The Deaconesses of Sydney Diocese: Part 2

More from Freedom From Sanctified Sexism - Women Transforming the Church by Mavis Rose, pp. 56-75.

The Diocese of Tasmania also allowed considerable responsibility to their deaconesses but also, like Gippsland, assigned them to remote, pioneering areas. Such was the case of Tasmanian deaconess, Elvie Fraser, trained in Melbourne, who in 1982 was commissioned as Deaconess of the Furneaux Islands, centred on Flinders Island. Elvie Fraser commented:

I can do all that a priest can do except consecrate the elements at Holy Communion, officiate at weddings (because I cannot pronounce the Blessing) and pronounce the Absolution.... We reserve the Sacrament. As we have to pay the fare across from Tasmania for a priest to consecrate the bread and wine, and that is rather expensive, we try not to run out too often.... Because it is not always easy to get a priest to come when we need one for a wedding, I now have a licence to officiate at weddings.

Deaconess Marie Kingston, a rural dean, who ran seven centres in the isolated Tasmanian parish of Derby-Ringarooma, admitted that in spite of her heavy responsibilities, “my status is no different from that of layreader”.

One of the important functions of Deaconess House in Sydney was to train women for overseas missions as well as for the Australian frontier areas. The missionary course was shorter if the trainee did not wish to graduate as a deaconess. Non-ordained graduates were usually referred to as parish or missionary sisters. According to Judd and Cable, under the sub-heading “The Export of Women” (just as if trained churchwomen were commodities!), between 1892 and 1931, 70% of the Church Missionary Society’s 246 missionaries were women. Deaconess Mary Andrews, while Head Deaconess in Sydney after serving with distinction in China, acknowledged the limitations for deaconesses in the Australian urban situation under the close supervision of male clergy. In her opinion, “for those women who sought a more active church role in the extension of Christ’s Kingdom, there was only one option, missionary work, both overseas or in remote parts of Australia.”

The experience of Jacinth Myles illustrates how irksome service in an urban parish could be. After four years of training in Deaconess House, Sydney, Jacinth Myles was employed as a “parish sister” in a Blue Mountains parish. She recalled:

From the start the rector made it clear where I stood. “You are the employee, I am the employer".... My weekly program in that parish was drawn up by the rector and it was not open to negotiation. It did include some adult group work, but it did not include involvement in the services apart from reading the Bible.

Jacinth Myles found that it was in Australia’s rural areas that she was accorded more opportunities and recognition. In Armidale, in contrast with Sydney Diocese, she was advised that “the position would involve a fair amount of leading services and preaching”. When handed her weekly programme, she was not expected to adhere to it slavishly but was “completely free to follow whatever ministry the Lord wanted me to have”.

A young woman from Sydney

Just before listening to Sarah Palin's acceptance speech on being invited to be the running mate for John McCain in the US presidential campaign, I met another beautiful and intelligent young woman. She had just completed an undergrad degree and had recently come here from Sydney, Australia.

She told me that had just joined a ministry training program for a year. I asked what the purpose of the program was and she said that it was developed to "train men to plant churches." I asked how she had become part of it and she explained. This is how I remember what she said.

It is a huge problem being a woman. Everything is against me. They said in the interview that I was an ideal candidate in every way and that I was just what they were looking for and had all the qualifications, but it was a problem because I was not a man. I mean, I would have been the ideal candidate if only I had been a man. But I said, you need women for the women's ministry, women's ministry is growing, you need women. So they let me join. I mean I can lead a Bible study for young mothers, right?

The deaconesses of Sydney Diocese Part 1

I have decided to post a few small excerpts from a lengthly chapter on the deaconesses of the Sydney Diocese. I had been thinking of how the first women ordained in Canada came from a worthy tradition of women who worked for little pay in the north and marginal areas of Canada. These self-sacrificing pioneers took on some very physically demanding assignments and often served where a church could not afford male clergy.

From halfway down the page,

So, away from the arena of churchmen scheming on their perpetual subordination, how did the Australian deaconesses themselves perform ?

