Deacons and the Servant Myth

Deacon Anthony Gooley

It is frequently argued that the distinctive character of deacons is that they are servants called to the
charitable and social justice ministry of the Church. The belief that service is distinctive of deacons is
the servant myth. It is based on a false reading of Acts 6 and it has consequences for the way in
which the Church receives the ministry of deacons. Breaking down this myth is the first step in
restoring an authentic diaconate in the life of the Church.
What happens in Acts 6.1-7? Is Acts 6 the starting point for the ministry of deacons and what is their
ministry? Frequently readers assume that the Seven were called to meet the material needs of the
Greek widows who were neglected at the daily distribution and that this form of charitable service
establishes the authentic and distinctive character of deacons. This is the begin ning of the deacon
as servant myth. This myth is a belief that the distinctive and defining char acteristic of a deacon
and diaco nal ministry is service, usually in the form of charity, especially to the poor and those on the
margins of Church and society. It is a myth that continues to distort our understanding of the
diaconate and hampers the full reception of the fruits of this restored ministry. Curiously
it never seems to touch the transitional diaconate, which is accepted without question or indeed
much reflection, at least in the Roman Catholic tradition. If service, is the distinctive quality of the
diaconate what does this say about the service dimension of the other ordained ministries and the
mission life of the Church? Diakonia is a word Roman Catholics use to describe the ministry of the
bishop without any sense that the word is restricted to social justice or charity (Lumen gentium 24).
Surely all ministers are called to imitate Christ the servant and a similar attitude should pervade the
whole church. I do not argue that deacons cannot have or will not have a charitable or service role
only that it is not the distinctive character of their ministry. The myth does not have its genesis in Acts
but is shaped by revival of the diaconate in nineteenth century German Lutheran church, reinforced by
translators choices which shape our understanding of Acts and reflections of diaconate in post war
Germany in the 1940s and 50s. In this article I intend to explore the origins of the myth and suggest
why it is not a sound basis for a theology and praxis of the diaconate. The most recent documents of
the Roman Catholic tradition on diaconate contain layers of tradition but it is possible to perceive an
outline of diaconate that is balanced and avoids the servant myth as a foundation.

Making sense of Acts

In making sense of Acts 6.1-7 translators in English take some liberties with the Greek text. The
choices translators make have influenced the way we hear and make meaning of this text. In verse
one the cause for the complaint of the Greek speaking Christians, is variously given as a neglect of the
widows in the daily distribution of food (NRSV), of funds (GNB) and of food (JB). The RSV is
happy to leave the neglect simply at an unspecified distribution. The Greek does not add the
preposition of or the terms food and funds and in this the RSV reflects the original text. The text does
not say what is being missed in the daily distribution and it has to be inferred from the whole
context of Acts. It would hardly seem likely that either food or funds could be intended because
Acts 5 deals with what happens to disciples who try to neglect others in the distribution of the
material goods of the community. In verse 2 the apostles complain about not wanting to neglect the
word and wait on tables (NRSV), neglect the preaching and manage finances (GNB) neglect the word
to give out food (JB) and to give up preaching to serve tables (RSV). Again it is the RSV which
resists the temptation to add anything to the text and it does not insert a preposition which is not found
in the Greek between serve and tables or add references to finances or food. In verse 4 all translators
are certain about prayer and with dealing with the word we are most interested in; diakonia, which is
translated in the way it is most normally used in Acts and the letters of Paul. Diakonia is translated as
ministry, and in the context of the whole sentence a ministry of the word (diakonia tou logou).
If we take the Greek text, as it is reproduced RSV, we are able to construct a better picture of what is
really happening in Acts 6.1-7. The Greek speaking Christians are complaining that their widows are
being neglected in the daily diakonia. In Acts the diakonia is the proclamation of the Gospel. They
are neglected for two reasons, the Aramaic speaking Apostles predominantly concentrate their
proclamation in the Temple and the widows, who cannot comprehend the language and for social
reasons are mostly restricted to the home, are overlooked in this daily diakonia.
The solution proposed by the Apostles and agreed to by the whole Church is to appoint seven from
among the Greek speaking community to do that daily diakonia in the homes of the Greek widows or
as the expression in the Greek has it, to minister tables. Both the Apostles and the Seven had been
entrusted with the same diakonia which is to minister or proclaim the word. To underscore this
interpretation we see that Stephen immediately commences to proclaim the Gospel to the point of
giving witness with his life (Acts 6-7.50) and Philip commences his diakonia of the word in
proclaiming the Gospel, catechising the Ethiopian and baptising (Acts 8). The laying on of hands
becomes the concrete sign that the ministry entrusted to the apostles is to be entrusted to the Seven.
The one thing we do not see the Seven do is charitable works or distributing food or funds to the
widows, in fact we do not see anyone in the New Testament with the title of diakonos engaged in a
specifically charitable service activity. This should give us some clues as we address the servant
myth.

