Pope making excommunications

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michael-kaw

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First of all feel free to change the category as I’m not sure I have put this in the correct place.

I’m trying to get a better understanding of excommunication. for example anyone who was part of the communist party was excommunicated, does that mean that if anyone joined the communist party after the Pope excommunicated people in it, is the new member is suddenly excommunicated aswell

Also is it true that the Pope excommunicated the entire mafia in 2014? And the same goes for that, if someone was to be born into the mafia and was part of it is he excommunicated even though the excommunication was done before his birth

(This is nothing to do with scrupulousity, I’m just wondering)
 
It is a rare thing, and done after great discernment as a last ditch effort. I believe most of the time, if not all of the time it is done with the hopes that the person will repent, and the excommunication lifted. Look this question up on the internet and you will find an interesting history of it I am sure.
 
Excommunications can be lifted right? So the baby born in mafia would have the excommunication lifted by baptism and confirmation but if he joins mafia afterwards would be by default excommunicated again.
I am just saying my opinion not an expert.
I remember the Pope called mafia evil I don’t know if he did any procedure of actual excommunication.
 
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I see now. Thank you for the link. I didn’t remember correctly.
I like Pope Francis like that I gotta say. He seems more like himself. When he meets celebrities who have nothing to with the Church or politicians he seems like he is …how to say… not fake… but just doing something he is expected to do or he thinks he is expected to do and not happy about it. Same as when he went to Sweden for the reform celebration. He wasn’t happy and it showed.
Jesus said not to fear. Why doesn’t he just do what he feels is right and let it all in God’s hands because we cannot be perfect and that’s that.
 
So anyone who lives a life of evil is excommunicated? And if someone was to live this life of evil after the Pope did this excommunication is that person excommunicated automatically?
 
Excommunication is really just a physical, earthly, formal act representing what’s already taken place between the believer and God in the spiritual realm due to the person’s actions. Mortal sin excommunicates us automatically, which is why we’re to refrain from the Eucharist (communion) when in that state.

Of course whether we acknowledge this truth and obey this rule or whether or not someone else knows about the internal state of our soul and acts accordingly to ecommunicate us is another question. When our actions are public and bad enough, however, the state is obvious and the pope has the right and perhaps even duty to identify and make it official so to speak. Otherwise the church would prefer to leave it between the person, their own conscience, and God
 
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Becket scene.

This is tweaked for Hollywood and isn’t quite how the text goes but it still would be frightening to have this pronounced against you. I’m sure if this was done today a lot of people would repent of such grevious sins so this sentence wouldn’t be carried out.
 
I think Rome pretty much backed away from using excommunication as a general policy. In times past it was used as a pretty effective weapon, particularly against errant princes (well, what any given Medieval and Renaissance Pope viewed as an errant prince), because excommunicating a King meant that all his vassals were cast out as well. After the Reformation, that was weakened pretty heavily, and by the time of the rise of the nation states, it would have been met with a shrug by many princes, seeing as if they couldn’t find what they were looking for with Rome, well, there was always any number of convenient Protestant churches to hang their hat on.
 
Excommunication is a correctional act, you’re meant to learn from it and repent. Or you could NOT repent; whatever you want to do with it.
 
You’re right that it is somewhat dramatized, but it’s not that far off from the official text:

Wherefore in the name of God the All-powerful, Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, of the Blessed Peter, Prince of the Apostles, and of all the saints, in virtue of the power which has been given us of binding and loosing in Heaven and on earth, we deprive him and all his accomplices and all his abettors of the Communion of the Body and Blood of Our Lord, we separate him from the society of all Christians, we exclude him from the bosom of our Holy Mother the Church in Heaven and on earth, we declare him excommunicated and anathematized and we judge him condemned to eternal fire with Satan and his angels and all the reprobate, so long as he will not burst the fetters of the demon, do penance and satisfy the Church; we deliver him to Satan to mortify his body, that his soul may be saved on the day of judgment.

And for the traditionalists among us:

Idcirco eum cum universis complicibus, fautoribusque suis, judicio Dei omnipotentis Patris, et Filii, et Spiritus Sancti, et beati Petri principis Apostolorum, et omnium Sanctorum, necnon et mediocritatis nostrae auctoritate, et potestate ligandi et solvendi in coelo et in terra nobis divinitus collata, a pretiosi Corporis et Sanguinis Domini perceptione, et a societate omnium Christianorum separamus, et a liminibus sanctae matris Ecclesiae in coelo et in terra excludimus, et excommunicatum et anathematizatum esse decernimus; et damnatum cum diabolo, et angelis ejus, et omnibus reprobis in ignem aeternum judicamus; donec a diaboli laqueis resipiscat, et ad emendationem, et poenitentiam redeat, et Ecclesiae Dei, quam laesit, satisfaciat, tradentes eum satanae in interitum carnis, ut spiritus ejus salvus fiat in die judicii.
 
niceatheist said:
I think Rome pretty much backed away from using excommunication as a general policy.
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People are still excommunicated on a fairly regular basis. Usually it’s the local bishop doing it, not Rome, so people outside the diocese don’t hear about it, but people in the diocese usually do hear about it. The persons being excommunicated are usually disobedient clergy, but in some cases they’ve excommunicated whole groups or parishes of people.

It’s also nothing new for priests in Italy to refuse Catholic funerals to mafia members. One presumes these folks weren’t exactly coming to confession weekly and that probably everybody in town knew what they were engaged in. I think the Pope in saying what he did is just backing up what the clergy have already been doing.
 
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