Having been born in tropical Indonesia taught me a useful lesson or two about storms. We might be playing outside in a local park on a usually hot sunny afternoon. Suddenly a few dark clouds would poke their heads up from the horizon.

Nothing to worry about? Gracious goodness. Plenty! We had to run back home just in time to avoid being washed away by torrents of water bucketing down from the sky. And now I sense a storm being unleashed upon the Church.

During the first millennium practically every parish, especially in the East, had one or two women deacons. They assisted at the baptism of women. They served women at Mass in the church assemblies. They took communion to women who were ill. They often performed their anointing with consecrated oil. They organised funerals for women who had died. But were they true deacons?

Various reports, both official and unofficial, indicate that one of the positive outcomes of the Synodal Process may be the restoration of the diaconate of women. But the latest news from the Vatican is that Pope Francis has appointed ten Study Groups dealing with specific issues. The Group commissioned to study questions of ministry, including the ordination of women as deacons, has been entrusted to the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith.

This raises serious concerns. Does this wipe the topic from the general discussion platform of the Synod? And in the light of previous negative experiences, will this Curia department deliver a truly dependable, independent scholarly report?

Moreover, well-grounded fears remain that an attempt will be made to downgrade this female diaconate as non-sacramental, as not part of holy orders.  The diaconate was conferred on women in the Church for a thousand years.

Great, you would think, but some conservative scholars, including Cardinal Gerhard Müller, former head of the Vatican Congregation for Doctrine, declared this to have been only a second-rank ministry. Pope Benedict XIV added an ominous clause to Canon Law in 2009, stating “Those who are constituted in the order of the episcopate or the presbyterate receive the mission and capacity to act in the person of Christ the Head, whereas deacons are empowered to serve the People of God in the ministries of the liturgy, the word and charity” (Can. 1009 §3.). He obviously wanted to make sure that, even if women are admitted to the diaconate, this will not open the door to them being ordained priests.

The crucial question is: were the ancient women deacons sacramentally ordained? Did they receive holy orders?

The Ordination Rite

The answer is: yes, they did. And this can be proved convincingly by comparing the ordination rites used for male deacons and female deacons.  I will focus first on the Byzantine part of the Church. Ordination rites have been preserved in many ancient Greek documents such as Barberini Gr. 336 (780 AD), Sinai Gr. 956 (950 AD), Grottaferrata Γβ1 (1020 AD), Coislin Gr. 213 (1027 AD), Bodleian E.5.13 (1132 AD) and Vaticanus Gr. 1872 (1150 AD). The rite in all these documents can be shown to derive from a fifth-century proto-type originating in Constantinople.

I will describe six decisive features of the ordination. The quotes are from the original first-millennium ordination rites.

Where the ordination took place

In the ancient Byzantine East, the sanctuary which held the altar was closed off by doors. These remained shut especially during consecration. But at all major ordinations these doors were opened and ordinands led into the sanctuary.  The ordination rite says: “After the sacred offertory, the doors [of the sanctuary] are opened and, before the deacon starts the litany ‘All Saints’, the woman who is to be ordained deacon is brought up [to the altar]”.

This means the woman deacon ordinand, just like her male counterpart, was placed in front of the altar facing the ordaining bishop. The Orthodox liturgist Simeon of Thessalonika confirms this in his classic work About Sacred Ordinations (ca.  AD 1429): “Two ordinations are given outside the sanctuary, that of the reader and sub-deacon. There are also others for administrators, deputees, acolytes . . . But the (three) exalted ordinations are imparted inside the sanctuary.”

Election to the ministry by God

Before all the major ordinations, the Bishop would speak the so-called ‘Divine Grace’ proclamation. It was considered an essential part of the ordination because through it the bishop elected the ordinand for one of the higher orders. Pseudo-Dionysius (5th cent. AD) explains it clearly: “The ordaining bishop speaks the Divine Grace proclamation with a loud voice. This mystery signifies that the ordaining bishop, who is loved by God, is the herald of the divine choice. It is not he himself who leads the ordinand to ordination by his own grace, but he is moved by God in all ordinations”.

The Divine Grace proclamation declared it was God who chose the ordinand for his or her task. The rite states: “He [the bishop] says the ‘Divine Grace’ with a loud voice, after which the woman to be ordained bows her head.”