Whether or not the Seven were the first deacons, as Eusebius calls them, is debateable. The one
word that Luke does not use of them is diakonos the noun from which we get our word deacon.
Proclaiming the word, leading communities, representing communities and taking messages between
communities and other forms of ministry are associated with those who are called diakonos in the
New Testament as well as the clear delegation and imposition of a mandate for such ministry by the
leaders of the community through the laying on of hands. Therefore it is reasonable to infer that the
Seven may have been referred to as deacons in the early Church and that Eusebius is reflecting that
understanding.

How did diakonia become service?

We do not have space here to review the many references to deacons in the first nine centuries of the
Church, and in particular the first four centuries when so much of the structure of ministries in the
early Church was taking shape. A few brief references, taken from the Fathers and used again in the
recent Roman Catholic documents are testament to an earlier tradition, before diakonia was defined as
service and deacons as a kind of ordained social worker/charity worker. Three references will suffice
to indicate the flavour of this early tradition. Ignatius to the Magnesians, deacons entrusted with the
ministry/diakonia of Christ and to the Trallians, deacons are not waiters (diakonoi) providing food
and drink but executives (hyperetai) of the Church of God and finally to the Philadelphians, take
care to use only one Eucharistthere is one bishop in union with the presbyters and the deacon. The
earliest witnesses of the tradition reflect the common Greek usage. Deacons were not thought of as
having a distinctive servant orientation but as part of the broader understanding of the apostolic
ministry and leadership of local churches.

Although it is a broad leap from the early tradition we need to look to Trent. By the time the
Reformation was underway the diaconate had become a transitional ministry of limited liturgical
functions. Luther and others argued that the ministry, as they experienced it, had limited value in
the life of the community and saw it more as an appendage to the ministry. The response of the
Council of Trent was to insist on the reality and validity of the threefold ministry of deacon, priest
and bishop and to call for the restoration of the diaconate as a permanent ministry in the life of the
Church. Trents desire to restore the diaconate was not fulfilled until the Second Vatican Council was
able to take up the issue again and Paul VI issued Sacrum Diaconatus Ordinem. (Basic Norms and
Directory, Introduction 2) By 1998 the Congregations for Clergy and for Education issued
jointly the Basic Norms for the Formation of Permanent Deacons and the Directory for the Ministry
and Life of Permanent Deacons.
In these two documents we find an outline of the teaching of the Roman Catholic Church on
diaconate. Although I will come to these in more detail later, what we find in the documents is an
interweaving of two traditions and early tradition which frames diaconate within the broader
understanding of the apostolic ministry of the Gospel and a narrower tradition with a focus on
diakonia as a synonym for service. Behind these two traditions stand two sources. The first source is
the Scriptural foundation which understands diakonia a ministry as outlined in the study by Collins.
The second source is the revival of the diaconate in the German Lutheran churches in the nineteenth
century specifically as a work of charity and social work. It is to this second source that we now turn
our attention.

