Baptist deacons, elected by the congregation rather than ordained through a sacramental rite conferring a distinct clerical order, form a lay board that assists the pastor with the practical, pastoral and, in many congregations, financial administration of the church, a role considerably different in both selection and theological weight from the ordained Catholic or Orthodox diaconate, reflecting Baptist congregational polity's general wariness of a formally graded clergy hierarchy separate from the priesthood of all believers the tradition emphasizes. Deacon responsibilities in a typical Baptist congregation include visiting the sick, supporting the pastor in counseling and pastoral care, assisting with the observance of the Lord's Supper and baptism, and, in many churches, serving on the congregation's governing board alongside or in place of separately elected trustees.
The office traces its biblical justification to the same account in Acts 6 that other Christian traditions cite for the diaconate, the appointment of seven men to oversee the distribution of food to widows in the early Jerusalem church, though Baptist practice, consistent with the tradition's broader rejection of a formal three-tier clergy of bishop, priest and deacon inherited from Catholic and Anglican structures, treats the office as a lay ministry position rather than as a distinct order of ordained clergy standing between the laity and the pastorate.