EVER ANCIENT, EVER NEW:
​EXPLORING THE FEMALE DIACONATE

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Join us for a live stream panel on Monday, September 14, 7:00-8:30 p.m.
Dr. Anna Miller, Casey Stanton and Luke Hansen, S.J.
Moderated by Allison Borden
and co-sponsored by Bellarmine Chapel,
the Institute for Spirituality and Social Justice,
and the Center for Faith and Justice at Xavier University

Registration Form - Please Complete!

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The topic of the ordination of women as permanent deacons has emerged at three consecutive global synods in Rome, most notably the recent Synod of Bishops on the Pan-Amazonian Region (October 2019), which formally requested that Pope Francis reestablish a papal commission to study the topic. Now that commission has been formed, which continues the dialogue and discernment in the church. Join this evening of dialogue about the ministry and leadership of women in the Catholic Church, specifically the history of women deacons and the contemporary practice and theology of the permanent diaconate.
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A flyer for the event can be found here.

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Ask a Question

​Dr. Anna Miller

Dr. Anna Miller is an associate professor of New Testament and Early Christianity and the Director of the Institute for Spirituality and Social Justice at Xavier University. Her research interests center on politics and gender in the earliest Christian communities. These interests are represented in her book Corinthian Democracy: Democratic Discourse in 1 Corinthians (Pickwick Publications), hailed as a “groundbreaking work” and available here. Dr. Miller also collaborated with Dr. Art Dewey on a lengthy article on Pauline literature and disability for the volume Disability and the Bible: A Commentary (Baylor University Press). Most recently, Dr. Miller has been researching and writing on 1 Timothy, women and public space in the ancient world. Dr. Miller often offers the class Women in Early Christianity on the undergraduate level, a class that allows her to share her research interests in a stimulating class that considers the significant, though often overlooked, place of women and gender in early Christian communities.

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Casey Stanton, M.Div.

Casey Stanton is the Minister of Social Action and Discipleship at Immaculate Conception Parish in Durham, North Carolina. She holds a BA from the University of Notre Dame, and a Masters of Divinity from Duke Divinity School where she graduated with a certificate in prison studies. Casey spent a decade working in the field of faith-based and labor organizing where she witnessed the power of collective action to bend decision makers towards justice. She hopes to be part of nudging the church towards a more radical embodiment of inclusive leadership, hospitality, social action, and mutual care. A Boston native, Casey is proud to make a home in Durham with her partner Felipe, and their two children, Micaela and Teddy. She loves reading poetry out loud and seeing her favorite band, Hardworker, perform live. You can find her occasionally blogging at Women in Theology.

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Rev. Luke Hansen, S.J.

Rev. Luke Hansen, S.J. is a Jesuit priest and the Catholic Chaplain at the Dorothy Day Center for Faith and Justice at Xavier University. He has studied the history of women deacons, the restoration of the permanent diaconate at the Second Vatican Council, and as a journalist reported from the Synods of Bishops in Rome in 2015, 2018 and 2019. Luke has an MA in social philosophy from Loyola University Chicago, a Masters of Divinity from the Jesuit School of Theology in Berkeley, and a Licentiate in Sacred Theology from the Pontifical Gregorian University in Rome. He is a contributing editor for America, he held the same position for the Jesuit journal La Civiltà Cattolica in Rome, and he has won several awards from the Catholic Press Association for his writing.

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This summer, Casey and Luke co-led the five-week discernment and organizing workshop, “Discern, Dream & Scheme.” The inaugural cohort included 44 participants engaged in a variety of works and ministries in 19 U.S. states and New Zealand.