The Latest Craze: Getting Excommunicated!
29 September 2006 by Eve
Are you an agnostic/atheist who was baptized Catholic? Did the Roman Catholic Church (RCC) ever officially excommunicate you? No?
Then according to the RCC, you are still considered Catholic, and they may include you in their reckoning of their numbers worldwide.
At least, that’s what the Atheist Foundation of Australia, Inc. says, but take heart: there’s an easy way out! The AFoAI has laid out the steps you can take to get yourself excommunicated, just like Archbishop Milingo.
But be prepared for a struggle, for the RCC “apparently does not excommunicate its members easily.”
snippet: They say that the reason for this is to leave the way open for reconciliation. However, their thinking is based on irrational belief and is motivated by fear, and they assume that you are the same. They believe that you will react as they do to the fear of death, and wish to deny reality and embrace an illusion. Even more importantly, by never giving up a member, the church is able to claim millions as members, who do not accept its doctrines, who never attend, who never contribute money or time and who are, in fact, opposed to what it stands for. This greatly enhances its power. If you were ever baptised a Roman Catholic, and have not been excommunicated, you are still being counted.
snippet: As of 1983 there are nine canons under which excommunication can take place. Five of them only apply to priests or bishops. One of the others is physically attacking the pope, and criminal acts can hardly be recommended. Another is ‘violation of sacred species’, normally called desecrating a consecrated host….Next to last is ‘procuring of abortion’. Excommunication for this is supposed to be automatic, but it only applies to the doctor and the woman involved. I am told the church does not seek out such cases. [snip]
Otherwise, there is canon 1364, ©1 Apostasy, heresy, or schism. This involves automatic excommunication, if you can convince the church that it applies to you. The most common usage of this canon is when a former Catholic embraces another religion….It is your task to convince the church that you, as an atheistic secular humanist, (or whatever) are in the same ‘non-Catholic’ category as a Muslim or Buddhist….You will need to write a letter to your current parish. It should include the necessary information to meet all of the criteria for deserving to be excommunicated.
snippet: The church is patronizing to atheists. They can easily recognize another superstition, but, being unfamiliar with rationality, they have difficulty accepting the decision to renounce all mumbo jumbo. They have, however, officially established these criteria for judging all cases of excommunication: You must ACT….You must be PERSISTENT….If at first you don’t succeed…Cite long commitment, and keep trying and keep writing. You must be CONTUMACIOUS….You must be AWARE that this involves excommunication. [snip]
You have to BE A ROMAN CATHOLIC. Obviously. In your letter, make them aware of this by telling them the parish where you were baptised and the date. Many people, hoping for some kind of heresy cachet, have inquired about getting excommunciated, even though they are not currently memebers[sic] of a church. No, you can’t.
THEY HAVE A DUTY to other Roman Catholics….In terms of marriage, communion, death and so on, you should be treated as a non-Catholic. If they fail to do this, they are not dealing fairly with the Catholics in their charge.
The piece concludes with a handy form you can print, fill out, and send to your local priest if you need additional ammunition to get the ball rolling; it includes unambiguous statements like “as a principled and rational person, it pains me that someone, somewhere may be counting me as an adherent of an irrational superstition which has done and is doing irreparable harm to humanity and with which I profoundly disagree.” Some helpful suggestions for getting in the mood to initiate your bid vary from “foster reason, critical thinking and self-esteem in children” to “promote human rights for all.”
As for ideas for celebration once your excommunication is officially complete - come on, you’re a freethinker; I’m sure you can come up with something that’ll kick some major butt! Maybe choosing “I’ve been excommunicated!” as the theme for your 2006 Halloween party? And don’t forget to frame that letter of excommunication!
29 September 2006, on 9:31 pm
This I’ve gotta try.
29 September 2006, on 9:40 pm
Oh great, now I have to be excommunicated? I never even thought about that. Thank goodness I never had any of my kids baptized! Thanks for pointing this out for us (this pains me to say!)catholics. I shouldnt have any problems finding out where I was baptized, so is that where I send my letter asking to be excommunicated? I’m telling them I’ve converted to satanism. Haaaail Satan!
29 September 2006, on 9:53 pm
Considering the walking womb-ed the Cat-hole-licks makes of women, one would think that they could do without padding their stats. Though being excommunicated sounds exciting, I’m still holding out for being condemned as a heretic- or, judging by today’s news, being labeled an “enemy combatant”. If no one hears from me for a couple weeks, would someone send the ACLU- and a carton of Marlboros- to Camp X-Ray?
29 September 2006, on 10:05 pm
Holy hell, I’m catholic!
29 September 2006, on 10:30 pm
Say No To Christ, I’d say cover all your bases and send letters to both your birth and current parishes! And don’t forget: Be Contumacious!
