Who's Next?

• Published in: Commonweal Vol. 151; no. 7; pp. 14 - 16
• Main Author: Frost, Carrie Frederick
• Format: Magazine Article
• Language: English
• Published: New York Commonweal Foundation 01.07.2024
• Subjects: Christianity; Councils; Ecumenism; Ordination; Religious organizations; Religious orthodoxy; Traditions; Greece; Africa; Ukraine
• ISSN: 0010-3330; 2163-3797

For the past century, various parts and peoples of the Orthodox world have advocated for the renewal of the ordained order of deaconess, including discussion in the 1917-1918 council of the Russian Orthodox Church; the late twentieth-century meetings convened by the World Council of Churches; the notable pan-Orthodox consultation in Rhodes, Greece, in 1988; various statements from Orthodox scholars and faithful; the founding of the nonprofit St. Phoebe Center for the Deaconess (which I currently chair) in 2013; and recent statements from the Ecumenical Patriarchate (see paragraphs 29 and 82 of For the Life of the World: Toward a Social Ethos of the Orthodox Church). The ancient order of the diaconate was a service ministry of the Church, directly involved in the care of local Christians and of the larger community. The current movement to ordain deaconesses focuses on the need for women to be vetted, trained, supported, and given the authority of the Orthodox Church to minister in a diaconal spirit. Because there has never been a ban on deaconesses in the Christian East and because this is not a doctrinal issue (which would require a pan-Orthodox decision), the Holy Synod of Alexandria voted unanimously to restore the order. In 2019, the Ecumenical Patriarchate granted autocephaly to the Orthodox Church of Ukraine despite questions of its authority to do so, and the ROC in turn broke communion with the Ecumenical Patriarchate and later aligned itself with the Russian government's invasion of Ukraine.