Last time we saw how far back the diaconate goes in our Catholic tradition. Deacons are there from the time of the Apostles and all throughout the early Church. We saw a lot of proof. At the expense of making this an exhausting (not just exhaustive) exercise, let me lead you to Council documents: Council ...read more

In the last couple of weeks we’ve been looking at the diaconate, first by addressing the event that brought about this whole conversation and then in two parts (part 1 and part 2), briefly, the meaning of the Sacrament of Holy Orders, for I don’t think you can separate the conversation about Church hierarchy outside ...read more

Interested in Women Deacons? Read what Sebastian Gomes recently wrote on this topic. And the two interviews with Phyllis Zagano: Subject Matters and Witness with Fr. Rosica Either the Church ordains women to everything, or we don’t ordain deacons. There are two questions we have to answer: ‘What is Ordination?’ And ‘What is the Diaconate?’ ...read more

Sometimes our work here at Salt + Light takes us to different cities or countries and when we travel, we often have to hire someone who we call a “fixer” – that’s what they call them in the industry. The fixer is a local person, someone who speaks the language, knows the customs and knows ...read more

In light of the fact that last week everyone became aware that the early Church had women in the role of deacons or deaconesses (or both, we’re not sure what exactly these roles were), I have begun to deaconstructing the diaconate. But before, let’s take a little detour and look at Ordination. It seems appropriate that as ...read more

Here’s what’s been going on across the country this week: In Vancouver, where the permanent diaconate program has only been in place for about two years, another group of candidates have started the journey towards ordained ministry. In Saskatoon, a controversial “conscientious objection” policy was passed this week by the province’s College of Physicians and ...read more