DEACONS
649
DEACONS
spptns to have been recognized from an early period,
liiit it does not at first appear to have been so distinc-
iivo as it has since become in the Western Church.
So/omen says of the church of Alexandria that the
I Ins pel might only be read by the archdeacon, but else- ■vliere ordinary deacons performed that office, while ill lit her churches again it devolved upon the priests.
I I may be this relation to the Gospel which led to the direction in the Apostolic Constitutions (VIII, iv), ihat the deacons should hold the book of the Gospels open over the head of a bishop-elect during the cere- iiiciny of his consecration. With the reading of the i.iispol should also probably be connected the occa- ^i^Tial, tho\igh rare, appearance of the deacon in the nllicc of preacher. The Second Council of Vaison
.'iJ',1) declared that a priest might preach in his own |Kiiish, but that when he was ill a deacon should read ,1 !i(imily by one of the Fathers of the Church, urging tliat deacons, being held worthy to read the Gospel, wrri' a fortiori worthy of reading a work of human aiitliorship. Actual preaching by a deacon, however, d. spite the precedent of the deacon Philip, was at all liiTiods rare, and the Arian Bi.shop of Antioch, Leon- tius. was censured for letting his deacon Aetius preach I Philostorgius. Ill, xvii). On the other hand, the s.-'>atest preacher of th-e East Syrian Church, Ephraem S; rus, is said by nearly all the original authorities to li i\c been only a deacon, though a phrase in his own iMitings (Opp. Syr., Ill, 4()7, d) throws some doubt upon the fact. But the statement attributed to Hi- larius Diaconus, nunc neque iHiironi in populo pra-ili- niril I nor do the deacons now preach to the people), iHi.lnubtedly represents the ordinary rule both in the fimrth century and later.
t. With regard to the great action of the Liturgy it si'iins clear that the deacon held at all times, both in l-.ast and West, a very special relation to the sacred M ssols and to the host and chalice both before and a 1 1 rr consecration. The Council of Laodicea (can. xxi'* I >rliadc the inferior orders of the clergy to enter the 'I'irimicum or touch the .sacred vessels, and a canon of tlip First Council of Toledo pronounces that deacons \\\\c, have been subjected to public penance must in future remain with the subdeacons and thus be with- Miawn from the handling of these vessels. On the m: h'T hand, though the subdeacon afterwards invaded n:'ir functions, it was originally the deacons alone Alio la) presented the offerings of the faithful at the al'ar and especially the bread and wine for the sacri- t: ■, lb) proclaimed the names of those who had con- iiilmted (Jerome, Com. in Ezech., xviii), (c) carried a A ay the remnants of the consecrated elements to be n -iTved in the sacristy, and (d) administered the I liaUce, and on occasion .also the Sacred Host, to com- niuiiicants. A question arose whether deacons might LiM' Communion to priests but the practice was for- li.'Men as unseemly by the First Council of Nicsea ( Hf fele-Leclercq, I, 6i0-614). In these functions, \i Inch we may trace back to the time of Justin MartjT \pnl., I, Ixv, Ixvii; cf. TertuUian, De Spectac. xxv, Hi 1 ("j-prian, De Lapsis, xxv), it was repeatedly in- ^i-tcil. in restraint of certain pretentions, that the dea- I' ii's office was entirely suliordinate to that of the I ' lilirant, whether bishop or priest (Apost. Const., ' MI. xxviii, xlvi; and Ilefele-Leclercq, I, 291 and .\lthough certain deacons seem locally to have
rped the power of offering the Holy Sacrifice
rre), this abuse was severely repressed in the
I iiiicil of .Aries {'M\). and there is nothing to support
tla' idea that the deacon in any proper sense w:ls licld
• 'iinsecrate the chalice, as even Onslow (in Diet.
