Anniversary Zoom Events
We’ve completed our anniversary year Zoom series. Thank you to all who attended! See below to watch the recordings and for information on our in-person symposium, click here.
St. Phoebe Center Network: Celebrating Our Anniversary Year
Thursday, April 20, 2023
Hosted by St. Phoebe Center Board Members Kristina Baktis, Susan Smoley, and Sara Tsugranis
This event was for St. Phoebe Center Network Members only, to provide updates and plan initiatives to support the restoration of the ordained deaconess.
If you want to engage in St. Phoebe Center’s work and provide hands on support, please join the Network to attend future Network events. Questions about Network Member status can be addressed to network@orthodoxdeaconess.org.
The Legacy of Rhodes, Featuring Deaconesses: A Tradition for Today and Tomorrow
Tuesday, May 9, 2023
This event was moderated by St. Phoebe Center Chair Dr. Carrie Frederick Frost and co-hosted with Holy Cross Orthodox Press, Very Rev. Dr. Anton C. Vrame
In 1988, Ecumenical Patriarch Demetrios I convened a conference in Rhodes, Greece on “The Place of the Woman in the Orthodox Church,” that included the recommendation that the Church ordain women as deaconesses once again. Thirty-five years later, the St. Phoebe Center for the Deaconess and Holy Cross Orthodox Press is asking, “What is the legacy of Rhodes?” This session featured a new book on deaconess dedicated to the legacy of the Rhodes Consultation, Deaconesses: A Tradition for Today and Tomorrow (edited by Rev. Dr. John Chryssavgis, Dr. Niki Papageorgiou, Ms. Marilyn Rouvelas, and Dr. Petros Vassiliadis).
Panelists:
Dr. Patricia Fann Bouteneff, Axia Women
Rev. Dr. Alkiviadis Calivas, Emeritus Professor of Holy Cross Hellenic College
Dr. Valerie Karras, Orthodox Christian Theological Historian
Girls’ and Women’s Liturgical Service
Sunday, June 25, 2023 on Zoom
Moderated by St. Phoebe Center Board Member Dr. Teva Regule
Co-sponsored with Axia Women, Dr. Patricia Fann Boutneff
Greater participation of girls and women in the liturgical assembly of the Orthodox Church benefits the entire community. This event, co-sponsored with Axia Women, offered the perspective of Orthodox women who have experienced these ministries as girl altar servers and tonsured readers or chanters. Topics explored included how to encourage the expansion of these ministries and how they do, and do not, connect with the revival of the ordained order of deaconesses.
Panelists:
Dr. Susan Ashbrook Harvey
Ms. Elizabeth Bouteneff
Dr. Hermina Nedelescu
Ms. Sophia Kyrou
Myth-busting: Addressing the Myths around Ordaining Deaconesses
Wednesday, July 19, 2023
Moderated by St. Phoebe Board Secretary Dr. Helen Creticos Theodoropoulos
This Zoom session directly engaged with concerns and and incorrect teachings about the revival of the ordained order of deaconesses in the Orthodox Church, addressing such issues as: the unfounded but wide-spread belief that women are not allowed in the sanctuary/altar, lingering and theologically indefensible connections between women’s bodies and impurity, and “slippery slope” concerns about deaconesses leading to women priests.
Panelists:
Rev. Fr. Peter Baktis, Mother of God Joy of All Who Sorrow Church
Sister Vassa Larin, PhD, Coffee with Sister Vassa
Carrie Frederick Frost, PhD, St. Phoebe Center Board Chair, Western Washington University
Church of Our Granddaughters by Carrie Frederick Frost: An Evening with the Author
Sunday September 3, 2023
St. Phoebe Center Chair Carrie Frederick Frost spoke and conversed about her new book Church of Our Granddaughters.
From the publisher: Church of Our Granddaughters is a visionary work of theology and ethics that looks hopefully and lovingly two generations into the future, imagining the Orthodox Church’s practices and realities rightfully aligned with its core theological teachings and truths regarding women. This reverent but bold work offers the necessary insight and inspiration to create a community that welcomes all its members, our granddaughters as well as our grandsons, thus allowing the Orthodox Church to better incarnate its mission of service and transfiguration.
