Women and the Diaconate: Part II

After my last posting on women and the diaconate, the conversation on Deacon Greg Kandra's Facebook page continued, and I received several interesting e-mails.

1) One deacon observed that "We've had this discussion for a few years now, although Phoebe is mentioned by name, I would like to draw attention to the following; many have stated that Rome hasn't spoken clearly on this subject, yet it seems to me, that they have clearly spoken "men" for ordination. . . ."  He then recounts the facts surrounding Vatican II's renewal of the diaconate.  And yet, for all of the quotations he offers, none really applies to the specific question of the admission of women to the diaconate.  All of the citations could just as easily and appropriately apply to women as well as men.  The fact that the current renewal has not yet included women is not alone dispositive.  After all, prior to 1967, there hadn't been a married deacon in centuries as well in the Latin Church!  I would also point out that the Canon Law Society of America, in 1985, examined this question and determined that there were no major canonical issues that couldn't be rather easily revised if the Church were to decide to ordain women as deacons.  In other words, just because we're not doing something right now doesn't necessarily mean that we might not do something in the future.

As I have said many times elsewhere, we MUST keep the question of the possibility of ordaining women as deacons quite distinct from the question of ordaining women as presbyters.  WHY?  Well, one major reason is that the Holy Father, both now and in his previous ministry as Prefect of the CDF, has done precisely that!  So, it's not helpful for people to get all excited about this question by somehow equating all three orders.  Prior to the renewal of the diaconate as a permanent order, a neo-Scholastic understanding of the Sacrament of Order might have seen things that way, but the renewal of the diaconate has signaled a paradigm shift in understanding.  And the church has been refining this new understanding over the last twenty or so years and this is evident in changes made to the catechism and subsequent documents (detailed in our book on women deacons).

 2) Deacon Jim, the original "commenter" I referenced in my last blog post, offered a number of further observations.  He clarified that he had not been using the term "definitively" in the technical sense used by theologians.  He also wrote that "it seems arbitrary to make the claim that, of all the uses of 'diakonos' by Paul or others in the NT, that in Phoebe's particular case (but not in any other), it has to mean 'ordained deacon'."  Another friend also wrote in an e-mail, concerning Phoebe, that "When it comes to Romans 16:1 it became clear that whether or not the particular scholar saw it as evidence for the female diaconate, it was not clear what the term "deacon" in this context referred to holding an ecclesial office. Most noted that it was likely too early to attribute to her an established office in the Church, let alone one received by ordination."  I couldn't agree more with both comments!  Let me explain.

St. Paul refers to "our sister Phoebe" as deacon of the Church of Cenchraeae.  Period.  We have absolutely no clue what being "deacon of the Church of Cenchraeae" meant in her day.  What's more, we have no clue HOW she received that designation; was it simply something bestowed on her in Paul's letter?  Some kind of ritual acknowledgment?  We have no idea.  Nada.  Zilch.  I get that, and I accept it fully.  I know of no one who would seriously suggest otherwise.  On the other hand, however, there is something going on with Paul's use of the word.  I can't believe that Paul, whose first language was Greek, somehow screwed up the grammar with the sentence; therefore, his attribution of a "title" of "diakonos" must have meant SOMETHING, and the fact is, whatever it meant, it went beyond some generic kind of "service", since that ought to have been rendered more accurately with a more generic attribution, such as "diakonissa."  So, while we don't know any specifics, we can tell that it was something special, using a "title" that had acquired some kind of technical meaning in Paul's usage (as found in other correspondence).

Deacon Jim also points out the various other ministers who are apparently referred to as "deacons".  The problem, as he correctly points out, is with the language of translation.  In the case of Phoebe, we have a masculine form of the "title" being used with a woman; it is a rather glaring use of the language.  With the men being referred to has "deacon" the challenge is greater, since it could be that the word is being used as a title of ministry, but it could be used in the more generic sense of "assistant" or "servant" without any reference to ecclesial ministry.  This is because it is a masculine form of the word being used to describe males, so we have to let the context help us a bit.  Perhaps some of these men were "deacons"; then again, they might simply be assisting in some other capacity.

