The identity of the deacon today
From the Revd Professor Paul Avis
Madam, — I would like to supplement what the Revd Adrian Leak has written about deacons (Faith, 19 June). Not only those recently ordained to the diaconate, but all priests and bishops, who also retain their diaconal order (Canon C 1.2), deserve clarity about what they have been ordained to.
The traditional description of the Seven in Acts 6.1-4 as “deacons” — and the common liturgical appeal to this passage as the institution of the order of deacons — is not warranted. There are several obscurities in the passage, but the key point is that the Seven are not called “deacons” (diakonoi). In 6.1 diakonia is used of the “distribution” of food and in 6.2 diakonein of “serving at tables”. But in 6.4 the same word is used of “ministry of the word” by the Apostles; this is the normative New Testament usage.
St Paul describes himself as a diakonos of the purposes of God (Colossians 1.25), exercising the diakonia of the mystery of Christ (1 Corinthians 3.5), of the gospel of glory (2 Corinthians 4.1-5) and of reconciliation (2 Corinthians 3.6; 5.18). In Acts, Paul refers to his apostolic ministry as diakonia (20.24; 21.19; cf. 1.25). This Pauline sense of commissioned embassy and authoritative agency has helped to shape a reconstructed identity for the diaconate.
The watershed was the publication of John N. Collins’s Diakonia: Reinterpreting the ancient sources (OUP, 1990); cf. the “accessible” Deacons and the Church (Gracewing, 2002). Collins showed that neither in Classical nor in New Testament Greek does diakonia mean humble or menial service, and that a diakonos acts on behalf of the one who sent them, often to carry out a responsible task, sometimes to announce a message or to bring a gift.
This reinterpretation has shaped the Common Worship Ordinal. In the rite for the ordination of deacons, a deacon is described as a herald and proclaimer of the gospel, “reaching into the forgotten corners of the world, that the love of God may be made visible”. The Ordinal makes it clear that deacons assist the bishop and priest in the ministry of word, sacrament, and pastoral care. This description invites us to see the diaconate as the foundational commissioning for all ordained ministry and as the bedrock of the priesthood and the episcopate.
Recent work in the Church of England has expounded this identity for the deacon. For Such a Time as This: A renewed diaconate in the Church of England (2001) and the follow-up document “The Mission and Ministry of the Whole Church” (GS Misc 854) recognise two pathways for diaconal ministry: diaconate followed by, but included in, priesthood; and the “distinctive” diaconate, in which a deacon does not proceed to priesthood but devotes themselves to the diaconal calling. The theology and the liturgy are the same for both.
PAUL AVIS
Membury, Axminster, Devon
The scientific arguments about God and evolution
From Mr Rupert Shortt
Madam, — Andrew Brown’s excellent piece “Not selfish — and not really genes” (Analysis, 19 June) sketches some problems associated with Professor Richard Dawkins’s scientific theories, let alone his pronouncements on religion. Christians and other people of faith can draw strong reassurance from this.
The career of Professor Denis Noble — an Oxford colleague of Professor Dawkins and a far more distinguished scholar — sheds light on the discussion. He was once a keen advocate of reductionism, the philosophy summarised by Jim Watson, co-discoverer of the structure of DNA, as “there are only molecules; everything else is sociology.” Professor Noble saw confirmation of this view in his finding that the pacemaker function of the heart could be explained in terms of the flow of potassium and calcium ions through protein channels.
Later, he changed his mind, realising that “in the heartbeat there was not only upward causation from the molecular level to the cellular level, but also downward causation from the cell influencing the molecules.” This led him to reject the neo-Darwinism of Professor Dawkins and others for what it is: a contentious philosophical postulate, not an empirical discovery. Reductionism seeks to eliminate teleology in nature: Professor Noble now accepts that it is ubiquitous.
Does this mean that the universe itself has an ultimate goal? As an agnostic, Professor Noble thinks that in asking this question we reach a boundary beyond which it is not possible to go. In other words, goal-directedness does not necessarily advance the case for God. Biologists explain roots moving towards water, for example, or leaves turning towards sunlight, in terms of micromechanisms in the relevant part of the organism. More generally, a Darwinian can maintain that any organism not adapted to flourish in a given set of conditions will be eliminated, and that the struggle for survival will tend to favour the most effective teleologically configured behaviour.
Fair enough. Evidence of teleology may at least bring us up short, though. The world does not just consist of meaningless bits of stuff. Matter matters; and if we believe in God on other grounds, teleology can supply a fitting resource for conceiving God’s relation to the world. We can also see why On the Origin of Species was judged by some of its readers as more of an aid to Christian reflection than a threat.
Aubrey Moore, Anglican priest and Darwinian, provides a famous example. In the essay collection Lux Mundi (1889), he wrote of Darwin’s coming in the guise of a foe and doing the work of a friend. By this, Moore meant that Christians could now free themselves from a deistic conception of God whereby the Creator had made a machine-like world, retreated, and then occasionally intervened with a tweak.
Moore realised that Darwin had restored agency to creation, while at the same time making that agency an expression of what God is. This was an echo of St Thomas Aquinas’s oft-quoted remark that nature is not like wood being made into a ship, but like wood that makes itself into a ship.
