Abstract
Current academic and ecclesial attention to the question of women deacons in the Catholic church owes much to the efforts of Phyllis Zagano in both arenas. From the publication of Holy Saturday: An Argument for the Restoration of the Female Diaconate in the Catholic Church in 2000 to this recent collection of scholarly essays, Zagano has steadfastly contributed to expanding and resourcing the discussion around Catholic women deacons. Her efforts have not gone unnoticed, as her appointment in 2016 to Pope Francis’s commission to study the issue attests. Only one meeting of the committee, in November 2016, has been reported. Nevertheless, the discussion persists around the world. This volume is a welcome addition to the historical documentation on which, at least in part, the Catholic question of women deacons rests.
Zagano has brought together 12 essays previously published in academic journals in English, Italian, and French between 1969 and 2011, the majority translated into English for this volume. Significant in themselves, the essays also reflect the trajectory of discussion from Vatican II and the introduction of the permanent diaconate onward. As Zagano notes in her introduction, the topic was discussed by the International Theological Commission in 1972 at the request of Paul VI; the 1987 Synod on the Laity; a subcommittee of the ITC from 1992 to 1997, which was not permitted to release a favorable study document; a new round of ITC consideration that resulted in publication of a study document in 2002 that rehearsed the theological and historical issues without reaching any resolution. The document concluded that ‘it pertains to the ministry of discernment which the Lord established in his Church to pronounce authoritatively on this question’ (§V).
Two opening essays address foundational and frequently contested New Testament texts: Rom 16.1–2, regarding the diakonos Phoebe (Corrado Morucci) and 1 Tim 3:11, the ‘women likewise’ addressed amidst instructions about the character and qualification of male deacons (Jennifer H. Stiefel). Morucci briskly analyzes the modern history of the passage’s interpretation in commentaries, highlights some significant loci in the ecclesial tradition, and crisply concludes that diakonos ‘signifies above all a title, a stable function, a ministry’ that is ecclesiastical but cannot be further specified from the evidence (p. 12). Stiefel presents a compelling analysis of the syntactic structure of 1 Tim 3:8–13 and the identification of ‘the women,’ concluding that ‘the evidence in 1 Tim 3:11 for a diaconal ministry of women is strong, though not completely conclusive’ (p. 29). A short essay by Ugo Zanetti argues cogently that there were indeed deaconesses in Egypt.
Other essays in this volume present strong analyses of the historical evidence for women deacons in the Eastern and Byzantine Churches, as well as in the late antique and early medieval West. There is inevitable overlap among some of these essays, especially in regard to the earlier and obvious texts (Didascalia Apostolorum, Apostolic Constitutions, Testamentum Domini); yet particular angles of vision work together to create a more textured understanding of these sources (Morucci, Pietro Sorci, Cipriano Vagaggini). One of the notable features of these and related essays is the breadth of geographical and ecclesiastical coverage beyond the axes of Rome and Constantinople: to Armenia, Georgia, Egypt, and Jerusalem; Nestorian, Monophysite, and western churches. Sorci’s essay stands out in this respect. In ‘The Ordination of Deaconesses in the Greek and Byzantine Tradition,’ Vagaggini concludes that their ordinations were equivalent to those of male deacons and in most cases both male and female deacons were regarded as among the clergy (p. 142). Sorci reaches similar conclusions while also taking into account other liturgical ministries of women. Marucci considers it ‘highly probable that deaconesses in the ancient and medieval Church received a sacramental ordination analogous to that of the deacons’ (p. 52).
Valerie Karras’s essay on ‘The Liturgical Function of Consecrated Women in the Byzantine Church’ illuminates the liturgical presence of women at a time when ordained deaconesses had all but disappeared in those churches. Three examples—a fresco of women incense-bearers leading a weekly procession in 13th-century Constantinople, older women consecrated for a ministry with women attending public liturgy at a male monastery, and an order of ‘myrrhbearers’ (possibly ordained) assisting the Patriarch at the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem—resonate with the apostolic and pastoral ministries of women deacons. Phyllis Zagano traces traditions of monastic ritual, diaconal service among consecrated virgins in the world, and finds echoes of diaconal ordination of abbesses in the profession ritual of Cistercian and Carthusian nuns. She asks: ‘Is the tradition of women deacons lost, or merely misplaced?’ (p. 217).
Philippe Delhaye reflects on the past and future of women’s ministries in conversation with Roger Gryson’s 1972 study, The Ministry of Women in the Early Church, supporting a renewal of diaconal office for women in light of apostolic precedent and in response to current need, while reserving ordination to the episcopate and presbyterate to men. A 1969 interview with Yves Congar about renewal of the diaconate reveals his openness to a diaconal ministry of charity for women along with his anxieties about the need to distinguish it sharply from ministerial or hierarchical priesthood. Peter Hünermann brings the volume to a close with some final observations on the full ‘ordination and integration of women deacons into the liturgical and pastoral ministry and the performance of charitable works’ (p. 229), the needs of mission, and the changing roles of women in modern society.
Women Deacons? Questions with Answers is a valuable resource for both the history and the ongoing conversation around ordination of Catholic women to the diaconate. The preponderance of historical evidence, sacramental theology, and liturgical and pastoral practice argues for ordaining women deacons. This collection cannot by itself resolve every historical question; but neither can the history alone resolve the contemporary question. That will require broadly shared discernment about the Gospel message and the mission of the church.