the decline started in the late seventh century with the introduction into the Byzantine Church of severe liturgical restrictions on menstruating women. By the eleventh century, the Byzantine Church had developed a theology of ritual impurity associated with menstruation and childbirth. Dionysius of Alexandria and his later successor, Timothy, had similar restriction on women receiving the Eucharist or entering the church during menses. Thus, "the impurity of their menstrual periods dictated their separation from the divine and holy sanctuary." By the end of the medieval period the role of the deacons decreased into mere preparation for priesthood, with only liturgical roles. In the 12th and 13th century, deaconesses had mainly disappeared in the European Christian church and, by the 11th century, were diminishing in the Eastern Mediterranean Christian churches. Even so, there is substantial evidence of their existence throughout the history of Eastern Churches. Restoration of the female diaconate In August 2016, the Catholic Church established a Study Commission on the Women's Diaconate to study the history of female deacons and to study the possibility of ordaining women as deacons. Until today, the Armenian Apostolic Church is still ordaining religious Sisters as deaconesses, the last Monastic deaconess was Sister Hripsime Sasounian (died in 2007) and on 25 September 2017, Ani-Kristi Manvelian a twenty-four-year-old woman was ordained in Tehran's St. Sarkis Mother Church as the first lay deaconess after many centuries. The Russian Orthodox Church had a female monastic subdiaconate into the 20th century. The Holy Synod of the Orthodox Church of Greece restored the female monastic subdiaconate in 2004. And on 16 November 2016, the Holy Synod of Greek Orthodox Church of Alexandria also restored the female diaconate, actually for subdeaconesses. Reformation era The Damsels of Charity, founded in 1559 by Prince Henri Robert de la Marck of Sedan, have sometimes been regarded as the first Protestant association of deaconesses, although they were not called by that name. Mennonites had a practice of consecrating deaconesses. Count Zinzendorf of the Moravian Church began consecrating deaconesses in 1745. Late modern period The deaconess movement was revived in the mid 19th century, starting in Germany and spread to some other areas, especially among Lutherans, Anglicans and Methodists. The professionalization of roles such as nursing and social work in the early 20th century undercut its mission of using lightly trained amateurs. By the late 20th century secularization in Europe had weakened all church-affiliated women's