Formally Leaving the Catholic Church

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JimmyJazz

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I’m not sure that this is the proper sub-forum, and if not then I apologize. I just wanted to know if anyone has any information on the actus formalis defectionis ab Ecclesia Catholica. Is there any more to it than writing a letter stating the intent to defect? Must that letter state the reasons for leaving? Are any witnesses necessary? Must the act of defection be made at the parish where one was baptized? All that I can find in canon law are the consequences; what little I know of details I’ve gleaned from websites recommending the practice to ex-Catholics. So does anyone know specifically how to formally leave the Catholic Church? Any help would be greatly appreciated, and I thank you in advance.
 
According to the little reading I have done, once you are baptized in the Church, the Church views you as a Catholic forever because baptism imparts a spiritual change that cannot be undone. If I am wrong about this, I am sure someone will straighten me out.
 
Why would you want to leave? Just being nosey,I geuss. There is a show on EWTN that shows a bunch of ministers and pastors from other religions coming back with many good reasons. It is called The Journey Home. I don’t like to be pushy but maybe you could find a previous broadcast from the show and see why they came back. Marcus Grodi interviews some very intelligent people about this. It’s your life but I think the Catholic Church is the best you can get. They passed on the traditions of Christianity and they basically wrote and compiled which books would be in the bible. So who could possibly know Christianity better?
 
No need for drama. One just quits going to Mass and receving the sacrements.
 
human_being said:
Why would you want to leave? Just being nosey,I geuss. There is a show on EWTN that shows a bunch of ministers and pastors from other religions coming back with many good reasons. It is called The Journey Home. I don’t like to be pushy but maybe you could find a previous broadcast from the show and see why they came back. Marcus Grodi interviews some very intelligent people about this. It’s your life but I think the Catholic Church is the best you can get. They passed on the traditions of Christianity and they basically wrote and compiled which books would be in the bible. So who could possibly know Christianity better?
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I want to leave the Catholic Church for a number of reasons. After a great deal of thought and consideration, I no longer believe in the divinity of Christ, the inspiration of the Bible, papal infallibility, conciliar infallibility, a Trinitarian conception of God, any of the Marian dogmas, divine revelation, the efficacy of the sacraments, original sin, Vicarious Atonement, or miracles. The only articles of the Nicene Creed that I still affirm are those that express a belief in one benevolent Creator, the crucifixion of Jesus by Pontius Pilate (although I attribute no religious significance to this event), the resurrection of the dead, and “the life of the world to come.” Besides dogma, I think that Catholic sexual ethics are drastically wrong on many points, and I’m not terribly enamored with the statist bent that Catholic social ethics have historically displayed.

However, I will look up the EWTN series that you mentioned. And I would just like to note that I plan on parting with the Catholic Church as amicably as possible, because I harbor animus neither against it nor against any other organized religion, and much less do I have any disdain for Catholics; I just respectfully disagree with them.
 
Spirithound said:
The letter is to be sent to the bishop.
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So I send the bishop a letter asking him to note my defection in the baptismal register, including the name of the parish where that register is kept, and that’s all it takes?
 
JimmyJazz said:
So I send the bishop a letter asking him to note my defection in the baptismal register, including the name of the parish where that register is kept, and that’s all it takes?
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So on what basis other than the scriptures do you believe that Christ was crucified by Pontius Pilate? It’s certainly not recorded in any other near-contemporary historical record. And if you accept the truth of scripture to that extent why so? And why not the rest of scripture as well?

More importantly, since you don’t believe in the dogmatical teachings of the Church, or their ethical example, or the authority of its Canon Law (and formal membership of the church is a matter of Canon Law), or the authority of its Pope or bishops, then why should you bother yourself with any formal defection? Clearly you don’t believe, as Catholics do, that Canon Law is binding on all the baptised, after all, so it shouldn’t matter to you.
 
The bishop has no more authority to revoke your baptism than I do. Just like that other guy said, no need for any drama you just stop doing whatever you don’t think you need to do.
 
exoflare said:
The bishop has no more authority to revoke your baptism than I do. Just like that other guy said, no need for any drama you just stop doing whatever you don’t think you need to do.
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Formal defection is not a matter of undoing your baptism - as you have said this is no more possible than to undo your biological DNA and lose your link to your biological parents. What formal defection DOES do is mean that the Church will recognise you as no longer bound by Canon Law, or at least the canons regarding to marriage. Just as your father might do by kicking you out of the family home and cutting you out of his will. Or a kid might do by seeking legal emancipation from their parents.

