Can Deacons Bless?
One reason I write about deacons on this blog is that in my studies I’ve discovered there is a lot of confusion about diaconal ministry…
One reason I write about deacons on this blog is that in my studies I’ve discovered there is a lot of confusion about diaconal ministry. For example, recently while researching information on blessings, I stumbled upon a story in an online Catholic forum, related by an expectant mother. A deacon at her parish offered to bless her unborn child (there is an official Rite for the Blessing of a Child in the Womb which can be presided over by a priest or deacon). She assumed the deacon was offering to do something illicit. Not wanting to appear rude or ungrateful, she made the excuse that her husband was out of town and he would want to be there for something like that. In her post, she expressed relief that she managed to “dodge the deacon” for the time being.
But was the deacon in the above story offering to do anything he was not supposed to do? Of course not. The short answer to the question, “Can deacons bless?” is YES. Now here’s the long answer…
What, exactly, is a blessing? The Catechism of the Catholic Church defines it this way: “A blessing of benediction is a prayer invoking God’s power and care upon some person, place, thing or undertaking.”
Have you ever prayed to God for the care or protection of some person? That’s a form of blessing. Yes, laity in the Catholic Church may offer prayers of blessing, though of a different sort than ordained ministers. If you are a practicing Catholic lay person, you probably offer blessings more often than you think. You probably bless yourself with holy water when you enter a church, for example. And before you eat your meals, you likely pray the words, “Bless us, O Lord…”
So yes, all God’s people may offer blessings, not just the clergy. This is not to say there is no difference between a blessing offered by a lay person and a blessing offered by a sacred minister. There is.
The Catechism of the Catholic Church says:
“Every baptized person is called to be a ‘blessing’ and to bless. Hence lay people may preside at certain blessings; the more a blessing concerns ecclesial and sacramental life, the more its administration is reserved to the ordained ministry (bishops, priest, deacons)” (CCC 1669).
In the General Introduction to the Book of Blessings, a distinction is made between the blessings which are reserved to the bishop, those that may be given by a priest or a deacon, those that can be offered by an instituted acolyte or reader (lector) — lay ministers — and those offered by other laymen and laywomen.
“Other laymen and laywomen, in virtue of the universal priesthood, a dignity they possess because of their baptism and confirmation, may celebrate certain blessings, as indicated in the respective order of blessings, by use of the rites and formularies designated for a lay minister. Such laypersons exercise this ministry in virtue of their office (for example, parents on behalf of their children) or by reason of some special liturgical ministry or in fulfillment of a particular charge in the Church…” (General Introduction to the Book of Blessings, 18)
(The USCCB has even published a book called Catholic Household Blessings and Prayers containing blessings any lay person may give. It’s a wonderful resource for any Catholic home.)
Conferring a blessing is a matter of spiritual authority. You can bless yourself. A parent can bless a child. Those in ordained ministry have a greater degree of spiritual authority and so are able to offer blessings on a wider range of people, objects, places and endeavors.
The Church makes a distinction between two types of blessings, invocative and constitutive. Fr. William Saunders defines invocative blessings in these terms:
In an invocative blessing, the minister implores the divine favor of God to grant some spiritual or temporal good without any change of condition, such as when a parent blessed a child. This blessing is also a recognition of God’s goodness in bestowing this “blessing” upon us, such as when we offer a blessing for our food at meal time. In blessing objects or places, a view is also taken toward those who will use the objects or visit the places (“What is a Blessing?”)
The blessings which may be presided over by lay persons are all invocative blessings. Constitutive blessings are different. Again, Fr. Saunders:
A constitutive blessing, invoked by a bishop, priest or deacon, signifies the permanent sanctification and dedication of a person or thing for some sacred purpose. Here the person or object takes on a sacred character and would not be returned to non-sacred or profane use. For example, when religious Sisters or Brothers profess final vows, they are blessed, indicating a permanent change in their lives. Or, when a chalice is blessed, it becomes a sacred vessel dedicated solely to sacred usage (ibid.).
Constitutive blessings are reserved to those in holy orders, because their office grants them apostolic authority within the Church. Bishops enjoy the fullness of this authority. Priests (and to a lesser degree, deacons) share in it.
When a priest or deacon is ordained, his bishop gives him something called a pagella (Latin for “little page”). It is written document listing out all the ministerial faculties granted by the bishop to the newly ordained. This underscores the principle that priests and deacons do not minister in their own right, but participate in the ministry of the bishop. Deacons and priests can only exercise those faculties permitted them by the bishop. And that includes blessings.
As a deacon, the pagella given to me by my bishop at ordination grants me the faculties to “give blessings according to the faculties prescribed in canon 1169.3.” It also states, “You may preside at those blessings which are expressly indicated for the deacon in the Book of Blessings.” Canon 1169.3 simply states, “A deacon can impart only those blessings which are expressly permitted to him by law.”
So what blessings are permitted to the deacon by law? Any blessings included in a liturgical rite that can be presided over by a deacon. This would include weddings, funerals, baptisms, communion services, the Liturgy of the Hours, etc. All of these rites involve prayers of blessing, which a deacon can — and should — offer when he presides, according to the norms in those particular ritual texts.
In addition, there are many blessings in the Book of Blessings which a deacon may offer. When it comes to the three sacred orders, the normal minister of blessing is a priest. Some more solemn blessings are restricted to a bishop. And many blessings are permitted to the deacon. How many? Most of them, as it turns out.
