Deaconesses, Baptism and Catechumens

[尼古拉前执事]

Are we saying that a deaconess = an abbess here though?

[Julianna]

ROCOR has deaconesses? :ohvey:

[Justin Kissel]

Nicholas

Are we saying that a deaconess = an abbess here though?

Or perhaps someone just given a blessing to do things that a woman ordinarily wouldn't be able to do (in the same way the females are sometimes given a blessing at a female monastery to enter into the altar area and clean it)? It had been my understanding that Deaconesses as an ordained office hadn't happened since Saint Nektarios used them out of necessity last century.

[Mary Kissel]

Julianna,
why are you shaking your head back and forth about rocor having deaconesses?? I am confused. what is wrong with any jurisdiction having them if they do? also, who said that it was rocor who has them? I'm not picking on you or anything like that...just very confused right now. Please clarify.

Thanks!

In Christ,
MaryCecilia

[Liudmilla]

The deaconess that I saw performed the duties of a deacon during the service. She did not however go through the altar but used the side doors. As far as I am aware, as long as a woman is past her menopause stage she can enter into the altar, so an older deaconess is really not out of the question. I'm sure there are other duties she performs but I do not know them. Nor am I completely sure of the rulees that apply to this calling. As I said before I have only encountered this in a woman's monastery.

For that matter, did you know that if there are no boys, or men available to perform the duties of altar boy, it is canonically proper for a priest to use pre-menstral girls? This is a practice that has died off (unfortunately), but is is proper.......

[尼古拉前执事]

What nuns in a convent can do is listed here.

Liudmilla, what canon states that pre-menstrual girls can be altar servers? I cannot find such an allowance in the Rudder. Girls are not even allowed in the altar when they are baptized & churched as babies.

[尼古拉前执事]

Bumping this up due to the discussion of deaconesses in convents at http://www.euphrosynoscafe.com/forum/vi ... .php?t=348