I stumbled across this while researching the RCC’s favorite excuse for not publicly excommunicating Hitler: ipso facto (or automatic by act/deed alone) excommunication. So far, ipso facto just seems like a good excuse for the RCC to explain why they don’t bother issuing public, official bulls of excommunication for lapsed, non-practicing catholics or those who convert to other denominations/religions.
It gives them an automatic out to either claim “he’s No True Catholic (TM)” (like Hitler) or “no matter what religion he said he was, he was still a True Catholic (TM) because he was baptized as such and never excommunicated” (any ordinary joe who happens to die without leaving funeral instructions). As the Church Lady would say, “Well, how conveeeenient.”
30 September 2006, on 12:12 am
I wasn’t ever baptised Roman Catholic, but I WAS baptised Mormon–and I’m considering getting myself excommunicated. I’ve already asked to be removed from the membership lists, but that was immediately after a heated argument with my bishop, and I don’t think he took me seriously. Could be kind of fun getting myself excommunicated, though…
30 September 2006, on 12:18 am
Thanks Eve
I dont have a parish, I haven’t been to a church in over 10 years. Does the closest one to my home count?
30 September 2006, on 12:25 am
‘Maybe choosing “I’ve been excommunicated!” as the theme for your 2006 Halloween party?’
Yes! An ex-communication party! That’s brilliant! Maybe I can get a bunch of my atheist/agnostic friends to do it too, and it’ll be like some “godless graduation” ceremony. What a great idea!
30 September 2006, on 12:28 am
Oh, and I can be very contumacious when it comes to religion. I have a long list of complaints and sins the church would definitely want to excommunicate me for. Haaail Satan! My kids and I love saying that we crack up everytime. Haaaail Satan!.heehee
30 September 2006, on 3:30 am
Wow. I’m still a cathoholic? That’s news to me. Does making sacrifices to Satan (yeah, my weird high school days….and my own blood, no worries), commiting every deadly sin, and blaspheming where ever I go count?? It sure as hell better. And when I get that letter, I’m framing it. And sending out announcements (like birth announcements)!
30 September 2006, on 7:06 am
For the non-Catholics or protestants amongst you, you may wish to consider the certificate of Debaptism and Renunciation of Religion from the National Secular Society in Britain. Not as dramatic perhaps, but at least there is space for a signature from the vicar of the church that baptised you.
30 September 2006, on 8:58 am
Do you really get an excommunication certificate, letter or something? That’s awesome! I was baptised a Baptist. SOUTHERN BAPTIST, no less. It never occurred to me to get excommunicated. I’ll investigate the process for Baptists, unless someone wants to clue me in?
30 September 2006, on 9:43 am
It doesn’t appear that Methodists are into the whole excommunication thing. Oh well.
30 September 2006, on 10:34 am
This is one of the most entertaining serious articles we’ve had yet! Thanks, Eve!
30 September 2006, on 11:07 am
You folks are really obsessed, aren’t you? Perhaps a counselor could help you work through the issues you still carry with you. This kind of hatred just can’t be healthy….
30 September 2006, on 11:24 am
Jeff, what hatred, friend? What obsession? This site is where we come to share our frustration at living in this, mostly, godbothering world. It’s called God Is For Suckers and, surprise, surprise, that’s what it contains. It isn’t, nor does it claim to be, representative of our whole lives. Your comment is akin to someone wandering into Wal-mart and declaring “you all are sure obsessed with low prices”.
30 September 2006, on 11:38 am
Makes me wish I were catholic. I would get to go to mass (hysteria) and “violate a sacred species”, “desecrate a consecrated host”. I could take the little wafer and hurl it across the heads of the congregation or drop it and grind it into dust, from which it came.
I suppose I’d have to plan a quick escape route lest I suffer the rath from the minons in the name of the Prince of Peace.
30 September 2006, on 11:45 am
My dh wants to know if barfing up the wafer all over the priest’s robes counts as having “desecrated the host?” ‘Cause then he’s got his out for sure — he did that more than once.
30 September 2006, on 12:04 pm
I always like the host. It was a tasty mid-morning snack. But the WINE. Ew. What is that stuff, battery acid?? I was an alter server. I spilled the host on the alter before as I was giving it to Father So-and-So. I doubt that counts, though.
30 September 2006, on 12:41 pm
Taylor
Two of my friends quit the Mormon church. One quit by telephone and they told him he couldn’t do it by phone, that he’d need to come to the temple to pray over the quitting part. He said no he didn’t accept praying as a viable response to anythig and that he quit and didn’t want to hear from them again. Apparently that worked. My other friend did the praying part but he is still a believer. He says they make a person pray prostrate on the temple grounds and at the temple asking god for guidance etc. etc. He still quit and they accepted it. He hasn’t heard from them again either.