3)  Deacon Jim also writes that "any claim that the Seven are somehow separate from Deacons seems, in my view, to be as weak as claims against the 'Trinity' as being Scriptural since the word 'Trinity' isn't used, say, at the Annunciation, or the Baptism of the Lord. If the 'Seven' aren't deacons, what are they? If Philip isn't a Deacon, what is he?"

Again, my earlier concern is that people be quite clear on what sources we're relying on for our information.  Many people honestly don't realize that scripture itself does not allude to Stephen and the rest of the Seven as deacons.  As I've said before, we Catholics do not hold a sola scriptura understanding of Divine Revelation, seeing the Revelation of God coming to us both through Scripture and from Tradition.  So, while scripture itself is silent on the whole Seven-as-Deacons idea, Tradition since the time of Irenaeus HAS seen the Seven as coming to represent the diaconal order.  I have no problem with that; we simply need to be careful in how we make our assertions.  In other words, SCRIPTURE doesn't make the claim here; Tradition does.  That's an important distinction for scholars and anyone else interested in the matter.

Now, as to Jim's questions, "If the Seven aren't deacons, what are they?  If Philip isn't a Deacon, what is he?" let's consider.  FROM SCRIPTURE, we can tell nothing about "what" they are.  For example, I have done some research into Second Temple Judaism, and there are some talmudic sources that suggest that each synagogue had a "board" of persons who were responsible for the charitable outreach of the synagogue, and quite often this "board" consisted of seven persons.  Could Peter have been asking those Greek-speaking Christians of Jerusalem simply to use the existing Jewish model for service?  We don't know, but what we DO know is that Luke -- who would have been familiar with the term "diakonos" and "diakonoi" in the technical sense -- chose NOT to use that term vis-a-vis the Seven.  It's also interesting, of course, that while Peter says that he wants the Seven to take care of the "daily distribution" so that the Twelve can take care of preaching the Good News, the only actual ministry we see two of the Seven doing (Stephen and Philip) is preaching and catechizing!  (I often remind deacon candidates that they should remember that Stephen was martyred precisely because of his powerful preaching, and they should expect no less!)  What we do know about the Seven FROM SCRIPTURE is this: they were picked from among their own community, were of good repute and filled with the Holy Spirit, and they were ordained (hands were laid upon them by the Apostles) into ministry.  As I wrote above, later Tradition will describe that ordination as diaconal.

Why do I persist in making this distinction?  I have encountered some people over the years who would like to say that contemporary deacons should only do what we see the "deacons" in scripture doing.  The problem is that we don't really know WHAT the deacons of scripture were doing, and trying to limit ministry to such scant evidence would not be helpful.  Imagine if we tried to suggest that limitation on presbyters or bishops!  But that's something for a different post.

I have delayed putting this post up, because I have reviewed so many previous posts on this subject and it seems like so much of the material -- both the objections to the question, and my responses -- is simply repetitive.  Many things have changed over the last couple of decades with regard to church teaching as well as historical and theological research on the matter, so I strongly recommend that this later material (starting with church teaching itself!) be studied carefully.

 

The Debate Continues: Women and Diaconate

Let me start with one preliminary observation: There are numerous unresolved issues related to a contemporary theology of the renewed order of deacons in the Church today; the ordination of women as deacons is simply one of those issues.  In my own research, writing and teaching on the diaconate, I have not focused exclusively on this issue, feeling that other fundamental matters needed to be attended to first.  However, the question of ordaining women as deacons can help us address issues related to the nature of diaconal ministry today.  And, for full disclosure, I have had the pleasure of looking into this issue with more intensity as one of the authors of Women Deacons: Past, Present, Future with Gary Macy and Phyllis Zagano.

The new Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (CDF), now-Archbishop (soon-to-be Cardinal) Gerhard Ludwig Mueller has written on the diaconate and priesthood, as well as participating as a theologian on the International Theological Commission (ITC), which developed a paper on the diaconate.  Ten years ago, he was interviewed on this question as part of that effort, and that is available here. I would observe, and will detail below, that much has happened SINCE that interview which would lead me to question whether he would still hold some of the same views today. 

