Theosebia

Saint Theosebia the Deaconess was a Christian leader of the fourth century, in Asia Minor, and is honoured as a saint in the Orthodox Church. The Catholic Church calls her Blessed Theosebia the Deaconess. Little is known of her life: the year of her birth is not known, and her death is placed sometime after the year 381, about 385. She is thought to have had an important role in the Church at Nyssa, where she was a deaconess. Our sources do not give the date of her commemoration.

Gregory of Nazianzus wrote a letter of condolence to Gregory of Nyssa on her death, in which he calls her your sister Theosebia and the true yoke-⁠fellow of a priest. This has caused debate because of the unclear manner in which she is identified. Some historians have supposed her the wife of Gregory of Nyssa, others one of his sisters, like Macrina the Younger, in which case she would also have been the sister of Basil the Great. Gregory of Nyssa, unlike the other Cappadocian Fathers, was married, according to his own testimony in his work On Virginity, in which he says that he cannot himself benefit from the subject of his own writing. This, together with Gregory of Nazianzus's statement that Theosebia was buried by the other Gregory, shows that she was either the wife or the sister of Gregory of Nyssa, whose funeral he would have been obliged to arrange.

In the letter, Gregory of Nazianzus praises her as the pride of the Church, the ornament of Christ, the finest of their generation, the free voice of women, the most illustrious among the brethren, outstanding in beauty of soul, truly a priestly figure, the colleague of a priest, equally honoured and worthy of the great mysteries. Some scholars, such as Ilaria Ramelli and Joan E. Taylor, consider these words evidence that Theosebia was herself a presbyter (priest). This is the opinion of some present-⁠day scholars and is not part of the teaching of the Orthodox Church, which honours her as a deaconess.

A centre of Christian spirituality, the Saint Theosevia Centre in Oxford, bears her name, in another spelling. Donald Allchin was its director from 1987 to 1994.