For some ex-Catholics this matters, though for the life of me I can’t see why. 🤷 For the Church it definitely matters, should the defectee decide to return later having contracted a marriage in the meantime (which might need to be investigated for validity) or something, since different rules apply to defectors as opposed to non-defectors.
 
LilyM said:
So on what basis other than the scriptures do you believe that Christ was crucified by Pontius Pilate? It’s certainly not recorded in any other near-contemporary historical record. And if you accept the truth of scripture to that extent why so? And why not the rest of scripture as well?
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Some parts of the Gospels are reliable, others aren’t. I don’t really want to get into great detail in this particular thread, but I need not accept the historicity of, say, the Resurrection to accept the historicity of a relatively mundane event such as the crucifixion. With all due respect, merely because a work has some credibility does not mean that it is inerrant.
LilyM said:
More importantly, since you don’t believe in the dogmatical teachings of the Church, or their ethical example, or the authority of its Canon Law (and formal membership of the church is a matter of Canon Law), or the authority of its Pope or bishops, then why should you bother yourself with any formal defection? Clearly you don’t believe, as Catholics do, that Canon Law is binding on all the baptised, after all, so it shouldn’t matter to you.
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I would like to make a clean break. I’m not just lapsing into religious indifference the way so many Christmas-and-Easter Catholics do; I am rejecting my original religion on principle and want to express this rejection formally.
 
JimmyJazz said:
Some parts of the Gospels are reliable, others aren’t. I don’t really want to get into great detail in this particular thread, but I need not accept the historicity of, say, the Resurrection to accept the historicity of a relatively mundane event such as the crucifixion. With all due respect, merely because a work has some credibility does not mean that it is inerrant.
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When you accept a work as your sole historical source for a particular event, and not for others, and when there is as little reason to believe the historicity of the ones you do accept from it (the crucifixion) as there is to believe the historicity of the ones you don’t (the Resurrection) then there’s a logical disconnect.
I would like to make a clean break. I’m not just lapsing into religious indifference the way so many Christmas-and-Easter Catholics do; I am rejecting my original religion on principle and want to express this rejection formally.
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How many people who reject their marriages on principle really feel the need - absent practical matters such as division of property of marriage or care of children of the marriage - feel the need to obtain a formal divorce?

Look at Mel Gibson - by all accounts his marriage has been broken down for several years, and it was only because of reports that his girlfriend is pregnant, seemingly, that they bothered to make it formal recently.

In this case there are no such practical matters to consider, and absent those, with all respect there seems to be no genuine principle involved here at all.
 
kage_ar said:
A simple google search will give you this reference:

jimmyakin.org/2006/04/formal_defectio.html

And the documents from the Vatican:

vatican.va/roman_curia/pontifical_councils/intrptxt/documents/rc_pc_intrptxt_doc_20060313_actus-formalis_en.html

I would suggest you meet with your Pastor and have a long discussion before you commit such an act.
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This is a good starting point; I think that I can answer my remaining questions well enough with this information. Thank you very much.
 
LilyM said:
When you accept a work as your sole historical source for a particular event, and not for others, and when there is as little reason to believe the historicity of the ones you do accept from it (the crucifixion) as there is to believe the historicity of the ones you don’t (the Resurrection) then there’s a logical disconnect.
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Well, at the very least, there were crucifixions aplenty in the ancient Roman Empire, and execution appears to have been the preferred method for dealing with seditionists or apparent seditionists such as Jesus. Additionally, reporting the crucifixion meets the criterion of embarrassment used in critical study of historical texts. In contrast, the Resurrection is a truly extraordinary event; it’s just prima facie unlikely that anyone has ever risen from the dead, and if anyone has, it would be nearly impossible to prove it using historical methods. Moreover, the Evangelists- or whoever wrote the Gospels- had every reason to fabricate such a story, which, while not making it necessarily untrue, makes it even more suspect than it already is.
LilyM said:
How many people who reject their marriages on principle really feel the need - absent practical matters such as division of property of marriage or care of children of the marriage - feel the need to obtain a formal divorce?

Look at Mel Gibson - by all accounts his marriage has been broken down for several years, and it was only because of reports that his girlfriend is pregnant, seemingly, that they bothered to make it formal recently.

In this case there are no such practical matters to consider, and absent those, with all respect there seems to be no genuine principle involved here at all.
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I’m not sure what you’re getting at. I want to formally separate from the Catholic Church because I no longer wish to be Catholic in any sense- not even the most contrived, practically irrelevant, technical one. I’m not any kind of orthodox Catholic intellectually, so why should I be one on paper? And if my understanding is correct, by going so far as to apostatize, I’m excommunicated anyway (CIC 1364). So this is a public acknowledgment- on my part and on that of the Catholic Church, represented in miniature by the Diocese of Knoxville- that I am no longer one of its own.
 
