Holy Orders (Ordination)

The Mystery by which the Church sets apart its deacons, priests and bishops, by the laying on of hands of a bishop during the Divine Liturgy, each at the point of the service that belongs to his order. A bishop is ordained by several bishops, which is what apostolic succession means in practice: not a private line of descent but the recognition of a whole college. Readers and subdeacons are appointed outside the altar. Married men may be ordained deacon or priest, but a man may not marry after ordination, and since the Quinisext Council bishops have been chosen from the celibate, in practice monks. At each ordination the bishop proclaims Axios, he is worthy, and the clergy and the choir repeat it. The ancient order of deaconesses, to which St Olympias belonged, fell out of use in the Middle Ages.