Excommunication on Demand

[Madaglan]

I’ve read online several places of former Catholics who request a diocese for a formal excommunication, and that moreover, it had been granted them.

What is the reasoning behind granting this request?

Would it be right for a bishop not to grant a request for formal excommunication?

 

[cheese_sdc]

Doesn’t make much sense to me. If a person wants to leave the church, then it’s likely that they no longer recognize the authority of the Church in spiritual matters anyway. Why go through the trouble of requesting an excommunication?

I can understand sending a letter telling the local ordinary that they’ve had enough and leaving, but that’s not the same thing as requesting an excommunication.

Me, I just stopped going to church and starting going to the local unitarian universalist church. Couldn’t care less about the bishop.

 

[cameron_lansing]

There is no juridical institute in canon law of some self-volunteered excommunication. Excommunication is either incurred or imposed by a quite different process of canon law.

What is possible is called a formal act of defection from the Catholic Church. It has no effect except to exempt the defecting person from three laws regarding marriage (see below at asterisk). It must be manifested by the Catholic to his or her ordinary or proper pastor and then accepted.

The source material to read is a notification from the Pontifical Council for Legislative Texts, 13 March 2006, Prot. N. 10279/2006, and is likely on the internet by now. I will cite it only in part:

"1. For the abandonment of the Catholic Church to be validly configured as a true actus formalis defectionis ab Ecclesia so that the exceptions foreseen in the previously mentioned canons would apply, it is necessary that there concretely be: a) the internal decision to leave the Catholic Church; b) the realization and external manifestation of that decision; and c) the reception of that decision by the competent ecclesiastical authority *

Such authority determines whether that first condition exists.

The notification continues elsewhere: “7. It remains clear, in any event, that the sacramental bond of belonging to the Body of Christ that is the Church, conferred by the baptismal character, is an ontological and permanent bond which is not lost by reason of any act or fact of defection.”

• That actus is mentioned in canons 1086, §1, 1117 and 1124.*

 

[cknick]

Here is the new Change-Hot off the press-See Zenit.org for the rest of the article

**Dicastery Given Faculties to Penalize Wayward Priests

Clergy Congregation Can Dismiss From Clerical State**
VATICAN CITY, JUNE 5, 2009 (Zenit.org).- There are cases when priests’ lack of discipline causes grave scandal and wounds the common good; to help quickly remedy these situations, Benedict XVI has extended the faculties of the Congregation for Clergy.

Archbishop Mauro Piacenza, secretary of that congregation, explained today that the dicastery now has the faculty to treat cases of dismissal from the clerical state “in poenam” (as a penalty) for those clerics who have attempted marriage or have committed other grave sins against the Sixth Commandment.

In an interview with Vatican Radio, the archbishop clarified that “this is not a simplification of procedures or even a simplified procedure, but rather a juridical instrument consistent and coherent with current canon law.”

The procedure is nothing automatic, the prelate added, “but rather one which is pursued in certain and very circumscribed cases according to the prudent judgment of the Apostolic See.”

The new guidelines also include “the faculty to intervene for the imposition of a just penalty or penance for the external violation of divine or canon law.” See Zenit.org for remainder of article…

 

[cyberwolf001]

As I understand it apostasy and heresy are grounds for excommunication. Another reason is because doing so is a -1 to Church membership rolls.

 

[adriancombe]

I’ve read online several places of former Catholics who request a diocese for a formal excommunication, and that moreover, it had been granted them.

What is the reasoning behind granting this request?

Would it be right for a bishop not to grant a request for formal excommunication?

I have never heard of this either. Excommunication is supposed to be a censure with the hoped intent of bring the erring soul back to the flock. I suppose, hypothetically, if a person wanted to be censured for their own good, they could request it - and thus they would be requesting it for a legitimate reason - but from what I have seen, the folks who need to be and are excommunicated are not thus enlightened - otherwise they would not need it. :tsktsk:

 

[bpbasilphx]

The procedure is nothing automatic, the prelate added, “but rather one which is pursued in certain and very circumscribed cases according to the prudent judgment of the Apostolic See.”

---

These words from the article seem very telling to me.

 

[1ke]

I’ve read online several places of former Catholics who request a diocese for a formal excommunication, and that moreover, it had been granted them.

What is the reasoning behind granting this request?

Would it be right for a bishop not to grant a request for formal excommunication?

I think you would need to link to the articles you have read for us to comment further on this as what you have posted does not seem to be in line with canon law or the concept/process of excommunication.

See Deacon Cameron’s post (he is a canon lawyer). Perhaps the article is wrongly calling a formal defection an “excommunication.” It is not the same thing at all. And, one may not request to be excommunicated.

 

[1ke]

The procedure is nothing automatic, the prelate added, “but rather one which is pursued in certain and very circumscribed cases according to the prudent judgment of the Apostolic See.”

---

These words from the article seem very telling to me.

