity but the obedience of the (church) hierarchy,"said Phyllis Diez, a conservative Chicago Catholic.

"I see the young girls being used by people pushing for theordination of women. This (altar girls) is a foot in the door."

Diez has filed a canonical "suit" with the archdiocese on behalfof other disgruntled people, asking Bernardin to put a stop to altargirls on the grounds that they violate liturgical law.

Bernardin seems unlikely to halt the practice.

Earlier this month, he said he does not "consider this matterof such importance in itself as to warrant an action on my part whichwould only cause more confusion and controversy."

The Rev. Al Ciciora, Regina's pastor at St. Barbara's, deniedthat there "is any linking" of altar girls with the women'sordination lobby.

He, like many other priests here, said he wanted only to extendto girls more involvement in the liturgy, an ideal that won supportfrom a bishops' pastoral letter proposed two weeks ago.

And the Rev. William Stenzel, pastor of Holy Rosary Church onthe Far South Side, who also uses altar girls alongside altar boys,waved off the conservatives' argument as "contrived."

He said they fail to see the difference between areas governedby theological law, such as the church's ban on the ordination ofwomen, and those covered by the more flexible liturgical law, such asusing girls as altar servers.

"I have never had a girl who served in the mass make an issue ofbecoming a priest," Stenzel said.

Regina, whose favorite subject at St. Barbara's School isreligion, said, "I didn't understand when I was little why only a mancan be a priest, and I still don't understand why girls can't becomepriests."

And before Regina was recruited by Ciciora a year ago, she alsodidn't understand why she couldn't be an altar girl when her mother,Rose, could be a lay minister of communion - technically a moreimportant function in the mass.

Bernardin's statement said he also recognizes the"inconsistency" and that he anticipates "eventually there will besome adjustment" of the Vatican's position.

Diez's fellow conservatives, such as Dorie Gruss of Catholicsfor Responsible Action here, have warned that "little boys don't wantto do what little girls are doing."

They said they fear that if boys decline to be altar servers forthat reason, the pool of future priests will dwindle.

Regina admitted that when she became an altar girl, many of St.Barbara's altar boys weren't "too keen" about her.

But she said the boys have taken her into their fold now,helping her through Holy Week masses and making her feel "like partof the group."