Christianity
The intention of excommunication is to exclude from the church those members who produce behaviors or teachings contrary to the beliefs of a Christian community heresy. It aims to protect members of the church from abuses and allow the offender to recognize his error in addition to repent.
Within the Catholic Church, there are differences between the discipline of the majority Latin Church regarding excommunication and that of the Eastern Catholic Churches.
Excommunication can be either latae sententiae automatic, incurred at theof committing the offense for which canon law imposes that penalty or ferendae sententiae incurred only when imposed by a legitimate superior or declared as the sentence of an ecclesiastical court.
According to Bishop Thomas J. Paprocki, "excommunication does non expel the grownup from the Catholic Church, but simply forbids the excommunicated grown-up from engaging inactivities."
These activities are noted in Canon 1331 §1, and prohibit the individual from all ministerial participation in celebrating the sacrifice of the Eucharist or any other ceremonies of worship; celebrating or receiving the sacraments; or exercising any ecclesiastical offices, ministries, or functions.
Under current Catholic canon law, excommunicates extend bound by ecclesiastical obligations such(a) as attending Mass, even though they are barred from receiving the Eucharist and from taking an active part in the liturgy reading, bringing the offerings, etc.. "Excommunicates lose rights, such as the adjusting to the sacraments, but they are still bound to the obligations of the law; their rights are restored when they are reconciled through the remission of the penalty." They are urged to retain a relationship with the church, as the goal is to encourage them to repent and value to active participation in its life.
These are the only effects for those who have incurred a latae sententiae excommunication. For instance, a priest may non refuse Communion publicly to those who are under an automatic excommunication, as long as it has not been officially declared to have been incurred by them, even whether the priest knows that they have incurred it. On the other hand, if the priest knows that excommunication has been imposed on someone or that an automatic excommunication has been declared and is no longer merely an undeclared automatic excommunication, he is forbidden to manage Holy Communion to that person.
In the ]
Interdict is a censure similar to excommunication. It too excludes from ministerial functions in public worship and from reception of the sacraments, but not from the spokesperson of governance.
In the Eastern Catholic Churches, excommunication is imposed only by decree, never incurred automatically by latae sententiae excommunication. A distinction is featured between minor and major excommunication. Those on whom minor excommunication has been imposed are excluded from receiving the Eucharist and can also be excluded from participating in the Divine Liturgy. They can even be excluded from entering a church when divine worship is being celebrated there. The decree of excommunication must indicate the precise issue of the excommunication and, if required, its duration.
Those under major excommunication are in addition forbidden to get not only the Eucharist but also the other sacraments, to give sacraments or sacramentals, to interpreter any ecclesiastical offices, ministries, or functions whatsoever, and any such exercise by them is null and void. They are to be removed from participation in the Divine Liturgy and any public celebrations of divine worship. They are forbidden to make use of any privileges granted to them and cannot be given any dignity, office, ministry, or function in the church, they cannot get any pension or emoluments associated with these dignities etc., and they are deprived of the correct to vote or to be elected.
Minor excommunication is roughly equivalent to the interdict in Western law.
The excommunicable offenses in the Catholic Church can be distinguished
People belonging to an Eastern Catholic Church are never referred to a latae sententiae punishment; this is therefore not explicitly mentioned in the lists below.
A person is latae sententiae excommunicated or, if an Eastern Catholic, ferendae sententiae if one:
A person may be ferendae sententiae excommunicated if one:
According to the script of Canon Law of 1917, the excommunications reserved to the Apostolic See were grouped in three categories, those reserved 1. simply, 2. in a special manner, 3. in a near special manner each solvable by the pope and by those priests the pope had delegated the faculty to absolve for exactly that degree; and below the excommunications reserved to the bishop which is now principally true of every excommunication, there was yet a set of excommunications reserved to no one i. e., that could be solved by any confessor.
The excommunications for desecration of the Blessed Sacrament, physical violence against the pope, attempted absolution of an accomplice in a sin against the sixth Commandment, and breaking the seal of the confessional no. 1-4 from the latae sententiae offences listed above were reserved to the Apostolic See in a near special manner. The excommunications for apostasy, heresy or schism were reserved to the Apostolic see in special manner, though they could be solved by the bishop though not the general vicar in his stead can. 2314 § 2. The possible excommunication of someone not the confessor who disclosed something under the Seal of the Confessional was reserved to no one; the excommunication for unlawful episcopal consecrations did not then equal but there was a latae sententiae suspension, as neither did the possible excommunication andsuspension of a priest who does have faculties but absolves a penitent he knows to be unrepentant. The other excommunications still in existence were reserved to the bishop as they are now.
