Women Serving the Church as Deacons: Qualified Women Serving as Deacons Clarifies both Church Offices.

 The next few posts I will be breaking up my one huge post that considered if women ought to serve the church as ordained Deacons into seven smaller posts.

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As I understand Dr. Strimple's argument, Dr. Strimple is only making the following point: Paul calls Phoebe a deacon of the church, therefore we should allow qualified women to also serve the church in the office of Deacon. This simple point changes the whole nature of the discussion. The question I run into usually is: ought women to be deacons? However, if Paul recognizes Phoebe as a office-holder in Romans 16:1 - 2 the actual question changes. The better question is: how does a Deacon differ from an Elder in the church?

That's the big question for the RPCNA. Is a Deacon a stepping stone to becoming an Elder, or is a Deacon a distinctly different office? It is only when the two offices are not distinct that the issue of Phoebe can lead to women pastors. An example of how these two offices can become fuzzy is when we believe that the men chosen in Acts 6 were Deacons.

In recent church news, for example, the Roman Catholic Church's discussion about women serving as Deacons is more complicated than the discussion needs to be because the Roman communion has a liquid distinction between the offices of Deacon and Priest. A lot more has been written about the Roman communion's continual need to have an ongoing earthly Priesthood.