010069 SE The Female Diaconate. Issues of orthodox liturgics and sacramental theology (2025S)

In the early 19th century, a serious discussion began about reviving the female diaconate in the Orthodox Churches. In 1840 Metropolitan Filaret (Drozdov) of Moscow used the historical rite for ordaining a deaconess to install an abbess in a monastery. Since then, a handful of women have been ordained as deaconesses in various Orthodox Churches using a variety of ordination rites with and without sacramental implications. Even more women have served as lay deaconesses in various missions and social ministries since the 1830s onwards.

The pan-Orthodox Rhodes Consultation in 1988 formally called for reviving the female diaconate and opening minor orders for women. In 2004, the Holy Synod of the Church of Greece decided that since the female diaconate had never formally been abolished, there is nothing to prevent a local bishop from ordaining nuns as deaconesses for ministry in their monasteries, but this ordination is distinct from the sacramental priesthood. In 2016, the Greek Orthodox Patriarchate of Alexandria decided to revive the female diaconate, but the initial ordinations performed the same year treated it as a minor order distinct from the male diaconate, but in 2024 the metropolitan of Zimbabwe ordained a deaconess on his own initiative using a modified form of the rite for ordaining a male deacon.

This seminar will explore the history and theological implications of the female diaconate in the Orthodox tradition in order to constructively reflect on the various attempts to revive the female diaconate during the last two centuries.