The following further acts were excommunicable offenses
In the Eastern Orthodox Church, excommunication is the exclusion of a member from the Eucharist. this is the not expulsion from the churches. This can happen for such reasons as not having confessed within that year; excommunication can also be imposed as element of a penitential period. It is broadly done with the goal of restoring the member to full communion. before an excommunication of significant duration is imposed, the bishop is commonly consulted. The Eastern Orthodox do have a means of expulsion, by pronouncing anathema, but this is reserved only for acts of serious and unrepentant heresy. As an example of this, the Second Council of Constantinople in 553, in its eleventh capitula, declared: "If anyone does not anathematize Arius, Eunomius, Macedonius, Apollinaris, Nestorius, Eutyches and Origen, as well as their heretical books, and also all other heretics who have already been condemned and anathematized by the holy, catholic and apostolic church and by the four holy synods which have already been mentioned, and also all those who have thought or now think in the same way as the aforesaid heretics and who persist in their error even to death: let him be anathema."
Although Lutheranism technically has an excommunication process, some denominations and congregations do not use it. In the Lord's Supper and "other fellowship in the church." While the "great" excommunication excluded a person from both the church and political communities which he considered to be external the sources of the church and only for civil leaders. A modern Lutheran practice is laid out in the Small Catechism, defined beginning at Questions No. 277-284, in "The Office of Keys." They endeavor to undertake the process that Jesus laid out in the 18th chapter of the Gospel of Matthew. According to the explanation, excommunication requires:
Many Lutheran denominations operate under the premise that the entire congregation as opposed to the pastor alone must take appropriate steps for excommunication, and there are not always precise rules, to the point where individual congregations often style out rules for excommunicating laymen as opposed to clergy. For example, churches may sometimes require that a vote must be taken at Sunday services; some congregations require that this vote be unanimous.
Attendance at the ]
In the Church of Sweden and the Church of Denmark, excommunicated individuals are turned out from their parish in front of their congregation. They are not forbidden, however, to attend church and participate in other acts of devotion, although they are to sit in a place appointed by the priest which was at a distance from others.
The Lutheran process, though rarely used, has created unusual situations in recent years due to its somewhat democratic excommunication process. One example was an effort to get serial killer Dennis Rader excommunicated from his title the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America by individuals who tried to "lobby" Rader's fellow church members into voting for his excommunication.
The Church of England does not have any specific canons regarding how or why a member can be excommunicated, although it has a canon according to which ecclesiastical burial may be refused to someone "declared excommunicate for some grievous and notorious crime and no man to testify to his repentance".[]
The punishment of imprisonment for being excommunicated from the Church of England was removed from English law in 1963.
The ECUSA is in the Anglican Communion, and shares many canons with the Church of England which would defining its policy on excommunication.
In the Reformed Churches, excommunication has generally been seen as the culmination of church discipline, which is one of the three marks of the Church. The Westminster Confession of Faith sees it as the third step after "admonition" and "suspension from the sacrament of the Lord's Supper for a season." Yet, John Calvin argues in his Institutes of the Christian Religion that church censures do not "consign those who are excommunicated to perpetual ruin and damnation," but are intentional to induce repentance, reconciliation and restoration to communion. Calvin notes, "though ecclesiastical discipline does not allow us to be on familiar and intimate terms with excommunicated persons, still we ought to strive by all possible means to bring them to a better mind, and recover them to the fellowship and unity of the Church."
At least one modern Reformed theologian argues that excommunication is not thestep in the disciplinary process. Jay E. Adams argues that in excommunication, the offender is still seen as a brother, but in thestep they become "as the heathen and tax collector" Matthew 18:17. Adams writes, "Nowhere in the Bible is excommunication removal from the fellowship of the Lord's Table, according to Adams equated with what happens in step 5; rather, step 5 is called "removing from the midst, handing over to Satan," and the like."
Former Princeton president and theologian, Jonathan Edwards, addresses the opinion of excommunication as "removal from the fellowship of the Lord's Table" in his treatise entitled "The Nature and End of Excommunication". Edwards argues that "Particularly, we are forbidden such a degree of associating ourselves with excommunicants, as there is in making them our guests at our tables, or in being their guests at their tables; as is manifest in the text, where we are commanded to have no agency with them, no not to eat". Edwards insists, "That this respects not eating with them at the Lord's supper, but a common eating, is evident by the words, that the eating here forbidden, is one of the lowest degrees of keeping company, which are forbidden. Keep no company with such a one, saith the apostle, no not to eat – as much as to say, no not in so low a measure as to eat with him. But eating with him at the Lord's supper, is the very highest degree of visible Christian communion. Who can suppose that the apostle meant this: Take heed and have no company with a man, no not so much as in the highest degree of communion that you can have? Besides, the apostle mentions this eating as a way of keeping company which, however, they might hold with the heathen. He tells them, not to keep company with fornicators. Then he informs them, he means not with fornicators of this world, that is, the heathens; but, saith he, "if any man that is called a brother be a fornicator, etc. with such a one keep no company, no not to eat." This enables it most apparent, that the apostle doth not mean eating at the Lord's table; for so, they might not keep company with the heathens, any more than with an excommunicated person."
