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Dear Friends,

Of all the Byzantine Catholics on this fourm, how many of you have people in your parish that have minor orders? I am talking about permanent orders not temp. orders on the way to the Diaconate.
Also how many parishes have woman as lay readers.

My God, there are Orthodox parishes where women chant the Epistle. What is the big deal??????????

No problem just a question.Do I need a secret agenda to ask a question?

Brian,

To you Brian it might not be a big deal but to the rest of orthodoxy it is.

Chad,

Of the view churches I have been members of there have not been any minor orders. I believe it has to do with people not asking then the church offering.

Thank you,

But I am wondering if this is a new devlopment in my particular Eparchy or is this comming from the Metropolia? I am very excited that my Bishop is going to revive this.

i have two questions...is there a difference between a subdeacon and a regular deacon? and is there really such thing as deaconesses? i see the title of deaconess alot and i am unaware with that order.

A full deacon dresses like a priest, with a beard & everything. They can take Communion to the sick, help distribute Commuion, and should be the one doing the deacon's responses if there is one.

A subdeacon doesn't dress like a priest, they put on vestments at Church, and then dress normally afterwards like the chanters & readers. They traditionally cannot touch the Body & Blood to assist at Communion. The normal role of the deacon is to lead everything in the Sanctuary, and the subdeacon's normal role is to coordinate everything outside the sanctuary, leading the chanters & everything. Since there are so few full deacons though, often subdeacons will do the deacon's responses instead.

Deaconesses are an order of the Church, but they have no liturgical function. It's kind of like how the RC's have nuns who are contemplative, and nuns who serve in the world. Well deaconesses are kind of like the later. They coordinate charity work for a church, or are an assistant to a bishop, they can assist at female baptism, etc. They are not a female deacon, they are deaconesses.

The way it works at my church (I know I'm not Byzntine or Catholic, but just ignore this if you want) is there are chanters and readers. Usually a reader leads all the chanters outside in leading, and there is a rotation of chanters/readers who take turns serving at the altar in sets of 3 or 4 with one captain in each set. We don't have a deacon or subdeacon. If it's a weekday Liturgy or something and there aren't enough readers and chanters to handle everything, then a member of the congregation can read an epistle. But a man should be picked before a woman. When the Gospel is read, first it's read by a "deacon" while the priest offers incense. The highest ranking person should do it, if there's a reader, they should do it before a chanter, if there's a chanter, they should do it before a man, if there's a man, they should do it before a woman. Then the priest reads the Gospel again, and again the highest ranking should do it, so if there's a bishop they do it.

Johan,

Then take it up with His Grace, Bishop +Tikhon of the Diocese of the West of the OCA who does not have a problem with it either! I would think he knows a little more about Orthodoxy then you do.

thank u very much for the reply and information coptic orthodox, i greatly appreciate it.

You're welcome. There's an article here: http://saintmark.com/topics/thecopticchurch/sacraments/7_priesthood.html about the priesthood with information about all the minor and major orders. It's a specifically Coptic Orthodox article, I don't know how much of it applies more broadly to Eastern Christianity.

Let me get the old pot stirring.

There are absolutely no prohibitions, either scripturally or canonically, upon women reading in the Church. How would a women's monastery function if this were the case? I regularly invite women to read at my chanter's stand, especially during Great Lent and Holy Week.

There is a canonical prohibition upon women serving at the altar during liturgical services. It does not mean that they may not enter the sanctuary at other times, but that "they may not serve at the altar."

The Apostle Paul seems to be indicating that women should not preach & teach during the litugical functions of the Church, although historically there are several stellar exceptions to this generally-accepted rule of our tradition. (Olimpia, etc.).

The real hot-point seems to be with tonsuring them as readers. An interesting question is why do we have unrefutable evidence of deaconesses in the early church but no evidence of female tonsured readers?

The answer is because the female deaconesses did not serve a liturgical role, except for baptisms of females, which were conducted in the nude and in a separate room. The primary role of the deaconess was in visiting the sick females and the younger widows. This avoided the perceived scandal of a male deacon or priest visiting the home of a younger widow. Inquiring minds (the town gossips) always want to know, what did they do in there for one hour?

In the case of a sick female, the deaconess can assist her in ways that a male may not, especially after childbirth.

As a reader myself, for the past six years in the Eastern Orthodox Church, I fully understand why women have not been tonsured as readers (accept in the Antiochian Orthodox jurisdiction in North America). Paul's concern is that they "not be placed in authority over a man." He is simply reflecting the natural male headship of the family and Church as established by God. My wife knows that very well and accepts that in our family. But how would she feel if some other woman were over me in authority at the reader's stand? She might even become jealous, God forbid!

So that everything might be done in good order, these rules have been adhered to for these many millenia, Old Testament and New.

With love in Christ,
Andrew

"I regularly invite women to read at my chanter's stand, especially during Great Lent and Holy Week."

I never heard of a psaltis determining who reads in services, considering it the priests role to select those performing this sacred function - a task of sacred ministry, not a musical one.

Spasi Khristos -
mark, monk and sinner.

Dear Fr. Mark,

My understanding is that the tonsured readers are minor clergy and not "in" with "those who sing." For this same reason, a woman may direct the choir but not be tonsured a reader. A woman who was pushing for female tonsured readers lamented the fact that tonsured readers are in with "the clergy" and not "the singers," thereby prohibiting their tonsure.

There are probably several more reasons on a practical level why the priests in our diocese usually leave this selection of lay readers to the esteemed tonsured readers:

1. They are very busy with other things.

2. Readers are hard to come by, usually easily offended (i.e. somewhat arrogant, especially if they are tenors {see below}), and not paid. [They need our free services too much to really offend us.]

3. The priests themselves don't know Byzantine chant, so, they would have difficulty instructing the laity on how to chant.

4. The people are easily confused by prokeimenon and allelulia verses and completely ignorant of the various service books from which we chant.

This is the situation in our diocese, in general, of course.

In Christ,
Andrew


Regarding Tenors: The woman asked the choir member, "and which part do you sing?" He replied, "Tenor." She exclaimed, "Tenor! That's not a part! It's a disease!"

Dearest brother Andrew,

My point is simply that I have never come across a psaltis deciding who reads, but expect the priest to do so, or to bless them to perform this function at the very least.

The chanting remains a sacred ministry even though the singers may not be tonsured ministers. I am not disputing the chanting by women, or even choir direction.

I like it when there are double choirs, with the women forming a separate choir with their own golovchitsa.

Spasi Khristos -
Mark, monk and sinner.

Within Russian Orthodox monasticism an abbot can tonsure to the minor orders, with the blessing of the bishop.

I was surprised to hear that an archpriest I know has been blessed to do so by his bishop. Does anyone else know of this function by an archpriest?

Spasi Khristos -
Mark, monk and sinner.