Bishops, Deacons, the Pope, Ordination and Baptism: How the Churches Differ

The New Testament names bishops, elders and deacons, but not a pope and not a single pattern. Churches disagree about how the offices fit together, who may ordain, and who may be baptized and how.

What the New Testament says

Three titles appear in the New Testament: overseer (Greek episkopos, usually translated bishop), elder (presbyteros, the root of the word priest) and servant (diakonos, deacon). Paul writes to “the bishops and deacons” at Philippi, and he sets out qualifications for both offices in his letters to Timothy and Titus.

Scholars and churches read the evidence differently. In Titus, Paul tells his helper to “ordain elders in every city” and then describes what a “bishop” must be, which suggests that the two terms could refer to the same office. Churches without bishops often point to this. Churches with bishops point to Timothy and Titus themselves, men appointed by Paul to oversee several congregations and to appoint others.

The appointment of such leaders was done by prayer and the laying on of hands. In Acts, the first seven chosen to serve the community were presented to the apostles, who “prayed, and laid their hands on them.” Church tradition calls them the first deacons, though Acts itself does not use the title.

The three-fold ministry in the early church

By the early second century, at least in some churches, one bishop led each city’s church, with a council of elders and a group of deacons. Ignatius of Antioch, writing on his way to martyrdom around AD 107, is the earliest writer to describe this pattern clearly. He insists that the church should do nothing apart from the bishop. Whether the arrangement was universal in his time, and how much it developed from the first century, is debated, but within a few generations it was the norm across the Christian world.

Bishop, priest and deacon today

The Catholic, Eastern Orthodox, Oriental Orthodox and Anglican churches, and some Lutheran churches, keep the three-fold pattern. A bishop leads a diocese, ordains clergy, and in these churches is seen as a successor of the apostles. A priest, the English form of presbyter, serves a parish and celebrates the sacraments. A deacon assists in worship and in works of charity. The Catholic Church restored the permanent diaconate, open to married men, after the Second Vatican Council, and in the Eastern churches deacons serve in the liturgy as well. Above the bishop, many churches have senior titles: archbishop, metropolitan and patriarch, each with a region of oversight.

The pope and the question of primacy

The pope is the bishop of Rome. Catholics hold that he is the successor of Peter and has supreme and universal authority over the whole church, with cardinals who advise him and elect his successor. Eastern Orthodox churches honor the bishop of Rome as having held a primacy of honor in the early church, but deny that he has jurisdiction over other churches; they are led by their own patriarchs, with the Patriarch of Constantinople honored as first among equals. This difference is central to the Great Schism of 1054. The Oriental Orthodox churches have their own patriarchs and popes, such as the Coptic Pope of Alexandria, who lead their churches independently of Rome. Protestant churches reject papal authority.

Churches without bishops

Protestant churches organize themselves in three main ways. Episcopal churches, such as the Anglican and the Methodist, have bishops. Presbyterian churches are governed by elders, teaching and ruling, meeting in regional bodies called presbyteries. Congregational churches, including most Baptist, Pentecostal and non-denominational churches, govern themselves locally, usually with a pastor and deacons chosen by the congregation. Some groups, such as the Quakers, have no ordained clergy at all and hold that all believers share in ministry.

Baptism: who, how and when

Every Christian tradition baptizes, because Jesus commanded it, but they differ on what baptism does, who receives it and how. The earliest church order we have, the Didache, already prefers immersion in running water, allows other water if there is none, and permits pouring three times on the head if there is not enough for either.

What ordination is

Ordination is the rite by which a person is set apart for a ministry. In the Catholic, Orthodox and Oriental Orthodox churches, and by teaching in many Anglican churches, it is a sacrament conferred by a bishop in apostolic succession, an unbroken line of ordination from the apostles, and it is held to give the ordained a lasting character. Most Protestants understand ordination as a recognition by the church of a calling and a gift, conferred by prayer and the laying on of hands as in the New Testament, but not as a sacrament that confers a different status. The priesthood of all believers, a Reformation principle drawn from 1 Peter 2:9, is why many Protestants avoid the word priest for their ministers and prefer pastor or minister.