Women’s Membership in the Church Council
Women’s Membership in the Church Council
Question
We received this question from some of our children in the diaspora:
“Your Holiness appointed some women as members of the Church Deacons’ Council. So what is the explanation for this, while the service of deaconship is restricted to men only?”
Answer
The service of the altar and the sacraments of the Church are restricted to men.
But there is a deaconess service for women, outside the service of the altar.
The title of deaconesses, and the work of deaconesses, are mentioned many times in the Didascalia, in the Canons of the Apostles, and in the canons of the Church and the canons of the great Fathers. Especially in the canons of Epiphanius and the canons of Basil the Great.
Women in our Church are far removed from the practice of priesthood.
But service on the Church Council is not a priestly work.
It is service in financial and administrative matters, which a woman can perform, and it does not at all conflict with priestly work, nor does it conflict with any of the laws of the Church…
And the Didascalia mentioned the service of deaconesses in Chapter Four, saying: “And the woman deaconess, let her be honorable among you”.
And it mentioned in Chapter Thirty-Four that she is appointed to serve women. Therefore, it is good for there to be a woman on the Deacons’ Council, representing women, their service, and their needs.
And as long as women have a role in endorsing the members of the Deacons’ Council, what prevents a woman from being a member of this council?
We also note that the Canons of the Apostles did not speak only about deaconesses, but also about subdeaconesses and readers.
This was mentioned in Canons 53 and 58 of Book One of the Canons of the Apostles. With the passage of time, the service of the deaconess expanded, representing the service of women in the Church.
Perhaps the most famous of the deaconesses is Phoebe (Rom. 16:1).
She was the deaconess of the Church of Cenchrea in the Apostolic Age, and one of the disciples of Paul the Apostle. She was the one who carried his letter to Rome. The saint praised her and recommended her, saying to the Romans: “I commend to you our sister Phoebe, who is a servant (deaconess) of the church which is at Cenchrea, that you receive her in the Lord as is fitting for the saints, and assist her in whatever matter she may have need of you; for she has been a helper of many and of myself also” (Rom. 16:1, 2).
The deaconesses served as a public line of communication between the clergy and women.
Their work included assisting in the baptism of elderly women, visiting women in their homes, and serving sick and poor women (Didascalia, Chapter 4). Their work also included arranging the women in the church and seating them in their places, especially strange women. Their work also came to include teaching women and catechumens (Didascalia, Chapter 10). See also:
The New International Dictionary of the Christian Church, p. 286.
Among the most famous deaconesses in the late fourth century was
Olympias, the deaconess of Saint John Chrysostom.
She had a prominent position and very broad responsibilities. And we hear in the sixth century, in the collection of letters of Saint Severus of Antioch, published in the collection Patrologia Orientalis,
that he answered several questions sent to him by the deaconess Anastasia.
You can read about the deaconess and about the service of women in the collection of writings of the Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Volume Fourteen, concerning the canons of the Church. Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Vol. XIV.
We do not prevent women from serving in non-priestly fields.
And she performs the services of a deacon except at the altar and teaching men.
Likewise, the liturgical services in the liturgical prayers.
But she performs the work of a deacon on the Church Council and as a member of it, because it is merely a financial and administrative work…
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