I bring all this up because the mention of Mueller's decade-old interview sparked quite a debate over on Deacon Greg Kandra's Facebook page, and some points were made there that I think need to be addressed.  One of the comments made was the following:

"The all-male diaconate definitively and historically emerges from the ministry of the apostles in Acts. Just as Jesus did with the Twelve, the Apostles do with the "Seven"--both excluding women. I would suggest reading our new Prefect's book "Priesthood and Diaconate" as well as Martimort's "Deaconesses" for the historical context that makes clear that, while the Church ordained "deaconesses" as a separate "order" in the Church, the order of deaconesses was never viewed as a participation in the Sacrament of Holy Orders any more than other orders were (porter, lector, acolyte, etc). While there has been no contemporary clarification that women cannot be deacons (though they obviously *can* be deaconesses if that "order" is ever restored), the history/practice on this point is explicit both in Scripture and Tradition."

1) The claim is made that an all male diaconate "definitively and historically" is grounded in Acts 6-8 and the selection of the Seven.  The commenter later admits that a separate group known as "deaconesses" existed later, although not on a sacramental par with male deacons (more about that later).  However, on this first point I'm concerned about the terms "definitively" and "historically," especially based on a reading of Acts.  Scripture alone cannot sustain this claim, since the passage does not explicitly refer to the Seven as "deacons."  Certainly scripture knows of deacons (one need only turn to the letters of Paul and the pastoral epistles to find that evidence), but Luke does not refer to the Seven as deacons.  It is later Tradition (at least 200 years later) that begins to refer to Stephen and his "classmates" as the first deacons.  (In fact, the only deacon referred to by name in the New Testament is actually Phoebe, who is referred to as deacon -- not by the feminine form diakonissa, but by the masculine form diakonos, leading some scholars to suggest that "deacon" has already emerged as the title of a particular office in the ancient Church.)  So, I would be very hesitant to attach a "males only" argument simply to the passage from Acts, especially using terms such as "definitively" and "historically."

2) The fact is, the Church has never spoken "definitively" on the subject of the ordination of women as deacons.  The term "definitive" was applied to the question of ordaining women to the PRESBYTERATE by Pope John Paul II in his encyclical Ordinatio Sacerdotalis, but that is a question distinct from the diaconate.  I would also point out that the working document released by the ITC (with Mueller as a member) also agreed that the Church has not yet spoken definitively on the subject, and that "it pertains to the Church's ministry of discernment" to address the matter.

3) The commenter suggests that people read Mueller's text on Priesthood and Diaconate as well as Martimort's work Deaconesses.  That's good advice, but incomplete.  First, Martimort was not writing in a vacuum.  He was engaged in an extended scholarly debate with Roger Gryson, who took an opposing view of the same historical evidence; so, I would encourage people to read BOTH men and analyze their arguments.  Second, this debate took place in the 1970's, and the historical record has been greatly augmented by more recent research, both in Eastern and Western sources.  Simply put, we have more historical data to consider today than those two scholars did.

4) Mueller and Martimort would agree that women were commissioned/installed/ordained as "deaconesses" but that this role was not sacramentally equal to that of male deacons, nor was their ministry on a par with male deacons.  The argument was that such women were installed to provide ministry to other women.  However, the historical record reveals that there is considerable variety in the roles "deaconesses" and "women deacons" (sometimes these terms are used equivalently, sometimes not) actually played in various cultures and places.  Furthermore, recent study of ordination rituals indicates that some women were ordained WITHIN the sanctuary (as contrasted with blessings and installations which took place OUTSIDE the sanctuary), with the laying on of hands by the bishop, and even -- in some cases -- the use of the exact same prayer of consecration used for both male and female deacons.  I am not suggesting that this practice was universally followed; but I am saying that it did take place alongside the historical practice alluded to by Martimort and Mueller.  Any attempt to justify one practice or another is methodologically and historically incomplete, since all of these practices were done, and there was great diversity of understanding and practice.