Some parts of the Gospels are reliable, others aren’t. I don’t really want to get into great detail in this particular thread, but I need not accept the historicity of, say, the Resurrection to accept the historicity of a relatively mundane event such as the crucifixion. With all due respect, merely because a work has some credibility does not mean that it is inerrant.
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On what basis do you believe that parts of the Gospels are reliable, and others are not?

And why do YOU think you can infallibly decide these things?
 
JimmyJazz said:
I’m not sure what you’re getting at. I want to formally separate from the Catholic Church because I no longer wish to be Catholic in any sense- not even the most contrived, practically irrelevant, technical one. I’m not any kind of orthodox Catholic intellectually, so why should I be one on paper? And if my understanding is correct, by going so far as to apostatize, I’m excommunicated anyway (CIC 1364). So this is a public acknowledgment- on my part and on that of the Catholic Church, represented in miniature by the Diocese of Knoxville- that I am no longer one of its own.
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Formal defection is an acknowledgement that you are no longer bound by (some, I think) Catholic canon law, is all. Doesn’t make you not Catholic - just like an exemption from some state law would not make you cease to be a citizen.

Like you’ve been told, the link to the Church that was forged at your baptism is indelible - like your DNA link to your biological parents. It’s not a paper link and cannot be severed by a piece of paper either.

A parent can renounce some or all legal rights in regard to you, or you in regard to them. That doesn’t mean they’re not your parents or you not their child, because you’re still bound by the most elemental of ties.

Even your excommunication and apostasy makes you an apostate or excommunicate Catholic (ie you can’t receive the sacraments or hold a teaching office in the church). It doesn’t make you not Catholic.

As an analogy, being in jail makes you not a citizen of your country - you are still a citizen, just one who happens to be deprived of some of the rights and privileges of citizenship, and under some legal pains and penalties.

Someone who, as you stated above, truly harboured no animus towards the Catholic Church nor disdain for Catholics wouldn’t be so keen to be rid of the taint of Catholicism as if it were an offensive smell or something. Imagine a child of yours saying to you ‘I don’t harbour any animus towards you or disdain you, my parents, I just dislike you so intensely that I don’t want even the least ties of any kind to bind us at all’. The behaviour totally belies the professed attitude.
 
Cluny said:
On what basis do you believe that parts of the Gospels are reliable, and others are not?
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The fact that this is generally true of historical documents. It’s never an either/or situation of inerrancy or complete falsehood with, say, Herodotus, so why should it be with Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John?
Cluny said:
And why do YOU think you can infallibly decide these things?
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I don’t. I’m certainly no professional historian, and even if I were I wouldn’t arrogate infallibility to myself. However, infallibility isn’t necessary to find (or make guesses at) the truth. All that’s necessary is reason, and in this case, the proper historical method, and while that may not yield certain results (considering the paucity of information we have on Jesus), it will yield good, very likely ones. My best rational guess- and that of virtually all mainstream experts on the historical Jesus- is that the crucifixion occurred, and that the Resurrection is historically unprovable. If I’m wrong, and Jesus actually died a peaceful death in Japan or something, I won’t lose any sleep over it. Religiously speaking, the way that Christ died simply doesn’t matter to me.

And if I may respectfully ask, why do you think that the Church is infallible?
 
JimmyJazz said:
Religiously speaking, the way that Christ died simply doesn’t matter to me.
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For me, the way he chose to die is more important. No one killed Jesus; He even said “I lay it down of my own accord.”

There are discrepancies in the Gospels. I actually think that’s a good thing because it proves that the writers didn’t collude to determine their contents.
 
If we accept the historicity of the gospels in mundane matters, there is very little reason to attribute the invention of a resurrection story to the apostles, unless we assume that the early Christians were actually sadomaschoists who enjoyed the thought of being tortured to death. Certainly, there would be little motivation for Paul to invent his conversion story.

But people will be convinced by arguments that they wish to be convinced by. We are all the same in that regard. I have noticed that many people who claim they are leaving the Church for intelletual reasons are really leaving for sexual reasons. Their refusal to accept limitations on their sexuality motivate them to be compelled by historical arguments that undermine the resurrection. Perhaps my desire to see a higher purpose in life, and to believe in the existence of an eternal good motivates my interpretation of history.

Regardless, I’d rather be a person who believes because they desire good than a person who disbelieves because they value something of the flesh.
 
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