A type of diaconate was revived in the nineteenth century in the Lutheran Church in Germany and
gradually this pattern of diaconate was adopted in the Nordic Lutheran and some of the Reformed
churches. The Lutheran Pastor Theodore Fliedner and his wife Frederike established a ministry to
care for the homeless and poor who were increasing in number in the industrialised cities. This
ministry was not an ordained ministry and was modelled somewhat on the lines of a Roman Catholic
religious order. The Fliedners took their inspiration from their understanding of Acts 6 as a ministry
of charity to the widows who, in their reading of the text, were neglected in the daily distribution of
charity and the goods of the community. They called the women in this ministry deaconess and the
men deacons.

Brodd argues that the identification of diakonia with charity (caritas) and social service developed
into a functionalist understanding of diaconate, where the deacon is defined not from an
ecclesiological foundation based on the Church as koinonia and situating ordination within this
context but inductively from the sum of the functions performed. The result is that in the Lutheran
and Reformed traditions the deacon came to be seen as a kind of ordained social worker. In his
study Brodd concurs with the work of Collins and indicates that caritas and diakonia essentially
belong to two different conceptual circles.
...it cannot be said for that reason that the theology of the diaconate has no authoritative points of
reference, completely at the mercy of theological opinion. (Basic Norms 3)
It is the intersection of four elements that provide us with the final clues as to how diakonia became
service. The first is the development of the functionalism in the eighteenth century as a way
describing ministry. The second is the practice of diakonia as is was revived in this charitable, social
work form in northern Europe. The third is the influence of the authoritative work of Bauer, The
Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament and other Early Christian Literature, which defined
diakonia as service. He was perhaps influenced in this by his association with the Lutheran deacon
movement. The forth element is the development of role theory in psychology and sociology and the
attempt to account for ministries in the church in terms of roles. What emerged was an
understanding of diaconate not based on Scripture and the early tradition of the Church but one
developed from the practice of the charitable diaconate movement.

Restoring the diaconate

The almost total disappearance of the permanent diaconate from the Church of the West for more
than a millennium has certainly made it more difficult to understand the profound reality of this
ministry. However, it cannot be said for that reason that the theology of the diaconate has no
authoritative points of reference, completely at the mercy of theological opinion. (Basic Norms
3) The norms list some of these reference points as an ecclesiology of koinonia/communion,
the sacrament of ordination, the gifts of the Spirit received at ordination, the rite of ordination, the
theology of sacraments of character and the powers conferred. The Norms and the Directory simply
equate diakonia with service, for the most part, and repeat the error and therefore continue the servant
myth through this process. Why and how this premise must be challenged is considered below.
The one essential reference point must be the recovery of the meaning of diakonia and diakonos
from the Scriptures and the early documents of the Church. In order to do this through the Scriptural
path churches, deacons and others interested in ministry must go through the work of John N
Collins. Collins has the only study of the diakon group of words and his work represents a
paradigm shift in our understanding of diakonia. Some churches have commenced this process,
as is evident in the documents from the Anglican Church in England on diaconate. Once the task is
undertaken diakonia can be fully appreciated and the gift of this ministry and it potential in the
Church can be more easily fulfilled.
The International Theological Commission in its paper, From the Diakonia of Christ to the
Diakonia of the Apostles, suggests that the Second Vatican Council intended to implement the
principle and not any particular historical form of the diaconate. That is Laurence of Rome or
Francis of Assisi or a Nicholas Ferrar might give us some idea of how deacons have exercised
their ministry in the past but we may not want to copy their ministry as the model diaconal
ministry. What we are looking for is a diaconate for today. It should also be a ministry that
includes women in all of the Churches since we know from the Scriptures and the early
Church and its laws that women were deacons. In the Roman Catholic Church there has never been
a statement about ordination to the diaconate being reserved to men alone, although canon law
includes such a reservation. This is one of the questions that remain open for the church to
consider in its restoration of the ministry.