This is the actual formula used: “Divine Grace [= God] who always heals what is infirm and completes what is missing chooses so-and-so [name] as bishop [or priest, deacon] of [name of the location]. Let us therefore pray for him/her that the grace of the Holy Spirit may descend upon him/her.” – The people reply: “Lord, have mercy on us!”

Some scholars maintained that the proclamation itself was the ordination, at least originally.  But later studies disproved this. Ordination consisted of two distinct stages of one and the same liturgical action, each equally essential: the election and the ordination proper. The election indicated who was chosen for the ministry. The imposition of hands was the ceremony through which God’s Spirit actually descended on the ordinand.

Note that the ‘Divine Grace’ was only proclaimed for bishops, priests and deacons. The fact that the ordaining bishop proclaimed the ‘Divine Grace’ to announce the divine election of a woman deacon, shows that he ranked her ordination, without any shade of doubt, within the sacrament of major orders, like that of male deacons.

The first imposing of hands while invoking the Holy Spirit

The ordination rite for women deacons says: “The Bishop imposes his hand on her head, makes the sign of the cross on it three times, and prays: ‘Do now look upon this your handmaid, who is to be ordained to the diaconate, and grant her your Holy Spirit. Dedicate her to the task of your diaconate, and pour out into her the rich and abundant giving of your Holy Spirit’.”

In the Eastern tradition, the calling down of the Holy Spirit is technically known as the epiclesis. At the eucharist, it is not so much the ‘words of consecration’ but the epiclesis that brings about the transformation of the bread and the wine. Epiclesis, in one form or other, occurs in all the sacraments, for the sacraments come about through the action of the Spirit. At ordination, the Pentecostal Spirit ‘who provides all things’, pours its fullness into the ordinand: the bishop, the priest or the deacon.

Although mention is made of the gifts of the Spirit in the installation prayers of some of the minor orders, it is only bishops, priests and deacons on whom the full epiclesis is called down.

Second imposition of hands while calling on the Holy Spirit

The ordination rite continues: “. . . Meanwhile [during the intercessions] the bishop prays as follows keeping his hand on the head of the woman to be ordained: ‘Lord, Master, you do not reject women who dedicate themselves to you and who are willing, in a becoming way, to serve your Holy House, but admit them to the order of your ministers. Grant the gift of your Holy Spirit also to this your maidservant who wants to dedicate herself to you, and fulfil in her the grace of the diaconate, as you have granted to Phoebe the grace of your diaconate, whom you had called to the work of this ministry’.”

The second ordination prayer, added since the 4th century, was known as the ekphonese, because the bishop spoke it softly. It was performed only for the major orders: episcopacy, priesthood and diaconate.

It may have been inspired by the need of the ordaining bishop to make sure that the conditions for ordination had been fulfilled. By speaking the ekphonese prayer over the woman candidate, the bishop again indicated her being raised to the sacramental order of the diaconate.

Investing the woman deacon with the official stole

The ordination is confirmed by imposing the diaconate stole: “The bishop puts the stole of the diaconate round her neck, under her [woman’s] veil, pulling the two extremities of the stole towards the front.”

The bishop himself invests her with the distinctive vestment: to diakonikon horarion, the diaconate stole, in a way that agrees with her veil, the maphorion.  As for functionaries in the Greco-Roman Empire, the distinctive insignia indicated rank and power. The Synod of Laodicea in 363 AD excommunicated anyone wearing the diaconate stole without having been ordained.

Handing over the chalice

The ordination rite also mentions the following: “At the time of the partaking of the sacred mysteries [= holy communion], she [= the newly ordained deacon] shares of the divine body and blood with the [male and female] deacons. When the newly ordained has taken part of the precious body and blood, the bishop hands her the holy vessel. She accepts it and, without distributing it to others, puts it back on the holy table [the altar].”

It should be noted that this is highly significant. At communion the new woman deacon was present in the sanctuary with the other clergy, for the holy doors of the iconostasis were still closed. She was given the host on her hand by the bishop as her male colleagues were. And she drank from the chalice as they did. Now a special rite was added.