5) Mueller and others often argue for the "unicity" of the Sacrament of Order, so that what applies to one order applies to the others.  Certainly we all agree that there is but one Sacrament of Order (now described as the orders of deacon, presbyter and bishop, although until 1972 the sacrament included subdeacon (a major order), and the minor orders of porter, lector, exorcist and acolyte), the way these orders relate to one another has received considerable official attention over the last 20 years or so.  The result of this work, led largely by then-Cardinal Ratzinger while he was Prefect of the CDF, has been to develop the notion of two modes of participation within the one Sacrament of Order.  Namely, there is the diaconal mode of participation and the priestly mode of participation which is shared by presbyters and bishops.  "Priests" (presbyters and bishops), we are told, "receive sacred power to act in the person of Christ the Head," while deacons "receive a special strength [vigor specialis] to serve the People of God" in a ministry of Word, Sacrament and Charity.  Such distinctions within the one Sacrament of Order are quite helpful in overcoming the sense that the diaconate is simply an abridged, or lesser, form of the priesthood itself.   The image I often use in teaching on this subject is that of a teeter-totter: one the one hand, there is the unicity of Order; on the other is the diversity within the Order.  In my own theological opinion, one must keep the teeter-totter balanced.  If we go too far to the side of unicity, we lose the inherent communio of the Order; if we go too far to the side of diversity, we risk creating two or three separate sacraments.  According to other members of the ITC, then-Father Mueller and his colleagues engaged in quite interesting debates during their sessions!

6) Finally, I would simply caution against "elevating" Archbishop Mueller's theological judgments now that he is Prefect of the CDF.  Just as the pope himself continues to publish his own personal theological research under the name "Joseph Ratzinger" -- realizing that his function as theologian is quite distinct from his role as the Pope -- so, too, must we continue to distinguish what "Gerhard Mueller's" own theological research might support contrasted to positions he may take as Prefect of the CDF.

In conclusion, I would simply affirm the official position of the Church: that the question of ordaining women as deacons remains -- according to papal and curial pronouncements -- an unresolved question, and the call to continue "the Church's ministry of discernment" on the question is ongoing.

A Comment on Comments

Gentle readers,

I have decided to join my blogging friends, like Deacon Greg Kandra, who do not have a "comments" section on their blogs.  Let me explain this decision.

I'm a teacher, and I thrive on the give-and-take of the classroom.  However, I find that here on the blog I have a tendency to want to respond and reply to each and every comment, and there's simply insufficient time and energy to do that.

So, if any of my reflections inspire comments, corrections, or uncontrollable rage, feel free to e-mail me off-line.

Thanks for understanding!

God bless,
Deacon Bill

On "Magisterium": Who or What? UPDATED

One of the most misunderstood and misused words associated with the Church is the Latin term magisterium.  If a quick survey of certain web sites is any indication, many people seem to think that magisterium is a "who": the Pope, for example, or the Pope and the world's bishops, or the Pope and the curia in Rome.  Actually, this is not accurate.  Magisterium, linguistically, is a neuter noun; it is a "what", not a "who."  It is "the teaching authority of the Church."  And, as we all know, "the Church" is more than its episcopal leadership.  Let's consider a few basics.

Why do we claim any sort of teaching authority at all?  It seems rather presumptuous to think that we human beings can teach with authority about spiritual matters.  Remember that this was shocking to some of Jesus' own listeners, when they observed that "this man teaches with authority."  Magisterium is founded on the promise of Christ that the Holy Spirit will remain present and active in the community of disciples.  Consider John 14:26:  "The Advocate, the holy Spirit that the Father will send in my name -- he will teach you everything and remind you of all that I told you."  It is the Holy Spirit who teaches, no human authority.