Jeff
Talk about obsession? Read the above.
We’re just here in our own little corner of the great big universe having fun. It isn’t hate. Maybe that is why you religionists have so much love that looks like hate. Because you got the two confused. Like so much else in your religious belief system. We aren’t advocating the loss of rights for anyone. We aren’t advocating stoning anyone. We aren’t saying anyone is due eternal punishment. No we aren’t doing any of those things. That attitude is reserved for the lying sacks of shit called BELIEVERS. Also please read our rules. You will be asshatted.
30 September 2006, on 2:47 pm
HEy all I am going to the San Fransico atheist meeting tonight and plan to let them know that some of us are still being counted as catholics(cringe). Maybe I will see some of you there? Thanks a lot Eve for letting us unfortunate catholics(cringe)know. Maybe we can come up with a huge excommunication party for of us (cringe again) catholics.
30 September 2006, on 4:59 pm
Jeff and other xian lurkers are obsessed with atheists. Their “persecution complex” kicks in and it’s almost like they WANT people to hate them. It’s from all that brainwashing about atheists being “evil gawd haters.”
Jeff, we don’t hate you…we are just annoyed with you when you religious folks try to shove your beliefs on us and into our government. You came here, we didn’t seek you out. If you don’t like what you see, why do you keep coming back? Could it be because you are curious and trying to sort out this gawd delusion for yourself?
30 September 2006, on 5:23 pm
I had been thinking for some time about contacting the Diocese of Rockville Center on Long Island about getting excommunicated just to see what their reaction would be.
30 September 2006, on 6:15 pm
Wait. My tubes are tied. Is that enough?
1 October 2006, on 1:49 pm
I was baptised in the Anglican Church and I excommunicated my self last year July 9th to be exact. This was after I had in-depth ‘conversations’ with some trees and Ravens. They told me there was no God and in fact, he wanted a piece of my ass. So I said bollox to that!
1 October 2006, on 3:24 pm
It’s easy to get excommunicated from the Lutheran Church Missouri Synod if you are a pastor. Just have an affair. When our kids were small they went to a Lutheran school. The pastor was fooling around with the second grade teacher. (The second grade teacher’s husband was the 5th grade teacher and the pastor’s wife was the kindergarten teacher)…well, when people found out what was going on, the church congregation fired him and the second grade teacher, and the Synod excommunicated them both. Strangely, adulterers who are just regular church members are not excommunicated for their “crimes”.
1 October 2006, on 3:44 pm
I was baptised Presbyterian but never officially “left the club”; I still sometimes write in “Presbyterian” on offical forms that ask for “religion”, just to avoid people giving me shit. Cowardly? Perhaps. CYA? You bet. American Presbyterianism is so theologically lightweight and uncontroversial, it’s like only 1 step removed from Unitarian Universalism.
To family and friends, I’m up front and unabashed about my atheism. To co-workers, I’m more circumspect. To census takers and other state authorities, let them go on believing I’m still Presbyterian, what the hell do I care to correct them. I remember when I was arrested once for DWI one of the forms demanded to know “religious affiliation”–I thought about putting “none” or “atheist”, but chickened out and put “Presbyterian”. Mainly to avoid being potentially fucked with by some god-botherer with a badge and a gun. Call me paranoid, I just call it being careful.
I’m definitely longing for a more secular country to live in where religion isn’t taken so seriously…
–JJR
1 October 2006, on 8:48 pm
Just because you were baptised Catholic doesn’t mean you remain on the Church’s role. The “your still counted on their roles” argument was invented by the athiest foundation in an effort to flood the Catholic Church with letters. The Church’s roles are based on active membership. Yes, while there is a record somewhere of you being baptised, there is no master list, in fact, there is no list just some records. You could be dead, you could be practicing another religion or, in your case, a non-believer. So feel free to write your letters and blast away at the Church it is your right in a free society. It does remind me a little bit though of the grade school class clown writing a letter and putting it in another child’s locker with references to picking your nose or wiping your butt or whatever.
2 October 2006, on 1:13 pm
I went through with this recently, writing a letter to the last parish I attended. It took a few weeks as they passed my letter to the parish that keeps the records for the area where I live, but it went through. It was incredibly satisfying to get that letter in the mail stating that my name had been removed from the roster of the Catholic church. It is not just a way of thumbing your nose at religion (which is always fun), but also a way of feeling a bit sronger and more comfortable as an atheist. I would have framed the letter, but I think my Mom would destroy it if she saw it, and I definitely want to hang on to it!
I’m still trying to convince my fiance (also an atheist) to do this also, but he doesn’t want to bother with it.
