When people come to church, they experience the people associated with the church. We want that experience to be warm and welcoming. Our ushers are a part of that experience. They communicate a sense of belonging to the parishioners and are an important extension of the church and the Catholic family.
The Ministry of the Ushers responsibilities include:
• Welcoming the assembly at Masses, helping to seat the
assembly, especially those parishioners with special needs
• Taking up the collection
• Organizing the Communion procession
• Distributing the bulletin at the end of Mass
• Other duties deemed necessary by the celebrant,
liturgy team, or any parish group needing the usher’s help.
Qualifications include:
• Registered parishioner
• Mature demeanor with a willingness to serve fellow parishioners
• Male or female
“The ushers of today have descended from a long line of people of God who have gone before them. Their ministry is deeply rooted in Scripture and tradition. The author of the Book of Chronicles, a book coming to us from the third century before Christ, pays particular attention to the part played by the “religious orders” of his time, not only the priests and Levites but the lesser orders of cantor and doorkeeper. These last, who may have numbered in the hundreds, loomed large in Jerusalem’s population at the time and are the progenitors of our ushers today. They comprised the guild of gatekeepers, who had as their assigned task “the guarding of the threshold of the tent, just as their fathers had guarded the entrance of the encampment of the Lord. (1 Chr 9:19).”
— From the Ministry of Ushers by Gregory F. Smith as told by St. Paul the Apostle’s Danny Amos