Relationship:

The inner part of the circle represents the interior life where, in response to being configured to Christ the Servant at ordination, the deacon prayerfully contemplate the Christ Servant. This is the “place” of ongoing encounter with the One who calls the deacon to Himself. This call, properly understood as his vocation, isn’t so much a call to something (the diaconate), but a call to Someone (Christ Jesus), in and through that something — that is, in and through the diaconate. It’s an invitation to share in the inner life of the Trinity by way of the deacon's vocation and, in doing so, bear witness to Christ the Servant. Here, his witness rises and falls in direct proportion to the intimacy he shares. It’s precisely within this call and his response that a new relationship, begun at our creation, consecrated at our Baptism, strengthened in Confirmation, purified in Reconciliation, and nourished in the Eucharist takes root. As a result of ordination, he now relates to Christ and His Church in a new way, in a diaconal way. This, of course, requires full, active and conscious participation with the sanctifying grace that accompanies Holy Orders. 

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Identity:

Within this relationship of abandonment, the deacon experiences the beauty that is God and is wounded at the depths of his soul. This woundedness brings about a transformation such that he gains a new identity. Much like in courtship, at some point in time the two are so struck with each other that they marry. Here, their relationship reaches such an intensity that it brings about a change in identity. He is now husband, and she is now wife. While they remain the same, they see and understand who they are in a fundamentally different way. The same is true with the diaconate. At some point in the discernment process the intimacy matures, requiring, by a positive act of the will, a choice that will forever change the man. As in marriage, this change reveals a fundamental truth — relationship gives rise to identity. Our connectedness to another shapes who we are. Thus, a husband is only a husband in relation to his wife, and a deacon is only a deacon in relation to Christ the Servant. The more intense the relationship, the greater its impact on identity. As a result, to the extent that the relationship grows or diminishes, so too does identity in direct proportion.

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The analogy with marriage and the diaconate as it pertains to identity can only go so far. Whereas in marriage the union is sacramental and dissolves at death, in ordination the relationship is ontological in nature. This means that it imparts an indelible character to the soul. While a married man can cease to be married, as when his wife dies, a deacon can never cease to be a deacon. This identity has been infused in his “spiritual DNA” and, even if he should deny his faith and burn in the fires of hell, he will do so as a deacon. Thus, relationship gives rise to identity. We know who we are based on our connectedness to, and intimacy with, another.

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It’s important to recognize that this new identity isn’t something other than who he is. He doesn't become someone else, adopting foreign traits and strange ways. Rather, if the relationship is healthy, this new identity strengthens and fulfills who he already know himself to be. In many respects, he becomes more fully who he is, more fully alive. This is simply an application of grace perfecting nature. The sanctifying grace received at ordination comes about through an intense encounter that configures the deacon to Christ the Servant. This grace capacitates him to rise above the effects of sin, enabling him to become what God fully intends him to be, revealing who he really is. 

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Mission:

Saint Pope John Paul II was fond of remarking that the Church doesn’t have a mission, she is a mission. In his 1990 encyclical Redemptoris Missio he writes, “This definitive self-revelation of God is the fundamental reason why the Church is missionary by her very nature. She cannot do other than proclaim the Gospel (Redemptoris Missio, 5). Understood this way, mission stands at the very heart of the Church. It’s her reason for being, her sole focus and, because of this, her highest work. This work, though singular in purpose, admits to a diversity of expression. Returning again to the thought of John Paul II, he writes, “Mission is a single but complex reality, and it develops in a variety of ways (Redemptoris Missio, 41). While all of the faithful belong to this mission and the discipleship it entails, the clergy are called to live out this mission in a specific way. As the Catechism observes: Holy Orders is the sacrament through which the mission entrusted by Christ to his apostles continues to be exercised in the Church until the end of time: thus, it is the sacrament of apostolic ministry. It includes three degrees: episcopate, presbyterate, and diaconate (Catechism of the Catholic Church, 1536).

 

The mission of the diaconate, like that of the entire faithful, always takes place within the broader context of the mission Christ entrusted to His Church. It’s a specific participation in, and a realization of, the call to go and make disciples of all nations (Mt 28:19). Each of the three degrees of Holy Orders shares in the Church’s mission in a way that corresponds to its particular role in the life of the Church. Hence, we can speak of a diaconal participation which has as its defining character a preeminent witness to Christ the Servant. As a result, the mission of the diaconate is inextricably tied to the mission of the Church, which herself is inextricably bound to Christ’s mission of salvation. For the deacon, his mission isn’t only realized in the many ministries that flow from his diaconate, but most important, from the witness of his life. Of this Saint Pope John Paul II writes, “Without witnesses there can be no witness, just as without missionaries there can be no missionary activity (Redemptoris Missio, 61)." It’s a way of life that shines out to others and beckons them to a more excellent way (1Cor 12:31 ff).

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This call to bear witness in the life and ministry of the deacon is grounded in his identity and sourced in his relationship to Christ the Servant. Where, as we’ve seen earlier, relationship gives rise to identity, identity now gives rise to mission. We know what to do (mission), based on who we are (identity). The man who becomes a husband, the moment he becomes a husband, has a whole new set of responsibilities. Likewise, the man who becomes a deacon, the moment he becomes a deacon, has a whole new ministry. Based on the Latin maxim agere sequitur esse (to act is to follow being), mission flows from identity.

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Identity gives mission a personal quality that differentiates it among missionaries. So, for example, two women are sitting in a room, one a mother, the other a babysitter. The mother’s child is playing nearby and falls. Both women react, but in very different ways. Though the babysitter cares for the child, she isn’t the mother. It’s the mother who instinctively jumps up and quickly attends the child. In this case, it’s the relationship with the child that gives rise to the mother’s identity, and it’s this very identity that led her to exercise her mission in a way different from the babysitter. This in no way diminishes the care given by the babysitter. Her identity as a babysitter gives her a different relationship to the child and, because of this relationship, she can quit at any time, which is not so for the mother.

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This analogy is also helpful in distinguishing the mission of a deacon from a lay minister. Both may be able to do the same thing equally well, such as proclaim the Gospel, but not in quite the same way. This is because identity matters. The deacon’s identity is grounded in his relationship to Christ the Servant as a result of his ordination. Consequently, his mission will admit to a different quality than the lay person, much the same way the priest’s mission will differ from the deacon’s mission. To the extent that diaconal identity grows or diminishes, diaconal ministry, and its unique contribution to the mission of the Church, grows or diminishes in proportion.

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