What Do We Know About Women Deacons?

Phyllis Zagano; Bernard Pottier

What Do We Know About Women Deacons?

Authors

Phyllis Zagano Hofstra University
Bernard Pottier Université de Strasbourg

Keywords:

Catholic Women, Deaconess, Diaconate, Women in Ministry

Abstract

Pope Francis’s decision to establish a Commission for the Study of the Diaconate of Women in August 2016 reemphasizes the question: What do we know about women deacons? We know they existed. There is ample literary, epigraphical, and historical evidence that women deacons ministered in the West at least to the 12th century, and longer in the East. That they existed presents three questions: What do we know about the liturgical ceremonies bishops used to create women deacons? What do we know about their tasks and duties? What do we know about the theology of the diaconate that would admit or restrict women from diaconal ordination?

Author Biographies

Phyllis Zagano, Hofstra University

Phyllis Zagano, PhD, State University of New York at Stony Brook (1979) is Senior Research Associate-in-Residence and Adjunct Professor of Religion at Hofstra University. Her books include Holy Saturday: An Argument for the Restoration of the Female Diaconate in the Catholic Church. New York: Crossroad/Herder, 2000; Women: Icons of Christ. Mahwah, NJ: Paulist Press, 2020. Her recent publications include “What Do U.S. Catholics Think About Women Deacons?” with Erick Berrelleza. Review of Religious Research 61, no. 3 (September 2019): 273-84 and “Women Deacons, Women, and Service at the Altar,” Theological Studies 79, no. 3 (September 2018): 590-609. She was appointed to the Pontifical Commission for the Study of the Diaconate of Women in August, 2016.

Bernard Pottier, Université de Strasbourg

Bernard Pottier, SJ, Doctor of Theology, Université de Strasbourg, France (1993) is professor of theology and philosophy and director of Forum Saint- Michel, Brussels and a Member of the International Theological Commission. His books include Dieu et le Christ selon Grégoire de Nysse, Préface de M Canévet, Culture et Vérité, Namur, 1994 and with Alphonse Borras, La grâce dudiaconat: Questions actuelles autour du diaconat Latin. Bruxelles:Editions Lessius, 1998. His other publications include “La sacramentalité du diaconat.” Nouvelle Revue Théologique 119 (January 1997) 20-36. and, with Dominique Struyf, Psychologie et spiritualité. Enjeux pastoraux, Coll. Donner Raison n. 35. Bruxelles: Lessius, 2012. He was appointed to the Pontifical Commission for the Study of the Diaconate of Women in August, 2016.

What Do We Know About Women Deacons?