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13 “Waiting at Table” A Critical Feminist The*logical Reflection on Diakonia The Greek term diakonia means literally “waiting at tables” but is usually translated as “service” or “ministry.” We can distinguish two different meanings in the New Testament usage of the word-cluster diakonia/diakonos/diakonein that have become paradigmatic for later the*logy. In a religious-spiritualized sense the word-cluster signifies an honorary activity, a person standing in the service of G*d/s, in the service of a city or commonwealth, or in the service of great ideas or ideals. When used in the New Testament in this sense the word-cluster characterizes Christian preachers and missionaries like Paul or Phoebe as representatives and messengers of G*d. However, in its original sense the term means actual material service, waiting at table and other menial tasks. As today so also in antiquity the “servant” had a low social position, was dependent on her or his master/mistress, and could not command respect. However, despite the debasing negative social connotations of its social and ancient meaning, “service” has become the keysymbol for the revival of a “servant ecclesiology” with progressive intentions. Feminist the*logical attempts to salvage this biblical symbol in the face of the stringent feminist critique of its cultural-political function in the oppression of women share the assumption of such a “servant ecclesiology,” that selfsacri ficing “service” is central to Christian identity and community. Servant Ecclesiology and Wo/men’s Ministry Since the early s the image of the servant-church has come to dominate progressive Roman Catholic and Protestant ecclesiologies and ministerial selfunderstandings . This revival of a the*logy of diakonia went hand in hand with a change in the church’s attitude to the “world.” For instance, the Pastoral Constitution on the Church in the Modem World of Vatican II teaches in Article  that just as Jesus Christ became human not to be served but to serve 213 214 Changing Horizons so also the church seeks to serve, the world by fostering the “brotherhood of all men.” In his book Models of the Church, Avery Dulles points out that a similar servant ecclesiology motivates official statements of other churches: “Remarkable in this respect are the Presbyterian Confession of , the Uppsala Report of the World Council of Churches in , the Conclusion of the Second General Conference of Latin American Bishops at Medellin in , and the document on Justice in the World issued by the Roman Catholic Synod of Bishops at its fall meeting in .” Such a servant ecclesiology insists with Bonhoeffer “that the church is the church only when it exists for others.” Insofar as this the*logy does not critically analyze the social underpinnings of servant-language, it is not able to recognize it as ideology or “the*logical double-speak” since the the*logy of service has different implications for men and women, ordained and nonordained , powerful and powerless. This servant ecclesiology legitimates a diversification of “ministry” in the Roman Catholic context. Its the*logians argue that ministries are functional, that they are a specific gift and service to the community. They exist for the building up of the community and do not consist in special status, lifestyle, or sacred office. Since the servant church as the ministerial community is prior to its ministers, the church can officially sanction new ministries that complement the traditional hierarchical ministries of bishop, priest, and deacon . Thus this the*logy does not seriously challenge the church’s structures of patriarchal-kyriarchal hierarchy and the ontological “class” division between ordained and non-ordained ministries but exhorts those who have kyriarchal clerical status and ecclesiastical powers to serve the laity and those in need. In Roman Catholicism this ecclesiology was developed in response to the shortage of priests in many parts of the world. It has engendered an explosion of specialized ministries that seek to serve not only the needs of the church but also those of the world. It has allowed wo/men to exercise ministerial functions, even though the official stance against the inclusion of wo/men in the ordained ministry has increasingly hardened. In short, the “progressive” the*logy of ministry as service as well as of the church as the servant of the world has supported not only a variety of ministries but also the participation of wo/men in the ministry of the church. However, because of their gender wo/men are relegated by church law to subservient...

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