A deacon can offer just about all of the blessings in the Book of Blessings pertaining to persons, buildings, and devotional objects. This includes blessing families, homes, those that are sick, blessings for birthdays and anniversaries, blessings of catechumens, students, teachers, travelers, animals, places of business, cars, boats, and fishing gear (yes, there is a blessing for that). Deacons can bless holy water, rosaries, nativity scenes, Christmas trees and Advent wreaths. These are illustrative examples and are not exhaustive.
The blessings deacons are not permitted to give are those associated more closely with sacred worship and the sacraments; for example, new baptismal fonts, lecterns, tabernacles, confessionals, church bells, chalices, or images intended for public veneration.
The Book of (Non)Blessings
Research blessings in the Catholic Church just a little bit and you’ll soon discover wide-spread dissatisfaction among the clergy with the current Book of Blessings. Some refer to it as the Book of Well-Wishes.
There is a general principle in the Church that prayers do what they say they do. And the problem with the Book of Blessings is that many of the prayers contained therein don’t actually seem to bless anything. Let’s use the blessing of holy water as an example.
Blessed are you, Lord, all-powerful God, who in Christ, the living water of salvation, blessed and transformed us. Grant that, when we are sprinkled with this water or make use of it, we will be refreshed inwardly by the power of the Holy Spirit and continue to walk in the new life we received at baptism. We ask this through Christ our Lord.
Most priests I know refuse to bless water with this formula. Why? Look at it closely. When is the water blessed? It isn’t. The minister prays that those who use the water may be “refreshed inwardly” but the water itself is never blessed by this prayer.
For another example, here is the blessing given for “technical equipment.”
Blessed are you, Lord our God, and worthy of all praise, for you have provided for the perfecting of your children through human labor and intelligence, and you show your own power and goodness in the inventions of the human race. Grant that all those who will use this equipment to improve their lives may recognize that you are wonderful in your works and may learn to carry out your will more readily. We ask this through Christ our Lord.
This is a lovely prayer, asking that those using the equipment be more open to carrying out God’s will. But nowhere are the words “bless this equipment” actually said. And if the minister does not pray those words, the equipment is not blessed.
This is true of most of the “blessings” offered in the Book of Blessings pertaining to objects. The prayers ask for all sort of wonderful things for those that use the objects. But they don’t actually bless the objects.
There are notable exceptions. One example is the “Short Formulary” for the blessing of a rosary, which is simply, “May this rosary and the one who uses it be blessed, in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.” There is a similar short prayer of blessing for any devotional article, where the word “rosary” is substituted with whatever the article is — a small statue, holy card, saint medal, cross, etc.. These are actual constitutive blessings, as indicated by the command, “may this _____ be blessed…”
(Oddly enough another example of a constitutive blessing in the Book of Blessings is the blessing of a boat & fishing gear, which says, “Bless this boat, its equipment and all who use it…”)
The Book of Blessings also contains an appendix entitled “Solemn Blessings and Prayers Over the People” which offers blessings and prayers that may be used by a priest or deacon to conclude any ritual contained in the book. They all end with the prayer, “May almighty God bless you, the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit.”
Because most of the prayers in the Book of Blessings don’t seem to actually bless anything, many priests I know prefer to use the blessings from the older Roman Ritual, which unequivocally and without doubt bless those things they intend to bless. But this begs the question: can deacons use the blessings from this older book?
I have heard it suggested that a deacon may offer any blessing from the Roman Ritual that corresponds to a blessing permitted to deacons in the Book of Blessings. But I have my doubts.
For one, there is actually very little overlap between the two texts. The items and occasions covered by the two books are surprisingly different. So even if it were true that a deacon could offer any blessing from the Roman Ritual that would be permitted to him in the Book of Blessings, that only applies to a couple of things.
Then there is fact that the text of the Roman Ritual itself presumes that the minister is a priest. Granted, this text predates the renewal of the permanent diaconate that came about as a result of the Second Vatican Council. But there were certainly deacons pre-Vatican II. Remember every priest is first ordained a deacon and serves in diaconal ministry for a period before priestly ordination. There have always been deacons. So the absence of any permission for deacons to offer the blessings in the Roman Ritual is not for nothing.
Even more important to me as a deacon is the fact that the pagella given to me by my bishop only grants me the faculties to offer blessings as permitted by law and which are “expressly indicated” in the Book of Blessings. Those two little words from my bishop strike me as mighty important. So unless someone can show me where either my bishop or the universal law of the Church has granted deacons permission to use blessings from the Roman Ritual, I’m going to limit myself to what the Book of Blessings says deacons can do.
So what does the poor deacon do who wants to make sure the object or person he blesses is truly blessed, when the appropriate rite from the Book of Blessings doesn’t contain an actual prayer of blessing? I suggest making use of the short formulary for the blessing of devotional objects, or the prayer over the people given in the appendix, as concluding formulas for any blessings given to make up for whatever may be lacking in the prescribed rite.
As a final word, if any deacons out there have received permission from their bishop to make use of the blessings from the Roman Ritual I’d love to hear from you! Please comment!
As a final final word, all of the above pertains to deacons in the Roman (Latin) Church. The practice in the Eastern Catholic Churches is that deacons do not receive faculties to bless, and so do not offer blessings. This is not because Eastern deacons are of a lesser degree than Western deacons — there is only one order of the diaconate, and all deacons are equal. Rather it is a matter of what ministerial faculties are granted by the particular law of the Eastern Churches. The tradition in the East is that blessings are reserved to priests.