The deacon is the closest assistant to the priest and bishop

According to the charter of the Orthodox Church, there are three degrees of priesthood. Bishops and priests belong to the higher and middle degree. The deacon is the lowest degree. Her representatives, although they were honored by the Grace of God at the ordination, but can not perform the sacraments on their own. Their task is to help in this bishops and priests.

Several ranks of deacon's rank

The deacon, who performs services in conjunction with the bishop, is called the "Protodeacon," that is, the senior deacon. If it is a clergyman who took monastic vows, he is called an archdeacon. The monk, who was not yet awarded the service of a bishop, is an Hierodjakon. You can also call the subdeacon, but he is not a clergyman, since he is not endowed with the grace of God. By his rank, he is lower than the deacon and performs purely auxiliary duties.

Duties of a deacon during worship

The role assigned to these clergymen in the church service is visible from the translation of the very word "deacon". In the language of the ancient Greeks it means "servant" or "servant". In order to understand who a deacon is in the church, it is enough to visit the worship service and see how much responsibility it entrusts to him. This is censing - fumigation of the temple with the smoke of incense. The incense formed during combustion of an aromatic tar is inextricably linked in the consciousness of each parishioner with the church service and thereby contributes to the creation of a favorable prayer mood.

In addition, the deacon has one more important duty. Having opened the Church calendar, one can see that to each day of the year there correspond certain passages from the Gospel and from the Apostle.

The apostle is usually read by the psalm-reader, and the deacon is exactly who is entrusted with reading our main New Testament book - the Gospel. Every day, under the arches of the temple, his voice brings to the parish its immortal lines. In addition, he is charged with duty during the service to give certain instructions to worshipers.

During the service, the deacon is commissioned to proclaim the Divine Litany. These are prayer petitions addressed to God. At the end of each of them the choir sings: "Lord, have mercy" or "Give, Lord." Litanies are divided into several types. Among them: the Great, the Soul, the Proclaiming and the Lesser. Each carries a certain semantic and psychological load, and special requirements are imposed on their reading. The deacon must understand this well and be able to convey the full depth of the words he utters to the worshipers.

Underestimation of the role of a deacon in worship

It should be noted that during the church service all the duties of a deacon can be performed directly by a priest or a bishop. This sometimes leads to an underestimation of the role of the deacon in the course of worship. Even periods in the newest history of the church are known, when there was a massive reduction of parish states due to the abolition of this post in them. In the overwhelming majority of cases, this practice caused sharp dissatisfaction on the part of the parishioners. It is not uncommon for a deacon who was taken out of the state and deprived of his salary, took the community of the temple for maintenance.

Deacon's ministry in the era of early Christianity

From the history of the Church it is known that in the time of the first Christians there was such a ministry. The deacon is a servant, who was then assigned duties related to charity. Due to the fact that he took all the trouble to collect and distribute between poor parishioners of alms and provisions, the priests had the opportunity, without distraction for these needs, to devote themselves entirely to worship.

It should be noted that in those old times there were not only deacons, men, but also women. The deaconesses - in the translation of the "servant", were engaged mainly in the care of sick women and the preparation of parishioners for Holy Baptism. Over time, this service was abolished.