As well as their Christian outreach to the urban poor in Melbourne and Sydney, deaconesses played an important role in inland and overseas missions. The Bush Church Aid Society depended on deaconesses for much of its outback ministry. The main areas of operation were in Bathurst, the Riverina, Gippsland and Willochra dioceses. As Judd and Cable comment in their history of Sydney Anglicanism: “The most striking aspect of Bush Church Aid work was the crucial part played by women in the growth of the Society”

They pointed out that in Sydney, while “male lay readers and catechists could assist the clergyman, deaconesses could not preach but only ”address" the congregation and read services in his absence". In the Bush, the deaconesses were allowed to lead local worship. As noted in Chapter One, away from direct clergy supervision women in ministry were allowed more opportunities to develop their talent and demonstrate their resourcefulness.

The Annual Reports of the Deaconess Institution from 1920-21 included a section “Bush Deaconess Report”. In these reports, the formidable tasks being assigned to young female graduates of the Institution were recorded, items such as: “Sometimes a whole month is spent by the Deaconess riding on and on through scattered parishes... visiting, teaching in schools and holding services”.

Deaconess Winifred Shoobridge, assigned to Gippsland Diocese, was reported to have “her own pony and thus can work more expeditiously”. By 1937, Deaconess Shoobridge was “travelling in a little Morris Oxford which is equipped with a bicycle (which helps with the daily visiting), a lantern outfit, Bibles, supplies of Mothers’ Union magazines and other literature”. Deaconess Shoobridge noted that bush women would greet her with comments such as “I’m glad it’s a woman come instead” or “Come in, you’re the first woman I’ve seen for ten months”.

Sydney deaconess Dorothy Almond also worked in Gippsland, in the “Big Scrub” region in the East, stationed at Cann River District, working among “pioneer settlers”, the nearest doctor being “sixty miles distant”. Dorothy Almond in 1923 was written up in the Victorian newspapers for her heroic efforts to save a desperately ill woman in the remote Croajingolong area of Gippsland. She rode forty miles and then walked sixteen miles in stormy weather in order to bring medical aid to the patient. “Through her ministry, in conjunction with that of a doctor, who was able to come out later, the woman’s life was saved”.

Deaconess Agnes McGregor, working for Bush Church Aid in the Far West near Wilcannia, in the late twenties, commented: “One has so many experiences that it is hard to know which is best to relate - punctures on treeless plains when the temperature is 115oin the shade (but there is no shade!) or well down to the footboards in sand and having to use the spade for two hours (no one to give the needed push) or trying to find the track in a blinding duststorm.”

In Gippsland Diocese, it became practice to appoint deaconesses to areas which could not afford the stipend of a priest or a deacon, and which were too demanding for a trainee lay reader. Mrs. Edith Littleton, eldest daughter of Bishop Cranswick, recalled that the deaconesses “were very poorly paid but there was no other way we could staff the diocese in those days”. Underlying this statement was an admission that the Diocese of Gippsland was prepared to exploit women workers for the sake of serving the Church’s frontier areas.

The Diocese could not get male clergy to accept such conditions. The positive aspect was that these difficult situations allowed deaconesses to prove themselves capable of carrying out the duties of clergy. Yet, despite his progressive views on women, Bishop Cranswick, while allowing the deaconesses to be addressed as “the Reverend”, did not give them the right to sit in the House of Clergy in Gippsland Synod. They were not given clergy seats in the diocesan Synod until April 1949.

In time, the deaconesses in Gippsland were placed in charge of parochial districts, officially under the aegis of some remote priest. They were permitted to conduct funerals, baptise infants, preside at Parochial Councils (before women were allowed to be members of them), prepare and present candidates for Confirmation, conduct Morning and Evening Prayer Services and preach. So highly were the deaconesses regarded in Gippsland that Deaconess Nancy Drew recalled that she was appointed to succeed Deaconess Winifred Halter to the parish of Nowa Nowa in 1955 because the people had petitioned the Bishop for another deaconess even though a male priest could have been appointed. When Deaconess Drew left in 1963, the people again asked for a deaconess.

Formal Women’s Ministry : The Deaconess
from Freedom From Sanctified Sexism - Women Transforming the Church by Mavis Rose, pp. 56-75.
Allira Publications, 17 Cervantes Street, MacGregor, Queensland 4109, Australia.
Copyright: Mavis Rose 1996.