HI,
My Mother was replacing my switch plates and receptacles and touched the ground wire to a screw in the box when the electricity was on. This caused the lights to short out and shorted out the other lights on this electrical wire. The short happened at the 3-gauge plate. We have tried to reset the breaker box and switch the receptacle out with a new one and the lights are still out. Any suggestions?

Are you saying that all the lights that went out when the breaker tripped are still out? Before resetting your breaker did you make sure the ground wire was no longer touching the screw? Also, did you turn your breaker all the way off and then back to the "on" position? It will not reset from the tripped position unless you turn it to the off position.

If above advice does not help, you may have burned open a connection, may need a meter.