•i-t. .\nt., I, .5:^0) fully allows, though a rather rhe- al phrase of .St. .\inbrose (De Otfic. Min , I, xli) suggested the contrarj'. Still the care of the M-e has remained the deacon's special province
' ri to modern times. Even now in a high Ma.ss the i.ijfics direct that when the chalice is offered, the
deacon is to support the foot of the chalice or the arm
of the priest and to repeat with him the words: Oj-
ferimus tibi, Domine, ralii cm xnlulnria, etc. As a care-
ful study of the first "Onlu HuTuanus" shows, the
archdeacon in the papal .Mass seems in a sense to pre-
side over the chalice, and it is he and his fellow-deacons
who, after the people have Communicated under the
form of bread, present to them the calicem ministeria-
lern with the Precious Blood.
5. The deacons were also intimately associated with the administration of the Sacrament of Baptism. They were not, indeed, as a rule allowed themselves to baptize apart from grave necessity (Apost. Const., VII, xlvi expressly rejects any inference that might be drawn from Philip's baptism of the eunuch), but inquiries about the candidates, their instruction and preparation, the custody of the chrism — which the deacons were to fetch when consecrated — and occa- sionally the actual administration of the sacrament as the bishop's deputies, seem to have formed part of their recognized functions. Thus, Saint Jerome writes: "sine chrismate et episcopi jussione neque presbyteri neque diaconi jus habeant baptizandi" (Without chrism and the comm.and of the bishop neither pres- byters nor deacons have the right of baptizing. — " Dial, c. Luciferum", iv). Analogous to this charge was their position in the penitential system. As a rule their action was only intermediary and preparative, and it is interesting to note how prominent is the part played by the archdeacon as intercessor in the form for the reconciliation of penitents on Maundy Thursday still printed in the Roman Pontifical. But certain phrases in early documents suggest that in cases of necessity the deacons sometimes absolved. Thus, St. (Cyprian writes (Ep. xviii, 1) that if "no priest can be found and death seems imminent, sufferers can also make the confession of their sins to a deacon, that by laying his hand upon them in penance they may come to the Lord in peace" (ut manu eis in pcenitentiam imposita veniant ad dominum cum pace). Whether in this and similar cases there can have been question of sacramental absolution is much debated, but certain Catholic theologians have not hesitated about returning an affirmative an.swer. (See, e. g., Rauschen, Eucharistie und Buss-Sakrament, 1908, p. 132.) There can be no doubt that in the Middle Ages con- fession in case of necessity was often made to the deacon; but then it was equally made to a lay- man, and, in the impossibility of Holy Viaticum, even gra-ss was devoutly eaten as a sort of spiritual communion.
To sum up, the various functions discharged by the deacons are thus concisely stated by St. Isidore of Se- ville, in the seventh century, in his epistle to Leude- f redus : "To the deacon it belongs to assist the priests and to .serve \mimstriire] in all that is done in the sacra- ments of Christ, in baptism, to wit, in the holy chrism, in the paten and chalice, to bring the oblation to the altar and to arrange them, to lay the table of the Lord and to drape it, to carry the cross, to declaim [prcedi- care] the Gospel and Ejiistlc. for as the charge is given to lectors to declaim the Old Testament, so it is given to deacons to declaim the New. To him also pertains the office of prayers [ofpn'tnn precum] and the recital of the names. It is he who gives warning to open our ears to the Lord, it is he who exhorts with his cry, it is he also who announces peace" (Migne, P. L., LXXXII 89.5). In the early period, as many extant Christian epitaphs testify, the possession of a good voice was a i|U.ilificalion expected in candidates for the diaconate. Duliui nirliirri) promcbat melhi cunorp was written of the deacon Hedeinptus in the time of Pope D.itnasus, and the same epitaphs make it clear that the deacon h.ad then nmrh to clo with the chanting, not only of the Epistle and Gospel, but also of the I'salms as a solo. Thus of the archdeacon Dcusdedit in the fifth century it was written: —