However, the article is talking about dismissal from the clerical state, not excommunication.

I don’t think we can really discuss this properly until the OP links us to the article she has been reading so we can see what it actually says.

 

[Aramis]

In most cases, the priests to whom this will be applied are already latae sentencae excommunicated.

The laicization of these priests allows removing them from the clerical rolls, a punishment which Rome withdrew from the Roman Church Bishops in 1917.

 

[Madaglan]

Here’s a general example:

zenit.org/article-23961?l=english

The difference here is that it’s writing a letter to the parish priest.

I’ve also read some personal pages online of people who wrote to their bishop to request excommunication. I’ll have to see if I can find any again, as I viewed them years ago.

There are many sites (mostly by atheists/agnostics) on the steps to being excommunicated from the Catholic Church. Most include mention of a specific letter format to be sent to one’s bishop.

 

[kage_ar]

Here’s a general example:

zenit.org/article-23961?l=english

The difference here is that it’s writing a letter to the parish priest.

I’ve also read some personal pages online of people who wrote to their bishop to request excommunication. I’ll have to see if I can find any again, as I viewed them years ago.

There are many sites (mostly by atheists/agnostics) on the steps to being excommunicated from the Catholic Church. Most include mention of a specific letter format to be sent to one’s bishop.

This article talks about the process of formal defection from the Church. It is not excommunication.

 

[Goblin_Taters]

This article talks about the process of formal defection from the Church. It is not excommunication.

All right. So all the atheist and other sites that sport instructions on how to be excommunicated from the Church are misnaming the process?

 

[tee_eff_em]

I think you would need to link to the articles you have read for us to comment further on this as what you have posted does not seem to be in line with canon law or the concept/process of excommunication.

See Deacon Cameron’s post (he is a canon lawyer). Perhaps the article is wrongly calling a formal defection an “excommunication.” It is not the same thing at all. And, one may not request to be excommunicated.

I agree. (But if one did insist on becoming excommunicated, it seems easy enough to do so )

tee

 

[kage_ar]

All right. So all the atheist and other sites that sport instructions on how to be excommunicated from the Church are misnaming the process?

Yup.

Imagine the shock, an athiest giving out error when speaking of the Church

 

[Seatuck]

All right. So all the atheist and other sites that sport instructions on how to be excommunicated from the Church are misnaming the process?

Looks that way. But then many of them have instructions to unbaptize someone including unbaptism certificates and we know that is impossible so I don’t think they really care if they are making up a name for something.

 

[Traditional_Ang]

Here’s a general example:

zenit.org/article-23961?l=english

The difference here is that it’s writing a letter to the parish priest.

I’ve also read some personal pages online of people who wrote to their bishop to request excommunication. I’ll have to see if I can find any again, as I viewed them years ago.

There are many sites (mostly by atheists/agnostics) on the steps to being excommunicated from the Catholic Church. Most include mention of a specific letter format to be sent to one’s bishop.

Madaglan:

Here are 2 other articles which seem to be closer to the Original source.

Polish Bishops issue Guidelines for Catholics leaving the Church
Thursday, 09 October, 2008
Link from TOTAL CATHOLIC

Poland’s Catholic Bishops advise people how to “Quit Church”
By Jonathan Luxmore
Updated: Friday, 17 October 2008
journeyonline.com.au/showArticle.php?articleId=1729

These have more information than the Zenit article.

Your Brother in Christ, Michael

 

[benedictgal]

Here is the new Change-Hot off the press-See Zenit.org for the rest of the article

**Dicastery Given Faculties to Penalize Wayward Priests

Clergy Congregation Can Dismiss From Clerical State**
VATICAN CITY, JUNE 5, 2009 (Zenit.org).- There are cases when priests’ lack of discipline causes grave scandal and wounds the common good; to help quickly remedy these situations, Benedict XVI has extended the faculties of the Congregation for Clergy.

Archbishop Mauro Piacenza, secretary of that congregation, explained today that the dicastery now has the faculty to treat cases of dismissal from the clerical state “in poenam” (as a penalty) for those clerics who have attempted marriage or have committed other grave sins against the Sixth Commandment.

In an interview with Vatican Radio, the archbishop clarified that “this is not a simplification of procedures or even a simplified procedure, but rather a juridical instrument consistent and coherent with current canon law.”

The procedure is nothing automatic, the prelate added, “but rather one which is pursued in certain and very circumscribed cases according to the prudent judgment of the Apostolic See.”

The new guidelines also include “the faculty to intervene for the imposition of a just penalty or penance for the external violation of divine or canon law.” See Zenit.org for remainder of article…

I think that this will probably called the Cutie provision. It is interesting that this came out not long after the Cutie scandal broke.

 

[Aramis]

All right. So all the atheist and other sites that sport instructions on how to be excommunicated from the Church are misnaming the process?

Yes. The process they describe is defection.

Excommunication is much simpler… but a very different thing.