Recently the United States College of Catholic Bishops
Committee on Clergy, Consecrated Life, and Vocations highlighted the importance
of the deacon in the life of the Church from their annual survey in a tweet.
Someone commented that the Church needs more priests and not empty nesters who
like to play dress-up. In a later comment he went on to say that there is no
coincidence that priestly vocations have collapsed at the same time as
permanent deacon vocations soared.
The vocation of deacon is vastly misunderstood by clergy and
lay alike. Even many deacons seem not to understand who they have been called
to become. The permanent diaconate, at least in the United States, is always
changing. It is not really evolving in as much as it is becoming better
understood. The Church is two thousand years old and clarity comes to it over
centuries, not years. The permanent diaconate in the United States was only
restored in 1968. In Church time it is still in its infancy.
To understand why the deacon is important to the life of the
Church we have to understand their two fold ministries of service and liturgy.
Before we talk about the deacon let us start by understanding the role of the
priest. Why do we have priests?
Jesus called the Twelve and bestowed his authority on them. They
were the first bishops. As the Church grew the Twelve could not be everywhere
at once. They ordained additional bishops to manage the new Churches, which
became localities, which became what we know as dioceses. The bishop is the
ordinary minister in his diocese. He is responsible for every soul residing in
his diocese, Catholic or otherwise. His job is to offer sacrifice and prayer
for all of the people.
A bishop cannot be in every parish in his diocese at once.
Priests are the bishops’ stand ins in the parishes. Priests offer sacrifice and
prayer on the behalf of the bishop in their parish. This is their primary
ministry.
Bishops are also responsible for the wellbeing of the people
living in his diocese. The original bishops found out early that they could not
look after the well being of their flock and offer sacrifice and prayer at the
same time. There just are not enough hours in the day to do it all. They
ordained the first deacons as ministers of service. They were to look after the
day to day needs of the people while the bishops offered sacrifice and prayer.
Deacons are ordained primarily as the agents of charity for
the bishops. They are ordained so that they may receive ordinational graces to
strengthen them in this ministry. Serving those on the peripheries is not an
easy thing to do. To bring Christ and be Christ to those in most need can be
both emotionally and physically taxing. Ordinational grace strengthens the
deacon to go forth and do that which Jesus calls him to do. Without the deacon
the responsibility for the well being for the people of the parish falls to the
priest who is already overburdened with things besides sacrifice and prayer.
The first bishops learned quickly that they could not do both at the level both
required. The priest is supposed to take care of the people’s spiritual needs
whereas the deacon attends to their physical needs.
The deacon has a secondary ministry when it comes to the
liturgy. The deacon is the ordinary minister of the Gospel, not the priest or
the bishop, even if it is the bishop of Rome, the Pope. When a deacon is
present at a Mass it is his duty to proclaim the Gospel. The deacon is also the
ordinary minister of the chalice. In a Mass where the host is being distributed
under both species it is the deacon who distributes the blood of Christ. The
secondary responsibility of the deacon in liturgy is to assist the priest
wherever he needs assistance. In the Church one retains all of the authority to
do the ministries below the one they are in. If there is no lector the deacon
becomes the lector. If there are no altar servers the deacon becomes the altar
server. If there is no deacon the priest becomes the deacon.
There is a theological purpose to the deacon in liturgy that
is seemingly unknown to just about everybody. To understand it we have to
realize what the Mass actually is in reality. The Church teaches that the Mass
is a re-presentation of Jesus’ sacrifice on Calvary. It is not a recreation. It is not a remembrance.
The Mass, in every respect, is a time
machine that transports us to the foot of the cross on Calvary. We become
physically present at Jesus crucifixion. To maintain our sanity our eyes are
veiled from seeing the supernatural world that surrounds us. Every Mass, no
matter how large or small, is part of the one true Mass offered once forever in
heaven.
The ordinary minister responsible for offering the Mass for
the people in his diocese is the bishop. Because the bishop cannot be present
in every parish for every Mass the priest acts as his stand in. In this world
the bishop himself is also a stand in. The bishop stands in for Jesus who is
offering the sacrifice of the Mass, which is his body, blood, soul, and
divinity. We say that the bishop/priest acts in Persona Christi, or in the
person of Christ.
If we were to lift the veil on the supernatural and see the
actual Mass we are a part of we would see angels to the right and left and
surrounding Jesus at the altar. In our reality the deacon is the stand in for
the angels. A Mass without deacons is a Mass without the visual representation
of the angels. When a priest chooses not to use the deacon at Mass because he
does not feel they are needed he is robbing the faithful of the fullness of
what the Mass truly is. It does not matter if it is just a private Mass at
which there is only one priest and one deacon or our highest solemnity, the
presence of the deacon makes visible the angels who are only visible through
supernatural vision.
It is true that the bishop/priest is the only one who can
bring life into the Church. They are the only ones Jesus has given his
authority to consecrate the host and unless we eat of the flesh of Jesus we
will have no life within us. No priest, no Eucharist; no Eucharist no life. The
bishop/priest is also the only one who can act as a conduit for the forgiveness
of sin. Again, no priest, no absolution of sin; no absolution of sin, no life.
The bishop/priest cannot be replaced. But, just as a car engine cannot run long
without oil, the Church cannot run long without her deacons. This is the reason
the permanent diaconate was restored in 1968, has flourished, and continues to
grow throughout the world today. It wasn’t to give a bunch of old, empty
nesters a chance to play dress-up.
