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821 THE DEACONESS MOVEMENT Cynthia A. Jurisson THE HISTORY OF the relationship between women and institutionalized forms of Christianity is a long and complicated one. Throughout history, women’s increased participation in the ministries of the church has held tremendous potential to bring about gender equality as well as social control and subjugation of women to the hierarchy of the church. Offices, honors, and positions made available for women in the church can at one and the same time increase women’s participation and decrease their influence, as well as their autonomy. So it was with the introduction of the concept of the deaconess in the North American church. The development of the role held tremendous promise as a way for women to exert greater influence in both church and society. On the other hand, it held tremendous potential for increased social control and subjugation of faithful women by the church bodies that they were being called to serve. Similarly, in terms of conceptions of gender, the role of deaconess offered women an opportunity to expand the sphere of their gender, moving them legitimately into the public sphere. On the other hand, the ideology by which that was accomplished, construing deaconess work as a logical extension of women’s work, also tended to reinforce traditional assumptions about gender that relegated women exclusively to the home and private life. Connections to the Ancient World and the New Testament The assumption is often made that the modern deaconess movement is the revival of an ancient church tradition. The term revival ought to be used with caution , since none of the offices of the New Testament and early church have been precisely replicated in more modern church offices, despite some similarity in terminology and notwithstanding claims to the contrary. The shape and content of church offices such as presbyter , bishop, deacon, and widow are not the same today as they were in the ancient Near East. This is no less true of the office of deaconess. Rather than a revival, it is accurate to say that there was, in parts of nineteenth-century North America, an appropriation of the term deaconess as the title for a newly created position for women in a number of Protestant denominations . According to Acts 6, the office of deacon was originally created by the apostles as a way to attend to the material needs of widows, and probably other impoverished or needful persons, among the early Christians . Seven men were chosen to serve as the first deacons . Their title, deacon, was taken from the Greek verb diakonein, to serve. It is significant that the term deaconess does not appear in the Greek manuscripts of the New Testament in reference to Phoebe. Rather, she is described by Paul in Romans 16:1 as a deacon, or minister, as the term is frequently translated, of the church at Cenchrae. Despite the gender of the title in the original Greek, many English-language translations of the Bible have often designated Phoebe a deaconess. However, not until the third century onward and mainly in the Eastern part of the church do we find evidence attesting to the position of deaconess, using the feminine form of the title. The deaconess’s primary task was to care for and assist in ministry to women, for example, at women’s baptisms where a female assistant was necessary to preserve modesty . Through the centuries there has been considerable debate about the meaning of the title deacon in reference to Phoebe. In mid-nineteenth-century North America, Romans 16:1 was often used to legitimate women’s entry into professional church work as deaconesses . It may also have contributed to nineteenthcentury assumptions that diaconal work was women’s work, a logical extension of female maternal and domestic impulses. It is notable that there were few, if any, concerted attempts in nineteenth-century North America to organize and train groups of men for similar work. Several impulses coalesced in the mid-nineteenth century into a movement to establish deaconess groups among a variety of North American Protestant denominations . First, the massive and rapid influx of impoverished immigrants in the mid- to late nineteenth century created a social crisis in many urban areas, taxing inadequate or nonexistent social service, educational, and health-care infrastructures. Many Americans looked with both compassion and helplessness at the misery and suffering of so many immigrants. Second, there was an enormous concern among...

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