Making Worship Happen
Worship services in The Episcopal Church are beautiful and transcendent, meant to guide our hearts, minds, and bodies closer to God. As with most things, worship doesn’t just happen. It takes preparation and participation, both of which exist as ministries such as the Altar Guild and the helpers with the service.
Altar Guild
The Altar Guild is a volunteer group of the parish whose ministry is to care for the altar, vestments, vessels, and altar linens of the parish. Altar Guild members prepare the sanctuary for services and clean up afterwards. Altar Guild members frequently supervise the decoration of the sanctuary of the parish with flowers.
St. John’s Altar Guild prepares the church for services and special occasions that include Holy Eucharist, such as Baptisms, Confirmations, Memorials, Christmas, Easter, The Feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe, Ordination and a visit from our Bishop.
The Altar Guild has four teams working one week each month. Each team has a Captain, a flower person and team members who set up the Altar for communion, clean up after communion, wash and press linens and set up the Altar for the next service.
For more information contact Sue Andersen at sue@stjohnsol.org
Worship Helpers
St. John | San Juan needs many volunteers to help with worship services. Please contact the rector or the designated person if you are interested in serving in any of these roles.
- Ushers meet and greet those attending services. They make sure people have a bulletin, offer seating and handling the collection during worship. Ushers are responsible to count the heads at attendance and complete the info card for communion wafer count and records keeping in the office. For more information contact Fawn Hacker at Fawn@stjohnsoly.org
- Lectors, also called readers, are lay people trained in reading scripture who are appointed by the clergy person in charge of the congregation to read lessons or lead the prayers of the people. The term is from the Latin, “to read.” There is no license required for this lay ministry. They read from the lectern, a reading stand upon which the lessons, psalms, or prayers sit.
- Tellers help in the office after church counting and recording the collection taken during each service.
- Lay Eucharistic Ministers are lay people licensed by the bishop to administer the consecrated elements of the eucharist. Lay eucharistic ministers may be licensed to administer the consecrated bread and wine at any celebration of the eucharist in the absence of a sufficient number of priests and deacons to assist the celebrant. They also may be licensed to go from a Sunday eucharist or other principal celebrations of the eucharist to share the sacrament with members of the congregation who were unable to be present at the celebration because of illness or infirmity. Lay eucharistic ministers may be licensed for either or both ministries. They help with the church services at the altar and during communion.
- Acolyte is a general term which covers not only servers, torchbearers, and lighters of candles but also crucifers, thurifers, and banner-bearers. They help with the church services by carrying the cross (crucifers), carrying lighted candles on either side of the cross (torchbearers), carrying and swinging the container in which incense is burned during the eucharist and other services (thurifer), holding the Gospel Book during the reading of the Gospel and assisting with the set up of the altar for communion during the service.
