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She's said in the past she has no fear of being excommunicated. Really, tho', she should be very publicly excommunicated; big press conference and all, for apostasy and teaching heresy as a public figure. Which, in essence, is what she has taken to doing. Perhaps she'll then go to one of the schismatic groups that accepts wymynpriests and abortifacients and abortions... things that I'm certain Madame Speaker Pelosi would approve of. (Because she's spoken positively of them in the past.)

The church needs to protect itself from the heterodox like Madame Speaker. The tools of so doing are public recognition of her excommunication, and an equally public reservation of the lifting of it to either the episcopal conference or the Apostolic See.

Punishment is not the effect of excommunication; protecting the church by marking those who are clearly not to be listened to is. The punishment for the laetae sentence excommunication is that it's a mortal sin that causes same... and until that sin is forgiven, no other sins may be either... and the poor soul is bound to hell, for the power to hold and loose is the power of the Church and of Peter, and by subsidiarity, the bishops.

Once recognized by the church, formal excommunication is the tool to protect the innocent of the faith from the devil's accomplices (witting or unwitting) who spread heterodoxis and heteropraxis. It's also the binding of an individual to be barred from confession until they admit the error of that sin. Only a perfect act of contrition (which, by definition MUST include that sin for which they were excommunicated) provides any hope for salvation.

By reconciliation with the church, the easier and better method, confession and absolution, is once again available; the lifting of the public excommunication is the first step in that road to healing the damage of heteropraxis &/or heterodoxis.

The Talmud is a little more severe: those guilty of "leading the people astray" are to be put to death. The Palestinian Talmud gives this as the reason Jesus was killed.

When did the last public excommunication of a public official occur elsewhere?

When his bishop told Patrick Kennedy not to present himself for communion, that was, by definition, an excommunication. What, exactly, does everybody think excommunication means?

I was referring to a public solemnly promulgated anathema.

[quote=StuartK]When his bishop told Patrick Kennedy not to present himself for communion, that was, by definition, an excommunication. What, exactly, does everybody think excommunication means?[/quote]


Unfortunately one of the problems with our media saturated society is the fact that a high profile person will be told this yet they still have the ability to flaunt their position in the public eye and to use that media to their own ends to make it seem that they are in the right. And another unfortunate thing is that it seems that the media delights in ridiculing the church in any way that it can and unfortunately many people can be easily swayed into going contrary to what the church teaches. I remember in Pittsburgh when Kerry was running for president there was a big deal made of the fact that because of his views he was not to receive communion yet when he was in Pittsburgh he attended mass and had no problem going to communion and the priest had no problem giving him communion. And the media took great delight in the fact that he attended mass while in Pittsburgh and received communion.

That would be cool, with bell, book and candle, too. But only if it was televised nationally in prime time.

Maybe the Latin Church needs something like the reading of the Synodikon on the Sunday of Orthodoxy, to remind itself of what it believes and what it condemns.

That's a very good idea.

aramis:

Christ is Born!! Glorify Him!!

The only problem I can see is some attorney taking a case like this on a contingency basis and successfully suing in court for libel. Unfortunately, you can't label someone in public in the secular arena without paying a secular price. And we call know how much secular price the Catholic Church has paid in the past decade. I think the only thing that's left is for the Judgment Seat from which there is no appeal, though it leaves the average person thinking there is no penalty for defying the Church's teaching.

BOB

Last public excommunication I recall was Theresa Obermeyer, PhD, in the Archdiocese of Anchorage. I don't recall why.

I do know she has been refused communion; I have, in the past, been instructed by the pastor of the Roman parish I was then a member of, case by case, to refuse her communion; he immediately pulled her aside before it became needful to do so.

This alone exemplifies why the Roman church needs more deacons and priests, and fewer lay ministers; by canon law, lay EMHC's may not refuse persons admission to communion; priests and deacons can, may, and if someone is known to be under excommunication, must.

Bob: then let it be done by the Comittee for the Defense of the Faith. That is the CDF's job, really. It also places the acting agent outside the bounds of US law. (It also then forces her to deal with the apostolic see for lifting of it.)

aramis:

Christ is Born!! Glorify Him!!

A good point. I was just hinking out loud since there is an attorney in my area who delights in suing the Church. He's not Catholic and just loves to take the Church down whenever he can and for whatever reason he can.

BOB

It would appear to me the the hands of the Church are tied.
Frau Reichsleiter Pelosi seems, by any reasonable standard to be in direct conflict with the teachings of the Church. To NOT excommunicate her is offensive to those who remain faithful to the teachings.

Alexandr

Sounds like the bishop should find another shark to sue him for harassment...

I have to agree wholeheartedly. But it seems as if the bakcbone to do what one is called to do by ordination is in short supply. There are those who think that this is "heavy handed" and that the "spirit of Vatican II" (a much overworked phrase) demands that we not do such an "outdated thing."

BOB