DEACON AND DEACONESS (PROTESTANT). – The 19th century, which marked among Protestants a renewed fervour in the work of their home missions, also saw the institution of deacons and deaconesses.
The deacons have as their founder the pastor Johann Heinrich Wichern, who in 1833 gathered at Horn, near Hamburg, many abandoned children and built for them a house in the manner of a colony with separate buildings for prayer, school, work and ordinary dwelling. The co-workers, assistants and educators who devoted themselves to the children and acted as fathers to them were called “deacons,” intentionally linking themselves to the ancient deacons of the primitive Church. The work prospered, and the institutes multiplied, extending their assistance to schools, hospitals, homes for the blind, the deaf-mute, the elderly and the disabled.
Almost at the same time, the deaconesses arose at Kaiserwerth, near Düsseldorf, in 1836, through the work of the pastor Theodor Fliedner. They attend to the sick and the poor, visit various districts, but are more subordinate than the deacons to the needs of the parishes in which their house is located.
The deaconesses are numerous and there are many of their institutes, especially in Germany, England and America; they are maintained by the diaconate, and while retaining the administration of their private property, they receive a small daily allowance. They must maintain the state of celibacy; in the Anglican Church and in the Methodist Episcopal Church of America they are admitted to their rank with the support of the blessing and laying on of hands by the bishop. Their training, in view of the mission they must carry out, is thorough.