Nineteenth Century England: The Order of Deaconess

 

The first Anglican sisterhood was founded in 1845 (The sisterhood of the Holy Cross, near to Regent’s Park in London) and this ignited the debate within the Church of England about what form any involvement of women in ministry might take. In the 1850a support for the restoration of the Order of Deaconesses began to grow as the need for assistance for clergy ministering in large urban settings increased with industrialisation. The potential of a dedicated women’s order within the Church of England was recognised after observation of such orders which were successful in continental Europe. The institution in Kaiserwerth in Germany in particular was influential in the development of the order in England. It was a Lutheran foundation, started in 1833 to train women for charitable and religious works. Famous English women such as Elizabeth Fry and Florence Nightingale received some of their training there. In 1861 the North London Deaconess Institution was set up with Elizabeth Ferard as the chief sister. It changed its name to the London Diocesan Deaconess Institution in 1868. The activities of the Deaconesses involved basic nursing and teaching children, always within a parish situation.


Controversies arose in the distinction of the deaconesses from religious orders and from male ordained deacons and priests. The deaconesses were ordained through episcopal laying on of hands but in order to prevent them from being in the same office as a deacon (who was male) they were required tin their vows to “set aside all unwomanly usurpation of authority in the Church”. In contrast to male deacons, the deaconesses were not permitted to promise an open ended commitment to their order. The Bishop would ask them “Inasmuch as this office is not to be lightly undertaken or relinquished is it your present purpose to continue in it for the space of five years at the least?” To which the candidate would would reply “I purpose to do so by the help of God”.


The order became a dual vocational one: some who were called to community life could live in a deaconess institution whilst others could remain in their own household situation. Both categories remained under the authority of the chaplain of the order who was always a clergyman, married and in priest’s orders. Within the parish they were required not to contradict or disobey the parish priest with whom they served.


A different model of deaconess ministry emerged through the ministry of Isabella Gilmore who established the Rochester Diocesan Deaconess Institution in the late 1880s. This was entirely parochially based without a community option and supported by the Bishop who favoured a low church approach of Bible classes and prayer meetings among women parishioners that could be led by deaconesses. The approach of Isabella Gilmore differed from that of Elizabeth Ferard in that for the Gilmore model ministry took place among women (in particular) who were of limited financial resource and often lived in impoverished conditions in slums. Elizabeth Ferard’s model with its focus on community life, did not permit the deaconesses to have an extensive ministry to those who were not of a similar social and financial status to themselves.


In both categories the effect was the same: the desire for women to minister within the Church of England was established and strengthened. The Deaconess movement paved the way for the first ordinations of women to the diaconate and then as presbyters in the late twentieth century and the consecration of women Bishops in the early twenty first century. This reveals a century and half of women’s ministry in the Church of England, that has changed its character hugely. What will the next century bring do you think?

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The Oxford Movement and The Gorham Judgment of 1850

  The Privy Council, a secular Court, announced a decision on the case of the Reverend George Gorham in 1850. The Anglican B ishop of Exeter Henry Phillpotts had refused to allow him to become vicar of St. Peter's in Bramford Speke, Devon because of Gorham's theology of Baptism, which Philpotts regarded as not conform ing to the doctrine of the Church of England. Reverend Gorham held that Baptism was not sacramentally effective and that an adult decision to accept Jesus Christ as Lord and Saviour was necessary. Bishop Phillpotts, however, was a High Church Anglican who could not accept what he regarded as a denial of Article XXVII of the Thirty-Nine Articles: Baptism is not only a sign of profession and mark of difference whereby Christians are discerned from other that be not christened, but is also a sign of regeneration or new birth, whereby, as by an instrument, they that receive baptism rightly are grafted into the Church; the promises of the forgiveness of sin, and o...
Read more

The Gothic Revival in the nineteenth century: Early work by A.W.N. Pugin

  As a young man Augustus Pugin converted to Roman Catholicism and in 1836 published “Contrasts” in which he compares architecture and interior furnishings in Protestant and Roman Catholic settings. One of his drawings illustrates “a faithful picture of Protestant desecration and neglect” and features a defaced altar screen, below which stands an altar table that Pugin describes as a “cheap and ugly table”. In contrast a sketch of an altar and associated furnishings in a Roman Catholic setting is described as “more suited to a fashionable boudoir that to an altar for sacrifice.” Pugin’s aim was to recapture the Gothic style in the buildings and furnishings he designed. An early commission was Scarisbrick Hall, close to Ormskirk in Lancashire. Charles Scarisbrick initially wanted a garden seat and chimney piece, but the young and enthusiastic Pugin set about trying to rebuild the entire property. Pugin produced for Scarisbrick a number of rooms central to the house: the Great...
Read more

A.W.N. Pugin “Improving the taste of young England”

Image
  On September 1 st 1846 the opening of St. Giles’ Church Cheadle took place after five years of building and interior design work by Pugin. The Earl of Shrewsbury whose money had largely funded the project was delighted. He thought it would “improve the taste of young England” and could often be found showing people around. George Gilbert Scott was impressed and the Earl of Shrewsbury commented about his reaction “ the stencilling absolutely made the water run down both sides of his mouth”. St. Giles Church was designed by Pugin to be entirely English in style and was symmetrical. This style no longer reflected his thinking at the time but it was an example of what became known as “Puginism”. The Church cost over thirty thousand pounds and was a full blown work of high romantic art. In it Pugin’s own religious and aesthetic ideals were equally fulfilled. Many notable guests attended the consecration including John Henry Newman, a recent convert from the Anglican to the Rom...
Read more