Conclusion

The creative possibilities for diaconal ministry are opened for the Church when we move away
from restrictive notions of the deacon as being primarily defined by service as the minister of
charity or social justice. Deacons are primarily those who proclaim the Gospel, in the name of their
bishop, to the assembled community and those dispersed. Like the bishop, whom they serve, they
have a diakonia to build up the community of faith and reach out to dispersed Christians and to
those who have yet to hear the gospel. Restricting our understanding of deacons as principally
servants of charity and justice not only reveals a disregard for the Scriptural witness but leads to
sterile debates about the identity of deacons and closes our eyes to new possibilities for the new
evangelisation to which deacons are called to contribute (Basic Norms and Directory, Joint
Declaration). When we look to the Scriptures and the early tradition of the Church, we see those
who are described as diakonos/deacons engaged in a vast array of activities. Only some of their
activities would include what we call charity or justice. We need to let go of the servant myth in order
to receive fruitfully the gift of the Spirit which is the ministry of deacons.

References

1. John N Collins; Deacons and the Church: Making Connections Between Old and New. Gracewing,
Leomister, 2002, p 47-58
2. NRSV is the New Revised Standard Version Bible: Catholic Edition. Thomas Nelson, 1990, GNB
is the Good News Bible, American Bible Society 1976,
JB is the Jerusalem Bible, Darton, Longman and Todd, 1966.
RSV is Revised Standard Version 1946.
3. John N Collins; Deacons and the Church, p52. I add the emphasis here to indicate that the unifying
meaning of diakonia in Acts is the ministry of proclaiming the gospel and is used throughout of the
work of the apostles, Paul and the other ministers of the Gospel.
4. John N Collins; Diakonia: reinterpreting the ancient sources. Oxford University Press, Oxford,
1990. Collins ground breaking study of the whole family of daikon words in the Bible and extra -
biblical sources indicates that service and charity are simply not part of the field of meaning of the
word diakonia and that the phrase minister tables had a particular resonance with the Greek speaking
community as a sacred duty by which one was delegated to perform a ministry of significance and
was not confused in Greek usage with the ordinary meaning of servers of food and drink. This
distinction is found in the texts of the early Greek Fathers e.g. Ignatius, Trallians,
2.3.
5. Collins, in the works cited, would conclude that the Seven were not deacons.
6. Sven-Erik Brodd, Caritas and Diakonia as perspectives on the Diaconate, in Borgegard, Fanuelsen,
Hall (eds) The Ministry of the Deacon: Ecclesiological Reflections 2, Nordic Ecumenical Council,
2000, p42-43
7. In the Nordic Lutheran Churches deacons have had to obtain nursing or social work qualifications
before being installed or ordained as deacons because charity was the defining feature of the
understanding of diaconate. The practice is changing across Northern Europe as more churches
engage with the research of the Australian scholar John N Collins. A diaconate with a clearer
scriptural and ecclesiological foundation is developing with a balance of a ministry of word, liturgy
and pastoral aspects.
8. Brodd, Caritas and Diakonia, p27
9. Two documents that give witness to the shift that Biblically based reflection can have are For A
Time Such as This: A report of the General Synod of the House of Bishops, 2001 and The Distinctive
Diaconate, Diocese of Salisbury, 2003. At one point the Church of England had wondered about
phasing out the diaconate and now their engagement with Collins and ecumenical conversations,
particularly the Hanover report have reversed this direction of thinking.
10. International Theological Commission, From the Diakonia of Christ to the Diakonia of the
Apostles. Catholic Truth Society, London, 2003.
11. Owen Cummings; Deacons and the Church, Paulist Press, New York, 2004. He devotes chapter 5
of his work to explore the life and ministry of this diverse group of deacons.
This article first appeared in The Pastoral Review Nov-Dec 2006.