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Pope Francis’s recent call for a commission to explore the
possibility of reinstating the female diaconate in the Catholic Church
resonates with over a century of similar calls among leaders and laity
of the Orthodox Church.
These calls for restoring the female diaconate
within the Eastern Orthodox Church have been supported by prominent
theologians and hierarchs. Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew I even
stated in 1995 that, “There is no canonical difficulty in ordaining
women as deacons in the Orthodox Church,” and in 1997, that the “order
of ordained deaconesses is an undeniable part of tradition” and that
“there are already a number of women who appear to be called to this
ministry.”
Despite hierarchical endorsement, consensus of various international
conferences, intermittent examples of elevating nuns to the rank of
deacon over the past century, and attempts to form centers for training
female candidates for the diaconate, no successful reinvigoration of the
female diaconate has been sustained. Although there is Byzantine
precedent for the female diaconate, concerns about women’s “roles” in
the Church, prejudices against the female body in liturgical space, and
ambiguity about how to apply historical tradition to the present day
Church in a way that attends to women as full and equal members of the
Body of Christ exist as subtle inhibitors of restoring this ministry.
Byzantine sources indicate the rite for making a female deacon was in
fact “ordination,” and that female deacons received a stole and
received Eucharist at the altar comparable to the male deacons. The
female deacons assisted in the adult baptism and sacramental ministry of
women in private. Sometimes, female deacons also were identified with
keeping order on the women’s side of a church, chanting, held prominent
monastic positions, and participated in processional roles. In general,
they had limited public liturgical functions, and were usually required
to be over the age of forty and celibate/virgins. While the ordination
of female deacons has not been canonically prohibited, the order did
diminish almost entirely excluding periodic exceptions within
monasteries by the twelfth-century. It is unclear what led to this
decline, but the increasing numbers of infant baptisms, and the
development of restricting women’s liturgical participation during times
of perceived “impurity” contributed.
Historically, the diaconate was not a stepping stone to the
priesthood, but modern documents about the female diaconate are
typically situated among conversations about the “role” of women in the
church–both to affirm women do have opportunities for service in the
church and (usually) deny any possibility of a female ordained
priesthood. For this reason, there is some debate about “consecrating”
instead of “ordaining” female deacons. Claims of iconicity, distinct
“charisms” for men and women, typologically based orders of creation and
redemption, and a lack of a female ordained priesthood in
revelation/tradition are used to justify the continued exclusion of
women from clerical ranks. An issue worth considering, however, is why
is the thought of a female serving liturgically results in such heated
debate. Perhaps the Church’s concerns about maintaining an exclusively
male administration of sacramental authority is more charged by
social/cultural values than theology.
The issue of maintaining or rejecting the Byzantine age requirements
for female deacons and the necessity of celibacy/virginity which
historically may have mediated cultural concerns about women’s sexuality
also need to be interrogated for contemporary relevance. Despite
episcopal and pastoral directives that have rejected practices of
prohibiting a woman from receiving communion during menstruation, one
only has to look at the prayers for a woman entering the Church forty
days after childbirth to see there remains a liminality about female
bodies in liturgical practice and space. The few twentieth-century Greek
deaconesses all were within monasteries, but the possibility of
non-monastic and married female deacons has been proposed. An opponent
of this proposal exclaimed that it would be a scandal to even imagine
maternity vestments. Perhaps the ridiculousness of the idea of a
pregnant deacon is obvious to some, but instead of scandal perhaps one
could see a Eucharistic icon, if such a deacon ever were to be allowed
to exist. Concerns about the hypothetical female deacon’s appearance in
liturgical public are not limited to their procreative potential, but
also include concerns about appearing sufficiently modest and
un-distracting to male parishioners. Perhaps, however, parishioners—both
male and female need to see women active in the ministry of the church
and the tradition of placing the responsibility for male sexual arousal
upon women finally needs to be rejected. Aside from any potential female
diaconal involvement in liturgical contexts, opponents also argue that
women should not have teaching authority over men, and that women would
not have time for ministry given their inherent domestic and maternal
duties. Authority should be recognized based on qualifications
regardless of sex, and these types of hesitations need to be dispelled.
The female diaconate should be developed for the present in a way
that does not idolize the past that has little relevance for women and
men today, but in a way that continues to receive and recognize the
gifts of the Holy Spirit working timelessly in the unified Body of
Christ. To reject the restoration of the diaconate on the basis that the
Byzantine pastoral concerns are no longer present today, ignores the
host of ministerial needs and the comfort levels of women and male
clergy in spiritual ministry. Although there are no longer adult nude
baptisms, and there are very few private spaces for women that a male
priest would not be permitted to enter, there are numerous pastoral
instances in which a female deacon would be preferable to a male. Most
of the arguments for restoring the female diaconate have centered on
women’s ministry to other women, as in Byzantine times, but this does
not necessarily need to be the only path for the female diaconate in the
future. The concerns restricting the development of the female
diaconate need to be prayerfully and critically considered in order that
a female ministry might emerge in a way that is abundantly fruitful
within, and authentically witnessing to, the unity and fullness of the
Orthodox faith.
Ashley Purpura is Visiting Assistant Professor of Religious Studies at Purdue University.