2 October 2006, on 3:47 pm
Elaphe_Mo: [Seeking excommunication] is not just a way of thumbing your nose at religion (which is always fun), but also a way of feeling a bit sronger and more comfortable as an atheist.
Elaphe, I’m pretty sure that was the main point of the Atheist Foundation of America, Inc.’s piece, to empower people as openly identified freethinkers; I had some doubts myself about whether or not the RCC really does keep a “master roster” of all catholics everywhere. They most likely only care when and if you’re a public personality of some kind, or if you die with no or few funeral instructions; as long as you still show up as having been baptized catholic, and no other religion/denomination pops up to “claim” you, they can still say you died catholic.
Say No To Christ: Does the closest [parish] to my home count?
I don’t see why not; seems as good a place to start as any!
Marcus, you’re welcome!
Jeff, what you’re doing is a common defense mechanism psychologists call projection, but cheer up! Keep going to therapy, and soon you’ll be able to catch yourself at it, and substitute healthier attitudes and behaviors.
3 October 2006, on 1:15 am
Eve:
Why would The Catholic Church care if you died Catholic? Are you expecting them to use it in a new advertisement campaign? “More Catholics die everyday than any other religion.” That is more illogical the the “master roster” theory.
elaphe_mo: Sending a letter made you feel a bit stronger and more comfortable as an atheist? You don’t believe in God; now what? you really really don’t believe in God. Are there degrees to this? merit badges maybe?
Going through the trouble of getting excomunicated when you do not believe in that Church, its rules or its God seems rather childish.
As a child, when you quit the game, took your ball and went home because you didn’t like the rules, did you write a letter to your (former) friends confirming that you quit?
3 October 2006, on 12:57 pm
Imagine, Jay, that you took your ball and went home because the team was full of people you didn’t care for and the rules of the game didn’t make any sense. Then they still called you and asked you to play, or asked for money for the team uniforms. You might want to remind them that you quit and why. I’m sick of letters from nuns asking for money. I also feel that it is important for me to do my part to reduce the influence of the Catholic Church, even if it is something minor like reducing their membership by one. Taking my name off that roster doesn’t make me more of an atheist, but it makes me feel like less of a hypocrite.
3 October 2006, on 2:28 pm
Wow, Jay; as usual, you theists brilliantly display your supreme lack of a sense of humor.
If we’re as “childish” as you claim we are (and sometimes we are, just for the fun of it; besides, doesn’t religion value childlike behavior?), then what in the name of the Great Goddess Isis’ left breast are you doing here on our site?
Could it be - oh, I don’t know - maybe - that even though you theists constitute the vast majority of the population in this country and continue to try to force us to live according to your rules even though we may disagree with them, you can’t stand the idea of a place for agnostic/atheists to come and blow off steam at your antics?
3 October 2006, on 3:21 pm
If we’re as “childish” as you claim we are (and sometimes we are, just for the fun of it; besides, doesn’t religion value childlike behavior?), then what in the name of the Great Goddess Isis’ left breast are you doing here on our site?
Eve, It’s because Jay would really like to be part of OUR group but is afraid to let go of the gawd beliefs because he has been brainwashed into believing that someone will hurt him if he doubts or gives up the sky daddy beliefs. Losing something is hard and scary…even if what one loses is a belief created in the imaginations of men.
Could it be - oh, I don’t know - maybe - that even though you theists constitute the vast majority of the population in this country and continue to try to force us to live according to your rules even though we may disagree with them
The more believers can keep in the “borg system” the more they can justify their beliefs. Their faulty logic is that the more people who believe, the more “true” it must be. We are a threat because they have that little speck of doubt that could mushroom into full disbelief if they just let go of the lies.
3 October 2006, on 4:04 pm
Ramen, Star!
This thinking can be so scary; it reminds me that I’ve got a post on the Inquisition due. Or do you think the Great European Witch Hunts are more “Halloweeny?” Or both?
3 October 2006, on 4:10 pm
This thinking can be so scary; it reminds me that I’ve got a post on the Inquisition due. Or do you think the Great European Witch Hunts are more “Halloweeny?” Or both?
Eve, Both would make it doubly scary! A Halloween “combo”.
6 October 2006, on 4:47 pm
Cool! I looked up the Lutheran Church, Missouri Synod before checking the replies and found the citation. https://www.lcms.org/pages/internal.asp?NavID=3441
My original church no longer exists. (Eli Lilly owned the land and eventually wanted it for a parking lot so kicked the church off the property) I wonder if I need to contact my local church? I’d love to get a letter. It would give me warm fuzzies to think of a pastor standing up in front of a tut-tutting congregation saying this awsome words.
It’s not that I so much despise my baptism, I really could care less, especially as I can’t remember it, it’s more like sending away for an autographed picture of a celebrity so you can frame it on the wall.
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