RUPERT SHORTT
Cambridge
Mother-and-baby homes: further discussion
Madam, — It was good to read your lead story about the Archbishop of Canterbury’s apology for all the trauma and suffering experienced by young women who were subjected to the C of E mother-and-baby homes in the mid-20th century (News, 19 June). I was born in the mid-1950s (to married parents), but I well remember the attitudes towards unmarried mothers and teenage pregnancy reflected in the article.
What I find most appalling in all of this, alongside the stance taken at the time by my own Church, is the attitude of parents towards their daughter when she had “become fallen”, shown by turning her over to the mother-and-baby-home system. To be fair, many such parents probably didn’t appreciate the trauma their daughter would go through, and may have felt that they themselves didn’t have any moral choice in the matter anyway. They would have realised, however, that they would never know their own grandchild born as a result of it all.
There must have been some parents (or other family members?) who courageously decided to stand by and support their daughter and grandchild, come what may, in those dark times. It would be good to hear more about that side of it, as well.
I retired from ordained ministry in the C of E nearly a decade ago now, although I still find plenty to do. For my last few years in office, my wife and I had an unmarried daughter living with us at the rectory, together with her child, our toddler granddaughter. Attitudes have changed a lot during my lifetime. It was lovely having our granddaughter with me at Edward Bears and other such services and events, and she provided a natural way in for me at the local nursery. I was aware, though, of a small handful of people across the parishes in which I served who disapproved of the whole situation.
NAME AND ADDRESS SUPPLIED
From Sylvia Burkinshaw
Madam, — We need to remember that, for most of the 20th century, until the early 1970s, it was widely believed that that a child needed two parents, and that they should be married. As a result of this belief, many couples were pressured into marriage to ensure this. The alternatives were keeping your baby, which needed the support of your family, or adoption that would provide two parents.
Many parents wanted to protect their daughters (and themselves) from exposure to a disapproving society by arranging for them to leave the area. Thus, some went to distant friends or relatives and some to mother-and-baby homes. These grew out of a need to offer a “safe” place, not to punish the expectant mother, but to protect her.
From the mother-and-baby home, many expectant mothers went to local hospitals for antenatal clinics and the birth of their baby. At that time, everyone who attended antenatal clinics or was a patient on a maternity ward was addressed as “Mrs”, and often wedding rings from Woolworths were worn to pretend that the mothers were married.
Adoptions were not “forced” by the Church, but, for many mothers, they felt that they had no alternative to this, because they could not themselves provide what they felt was best for their baby. That was then. . . We have to understand that.
SYLVIA BURKINSHAW
Richmond
From Canon Andrew Dow
Madam, — How disappointing that the Archbishop of Canterbury could offer only an apology (albeit a much needed one) to the mothers whose babies were forcibly taken from them in adoption centres run by the Church of England! Could she not, should she not, also have offered a gentle word of motherly care to the present generation, by saying how sad she was, not only at the Church’s behaviour then, but also that so many girls and young women gave birth, either by consent or coercion, to a child outside any recognised legal or professional means of support, or relationship security?
The viewer of her televised interview could easily have inferred that the Church of England now accepted, and even encouraged, any woman who had a child with whomsoever, wheresoever, regardless of the long-term welfare and well-being of the infant. Not a good message to send to our family-riven population in these unsettled and turbulent times.
ANDREW DOW
Moreton-in-Marsh, Gloucestershire
The part played by ‘fun’ in a cathedral’s outreach
From the Dean of Leicester
Madam, — I was disappointed by Canon Angela Tilby’s dichotomy between “fun” and sacred space (Comment, 19 June; letter, 26 June) as she presented her interpretation of the recent Theos report Living Stones (News, 22 May). This is not a distinction made by many cathedral visitors who regularly relate spiritual experiences to us during or after visits that they have made for “fun”.
Let me cite an email I received after “Motown by Candlelight”, one of the many Concerts By Candlelight live music events presented in our cathedrals by Kinda Dusty Ltd. “It was a night where the sacred and the soulful met in harmony. The concert was not merely performance; it was communion. A gathering of souls uplifted by melody, bound by candlelight, and blessed by the beauty of the Cathedral. I shall carry the warmth of that evening with me always.”
The research being undertaken at Liverpool Cathedral by Professors Andrew Village and Leslie Francis (“Do installations catalyse faith?, Comment, 12 December 2025) into return visits for services offers tentative indications that event attendance does indeed precede attendance at, for example, carol services. Anecdotally, I know this is true and have spoken to those who come to worship because they first came for “fun”. Professors Village and Francis rightly suggest “ensuring strong links between the events, installations, and exhibitions (that soften the threshold) and the liturgical life of the cathedral and diocese (which signals the migration from common ground to sacred space)”.
The missional calling of every Christian, not least our cathedrals, is to accompany people as they articulate their experiences of the sacred, and point to the presence of God seen even more clearly in Jesus Christ. May I assure Canon Tilby and others that, despite pressing challenges, cathedrals are always primarily pointing “toward the mystery at the heart of things — the mystery that they were designed to celebrate”, and that “fun” plays its part.
KAREN ROOMS
Leicester
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