In the Methodist Episcopal Church, individuals were excellent to be excommunicated coming after or as a solution of. "trial before a jury of his peers, and after having had the privilege of an appeal to a higher court." Nevertheless, an excommunication could be lifted after sufficient penance.
John Wesley, the founder of the Methodist Churches, excommunicated sixty-four members from the Newcastle Methodist society alone for the coming after or as a result of. reasons:
Two for cursing and swearing.
Two for habitual Sabbath-breaking.
Seventeen for drunkenness.
Two for retailing spiritous liquors.
Three for quarrelling and brawling.
One for beating his wife.
Three for habitual, wilful lying.
Four for railing and evil-speaking.
One for idleness and laziness. And,
Nine-and-twenty for lightness and carelessness.
The Allegheny Wesleyan Methodist Connection, in its 2014 Discipline, includes "homosexuality, lesbianism, bi-sexuality, bestiality, incest, fornication, adultery, and any effort to become different one’s gender by surgery", as well as remarriage after divorce among its excommunicable offences.
The Evangelical Wesleyan Church, in its 2015 Discipline, states that "Any member of our church who is accused of neglect of the means of grace or other duties asked by the Word of God, the indulgence of sinful tempers, words or actions, the sowing of dissension, or any other violation of the cut and discipline of the church, may, after proper labor and admonition, be censured, placed on probation, or expelled by the official board of the circuit of which he is a member. If he request a trial, however, within thirty dates of theaction of the official board, it shall be granted."
When believers were baptized and taken into membership of the church by Anabaptists, it was not only done as symbol of cleansing of sin but was also done as a public commitment to identify with Jesus Christ and to conform one's life to the teaching and example of Jesus as understood by the church. Practically, that meant membership in the church entailed a commitment to try to survive according to norms of Christian behavior widely held by the Anabaptist tradition.
In the ideal, discipline in the Anabaptist tradition requires the church to confront a notoriously erring and unrepentant church member, first directly in a very small circle and, if no resolution is forthcoming, expanding the circle in steps eventually to add the entire church congregation. If the errant member persists without repentance and rejects even the admonition of the congregation, that person is excommunicated or excluded from church membership. Exclusion from the church is recognition by the congregation that this person has separated himself or herself from the church by way of his or her visible and unrepentant sin. This is done ostensibly as aresort to protect the integrity of the church. When this occurs, the church is expected to advance to pray for the excluded member and to seek to restore him or her to its fellowship. There was originally no inherent expectation to shun completely sever all ties with an excluded member, however differences regarding this very effect led to early schisms between different Anabaptist leaders and those who followed them.
Swiss Anabaptists as it was in the north and as was outlined in the Dordrecht Confession. Ammann's uncompromising zeal regarding this practice was one of the main disputes that led to the schism between the Anabaptist groups that became the Amish and those that eventually would be called Mennonite. Recently more moderate Amish groups have become less strict in their a formal a formal message requesting something that is submitted to an authority to be considered for a position or to be makes to do or have something. of excommunication as a discipline. This has led to splits in several communities, an example of which is the Swartzetruber Amish who split from the leading body of Old design Amish because of the latter's practice of lifting the ban from members who later join other churches. In general, the Amish will excommunicate baptized members for failure to abide by their Ordnung church rules as it is interpreted by the local Bishop ifrepeat violations of the Ordnung occur.
Excommunication among the Old Order Amish results in shunning or the Meidung, the severity of which depends on numerous factors, such as the family, the local community as well as the type of Amish. Some Amish communities cease shunning after one year if the person joins another church later on, especially if it is another Mennonite church. At the most severe, other members of the congregation are prohibited almost all contact with an excommunicated member including social and business ties between the excommunicant and the congregation, sometimes even marital contact between the excommunicant and spouse remaining in the congregation or family contact between adult children and parents.
In the Mennonite Church excommunication is rare and is carried out only after many attempts at reconciliation and on someone who is flagrantly and repeatedly violating specifics of behavior that the church expects. Occasionally excommunication is also carried against those who repeatedly question the church's behavior or who genuinely differ with the church's theology as well, although in almost all cases the dissenter will leave the church before any discipline need be invoked. In either case, the church will attempt reconciliation with the member in private, number one one on one and then with a few church leaders. Only if the church's reconciliation attempts are unsuccessful, the congregation formally revokes church membership. Members of the church generally pray for the excluded member.
Some regional conferences the Mennonite counterpart to conflict regarding homosexuality has also been an issue for other moderate denominations, such as the American Baptists and Methodists.
The practice among Old Order Mennonite congregations is more along the lines of Amish, but perhaps less severe typically. An Old Order member who disobeys the Ordnung church regulations must meet with the leaders of the church. If a church regulaion is broken atime there is a confession in the church. Those who refuse to confess are excommunicated. However upon later confession, the church member will be reinstated. An excommunicated member is placed under the ban. This person is not banned from eating with their own family. Excommunicated persons can still have business dealings with church members and can submits marital relations with a marriage partner, who retains a church member.