For the ordinary faithful, both the wine and pieces of consecrated bread were mixed in a chalice. Communion was given by dipping a little spoon in the chalice and pouring the contents on a communicant’s tongue.

It was customary for a newly ordained male deacon to be introduced to his task by making him share in the distribution of holy communion to the laity for, at the public eucharist, it was the male deacons who distributed communion to the faithful. But to show that in principle the woman deacon too received the same commission, the bishop handed her the chalice which contained the consecrated bread and wine, and she herself put it back onto the altar.

This meant that she was, in principle, empowered to distribute communion. It amounts to what theologians call a degree of potestas in eucharistiam, authority regarding the eucharist.  The Syriac Testamentum Domini 5th century confirms that women deacons took communion to the sick.

Conclusion

In all essentials, the ordination of women to the diaconate in the Byzantine part of the Church ran parallel to that of men. If women were not ordained to the full rank of the diaconate, then neither were the men.

The public setting, the proclamation, the double imposition of hands and invocation of the Spirit, the investiture with the distinctive stole and presentation with the chalice prove abundantly that women, as much as the men, were ordained to the major order of the diaconate.

Most scholars have come to the same conclusion (Thiermeyer 1966; Congar 1973; Vaggagini 1974; Hünermann 1975; Frohnhofen 1986; Aubert 1987; Ansorge 1990; Theodorou 1992; Hofrichter 1996; Böttigheimer 1996; Lochmann 1996; Jensen 1997; Karidoyanes 1998; Reiniger 1999; Zagano 2000; Winkler 2010; and many others).

The Orthodox scholar Bishop Kallistos Ware sums it up. “The order of deaconess seems definitely to have been an ‘ordained’ ministry during early centuries in the Christian East . . . Some Orthodox writers regard deaconesses as having been a ‘lay’ ministry.

“There are strong reasons for rejecting this view. In the Byzantine rite the liturgical office for the laying-on of hands for the deaconess is exactly parallel to that for the deacon; and so on the principle lex orandi, lex credendi — the Church’s worshipping practice is a sure indication of its faith – it follows that the deaconess receives, as does the deacon, a genuine sacramental ordination.”

In the Western Latin-speaking part of Europe there were fewer ordinations of women to the diaconate. This was mainly due to patriarchal prejudice against women stemming from Roman law. In spite of that, quite a few women were ordained deacons in present-day Italy, France, Germany, the Netherlands and England.

In 786 Charlemagne obtained from Pope Adrian I a sacramentary with ordination rites which the king prescribed as a model for all bishops in his realm. The sacramentary originated under 6th-century Pope Gregory the Great.

Hadrian’s sacramentary, which has been preserved in five manuscripts, contains this basic ordination formula for women deacons: ‘Prayer to make a woman deacon [diacona]. “Hear, O Lord, our petition and send down on this your maidservant here [on which I impose my hands] the Spirit of your ordination so that, since you have conferred on her your heavenly office, she may obtain favour with your majesty and may present to others the example of a good life. Through etc.”.’ It runs parallel to the formula for male deacons.

After the first thousand years, the diaconal ordination of women was gradually halted. Byzantine scholars of the time tell us that the main reason was a growing fear of menstruation, which it was thought, would contaminate the sanctuary.

Balsamon (12th cent.) says: “Formerly the order of deaconesses was recognized as in accordance with ecclesiastical law. They themselves had a position [= a specific duty] at the altar. But because of their monthly defilement their office was removed from the cultic sphere and from the holy altar.” Blastares (14th cent.) states: “Today the ministry of women deacons is almost totally unknown … Apparently, they had access to the altar and fulfilled the tasks proper to a deacon. Later however authorities stopped them from entering the sanctuary or fulfilling their duties because of their uncontrollable menstrual fluids.”

More detailed information about all this can be found in my book: Women Deacons in the Early Church (Crossroad 2006) and on www.womendeacons.org. On that website I have printed historical records of 108 women deacons who served in present-day Greece, Turkey, France, Italy, Armenia, Syria, Palestine and Egypt. There I also published the complete texts of 18 ancient ordination rites and their mention in 11 church councils and synods.

John Wijngaards is a Catholic scripture scholar and a longstanding advocate for women’s ordination in the Catholic Church.