The official terms liturgically are that bishops, priests, and deacons are the “ordinary ministers of Holy Communion.” Anyone else who helps in this way or in any other way is an extraordinary minister. Respectfully, in an ideal scenario, you wouldn’t be there. So please do it reverently and efficiently by all means. But ideally, the faithful shouldn’t notice you.
It is also the case that people with bad motives and the ignorant use the provisions and permissions for less-than-ideal situations to introduce their wrong ideas into the liturgy. More than a few people need to hear, “Hey friend. You could literally go to Hell for stuff like that.”
“Active participation” does not mean, “As many of us as possible need to do stuff in the liturgy.” It means that we know the significance of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. We are trying to be prayerfully aware of what the priest is doing, and to offer our own selves as distinct sacrifices to God. This is where the “and yours” in the vernacular of the Mass of Paul VI is a bit imprecise in English: there are two distinct types of sacrifices going on: the priest offering Christ, and the laity offering themselves. If we’re not really paying attention, we could think we’re helping the celebrant with the Sacrifice. Sentimental, but wrong.
But a note on altar girls and lectors of both sexes: I don’t care. We’re absolutely not getting that toothpaste back in the proverbial tube. There is no obvious and direct relationship between being an altar boy, and being a priest. Earlier generations, maybe. But any kid is going to understand that the liturgy, humble as it may seem, is the most important thing we will do in any given week, on any given day. That is, if we have a faithful priest. For those who attend a Traditional Latin Mass, I do think we need to affirm girls and women in the life of the parish more. Submission to men relative to second and third wave feminism might be important, but we have a worldly hypermasculinity and misogyny just floating around in our culture. We absolutely cannot just say, “No enemies to the Right of me” in politics, and hope for the best. Fr. Ripperger is walking into chapels with quasi-military weapons, for Pete’s sake. We’re gonna own the libs and still lose our souls.
One more thought on aesthetics and beauty in the liturgy: Someone might have been scandalized by liturgical abuse and frivolous music, and that’s a true reality. I heard a Gloria setting that precisely recreates the theme music from the kids’ cartoon My Little Pony. It’s a perfectly lovely show/franchise, but it’s all I can do not to laugh every time it happens. I heard a responsorial hymn/song that probably should be sued by Barry Manilow. I laughed that time. I’ll be OK; if you’re gonna get the giggles, Divine Mercy Sunday is maybe the best day to do it. But we can do better than that. I can always play my Manilow after Mass. But we invented Gregorian chant. Have you heard it? They use it on TV to symbolize holiness and Heaven for a reason.
I will say that we have to be intentional. And that cosplaying and nostalgia aren’t enough.
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