The Holy Spirit is given to everyone at Baptism, and indeed, through all of the sacramental life of the Church.  In the Middle Ages a distinction was introduced between the ecclesia docens (the teaching Church) and the ecclesia discens (the learning Church).  However, of course, all of us participate, in a variety of degrees, in the one and the same teaching-and-learning Church.  The role of the ordained is often highlighted.  Vatican II spoke of the teaching role of bishops and presbyters as their primary obligation (the primum officium); subsequent documents have extended this as well to the renewed (permanent) diaconate as well.  While one can sometimes read (usually in very derogatory terms) that others are claiming magisterial authority as well (consider some recent nasty blog posts about "the magisterium of the nuns" when criticizing the LCWR, for example), the medieval Church DID extend its understanding of magisterium beyond the bishops themselves.  No less a theological giant than Thomas Aquinas in the 13th Century, wrote of the magisterium of university theologians; at the great Council of Trent in the 16th Century, and at Councils before that, the theological experts were often given a vote on conciliar texts!  Trent, for example, referred to the theologians as minor theologians and the bishops as major theologians.  Some votes included them all; some were restricted to the bishops alone.

UPDATE:  After my initial post, I was doing some research on Blessed John XXIII's opening address o the world's bishops at the Second Vatican Council.  I was struck by how he used the term magisterium, clearly using it the term accurately, and in the way we all used to use it until relatively recently.  Look at how he introduces the term at the beginning of his address:

In calling this vast assembly of bishops, the latest and humble successor to the Prince of the Apostles who is addressing you intended to assert once again the magisterium, which is unfailing and perdures until the end of time, in order that this magisterium, taking into account the errors, requirements and opportunities of our time, might be presented in exceptional form to all people throughout the world.

Clearly, the pope is not referring to the college of bishops, with pope at the head of that college.  Here's another wonderful example.  The pope turns his attention to the previous 20 ecumenical (general) councils of the Church:

Ecumenical Councils, whenever they are assembled, are a solemn celebration of the union of Christ and His Church, and hence lead to the universal radiation of truth, to the proper guidance of individuals in domestic and social life, to the strengthening of spiritual energies for a perennial uplift toward real and everlasting goodness.  The testimony of this extraordinary magisterium of the Church in the succeeding epochs of these twenty centuries of Christian history stands before us collected in numerous and imposing volumes, which are the sacred patrimony of our ecclesiastical archives, here in Rome and in the more noted libraries of the entire world.

Finally, consider this famous passage:

The substance of the ancient doctrine of the deposit of faith is one thing, and the way in which it is presented is another. And it is the latter that must be taken into great consideration with patience if necessary, everything being measured in the forms and proportions of a magisterium which is predominantly pastoral in character.

"Good Pope John" (as the Italians still refer to him) shows us the proper understanding of this very complex term.

We are all expected to "follow the magisterium of the Church."  But this means so much more than simple obedience to the institutional structure of the external Church!  After all, bishops alone are not given full knowledge of all religious Truth simply by virtue of their ordination as bishops!  Like everyone else, they too grow "in wisdom, age and grace."  "Following the magisterium" is not some kind of loyalty test; it means being attuned to the full "teaching office" found within the entire People of God, great and small.

Up and Running: Back to Blogging

It's been a month or so since I took my sabbatical from blogging.  As I indicated then, I was feeling quite overwhelmed with work responsibilities, teaching, traveling and writing.  Over the last several weeks I've been involved in all of those things, including attending the Catholic Theological Society of America (CTSA) Convention in St. Louis during which I gave a paper, then directing the diaconate retreat for the Diocese of Pueblo at a retreat center in Colorado Springs. The highlight, however, has been the opportunity to take some much needed time for family: my wife and I have had the chance to visit our family spread out around the country.  We've seen our four children and all nine grandchildren (which included meeting our newest granddaughter for the first time!), my Mother and sisters, and many other family members.  I even got to baptize a new great-nephew!  It's been a truly blessed time.  This weekend, before heading back to the office, some of my former students -- now all involved in various ministries -- will be gathering for a small reunion.  All in all, then, this has been a very life-giving time, for which I am eternally grateful!

Now is the time to return to the blog.  You might notice that I've done a little refreshing of the design to signal my renewed effort.  More important, while I will certainly find things to blog about, it would also be helpful to know of any particular questions that you may have, so feel free to send along questions and suggestions for blog entries.

May all who pass by find this a place of peaceful yet challenging reflection.