Automatic Excommunication question

[wkj_123]

As some of you may know at one point I became a total apostate from the faith and totally turned my back on the Church and became an athiest. I have since repented but, but I remain confused about automatic excommunication. I was aware of this penalty before I committed my sins, so I feel as though I would have incurred the automatic excommunication. I have been to confession, and even spoken to my Bishop, who have told me I was not automatically excommunicated. I totally trust my priest and Bishop, and have since taken the Eucharist, I’m just curious if I am missing reading or mis understanding Canon law regarding automatic excommunication?

 

[Tis_Bearself]

If the bishop decided you were not automatically excommunicated, then you likely did misread the law.

If you did not ask for or obtain a legal explanation from your bishop, it’s not really possible for us to tell you where you went wrong. There are a large number of exceptions to automatic excommunication in canons 1321-1330 and maybe the bishop felt one applied to your case. In addition, he may have decided that whatever you did, did not even fall under the legal definition of apostasy in the first place for some reason.

Law is a tricky thing and often people who are not canon lawyers or other experts (a bishop is presumably experienced with the excommunication laws) do not fully understand how it is interpreted. In any event, it’s a moot point as you’re back in the Church and hopefully will not be leaving again.

 

[Canvas]

People leave the Church and come back all the time. I assume the excommunication is lifted when you are absolved after a Confession.

 

[Tis_Bearself]

Some automatic excommunications require the bishop to lift it - the priest can’t do it. Or you might be required to confess to certain priests if the bishop has not delegated the authority to all priests under him to hear confessions for a certain excommunicable offense. The OP contacted his bishop presumably to make sure it got lifted. The bishop told him he was not automatically excommunicated, so there was nothing to lift.

Edited to add, presumably the OP would have been worried about being automatically excommunicated for apostasy due to his becoming an atheist and totally rejecting God and the Church.

 

[Canvas]

I don’t think leaving the Church and then returning is a “reserved sin”, like Eucharistic desecration is (which is actually reserved to the Holy See). I think that goes even if one stops believing completely or joins a different sect or faith.

How many people have turned away from the Church and then come back years later? Probably a large percentage of practicing Catholics stopped at one point in their life and came back. I doubt that it would be a “reserved sin” involving the Bishop. The Bishop would have to deal with “reverts” all the time.

 

[Tis_Bearself]

I understand what you are saying, but apostasy is a potentially automatically excommunicable offense under a strict reading of the canon law. That doesn’t mean that everybody who becomes an atheist for a while is automatically excommunicated and needs to see the Bishop to be let back in. It just means the potential is there unless the Bishop
a) delegates responsibility to all his priests to just hear your confession and in doing so let you back in,
or
b) decides you didn’t commit the automatically excommunicable offense,
or
c) decides you committed the automatically excommunicable offense but an exception, of which there are many, applied to your case.

It may also be that if the OP called the bishop after he had already been to confession to his priest, the bishop thought this was a moot point because he had delegated the authority to his priests to lift the excommunication by simply hearing confession, so he just told the OP that there was no automatic excommunication because at that point, there wasn’t one existing any more.

Maybe this EWTN article will make it more clear.

https://www.ewtn.com/expert/answers/heresy_schism_apostasy.htm

 

[Canvas]

There are so many conditions that apply for an actual excommunication that only a Canon lawyer can be excommunicated nowadays.

 

[Tis_Bearself]

Yes, you’re right on that point.

I’ve also seen EWTN posts saying that people are automatically excommunicated for not believing in some Catholic belief like the intercession of saints. I sincerely doubt that one is automatically excommunicated for having a doubt about Catholic teaching. If that’s the case then many if not most people are walking around excommunicated already.

I’m also willing to bet that the Bishop gets calls about this stuff all day.

 

[wkj_123]

It may also be that if the OP called the bishop after he had already been to confession to his priest,

This is indeed the case. I went to confession and then called the Bishop to be sure. The priest didn’t think I was automatically excommunicated. The Bishop didn’t say if the priest had been delegated to lift Excommunication or not. The Bishop just felt like I had not been automatically excommunicated in the first place. It gets very confusing if you read about it though because it does seem that a whole host of things could technically get you excommunicated.

 

[Tis_Bearself]

The Bishop and the priest do not want to be legalistic about this. There is no reason for them to be; I’m presuming you are just some Catholic in the pew who left and then came back and you’re not the pastor of a parish, or a Father Feeney type leading a whole movement, who was in the public eye preaching apostasy. They just want you back, you’re back, they aren’t going to sit around in hindsight analyzing your legal status while you were away. They realize most people who skip out on the Church or hold some different viewpoint are simply confused or misguided or not well catechized, etc.

As Canvas said, people leave the Church and come back all the time, and the Bishop doesn’t want to have to take some special action every time it happens.

 

[awesomecatholic]

Since your bishop said you were not and you went to confession, then you are fine.