Can You Excommunicate Yourself?

My first instinct to answer this question was: No. Excommunication, to me, seemed to be a power trip by a Pope or other Church authority figure. In fact, in the 16th century, so many people were excommunicated that there had to be new rules.

While seemingly commonsensical, they were apparently not, and as stated in the Council of Trent (15435-63) the rules are as follows*:

• [excommunication] is to be used with sobriety and great circumspection (seeing that experience teaches that if it be wielded rashly or for slight causes, it is more despised than feared, and works more evil than good)
  
• it is to be used for the purpose of provoking a revelation on account of things lost or stolen
• it shall be issued by no one whomsoever but the bishop
• not then, on account of some uncommon circumstance which moves the bishop thereunto
• and after the matter has been diligently and very maturely weighed

Good to know bishops shouldn't just go around excommunicating people for the hell of it. The few excommunications there are now are for public figures, usually who oppose papal teaching or Council decisions. (Though I am thinking of the nun in Phoenix who approved an abortion at a Catholic hospital to save the mother of the child. If you don't know the story, you can read an article here: http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=126985072 . A famous female theologian from BC is quoted, and although I look up to her, she unfortunately once told me she didn't think I could handle her class; le sigh). The point of excommunication, or "exclusion from communion" is to forbid someone who has done something grievous to partake in Catholics' highest sacrament. The action is meant to make people repent, and since baptism cannot be undone, no one can be excommunicated forever and can be welcomed back.

While bishops, popes, and cardinals have the power to excommunicate, they are not the only ones. My initial answer to this question was wrong: the Code of Cannon Law** allows for latae sententiae, or automatic excommunication. A person can excommunicate herself when engaging in the following:

• apostasy (formally renouncing your religion)
  
• heresy (rejecting religious beliefs or dogma) [Or in Medieval Times, being confused, illiterate, and unable to distinguish your Catholic from your traditional pagan beliefs... if this was your case, you would probably be burned thanks to the Inquisition]
  
• schism (separation from the Church body) [though if you're schisming, I doubt excommunication would matter. With the Avignon popes, which I will get to at a later date, I wonder if they all excommunicated each other?]
  
• desecration of the Eucharist [how often did this happen?]
  
• physical violence against the Pope [why only against him?]
• ordination of the bishop without papal approval [this is more for when monarchs and not the pope named bishops, but if I were to be excommunicated for anything, I would want it to be for this]
• procurement of a completed abortion [what's an incomplete abortion? If you try and fail, does it still count?]

But don't worry, there's good news: an individual who excommunicates himself can seek repentance and rejoin the Church.

The last instance of automatic excommunication is interesting: can a man procure a complete abortion? In the case from Phoenix stated above, if the mother is Catholic, is she too excommunicated? And why out of all things, is procuring an abortion excommunication-worthy? Why not completely killing anyone? Or sexually abusing someone? Or physical violence against a regular priest, not just the Pope? Or physical violence against women? Etc. Etc. Do I agree that killing an innocent life is bad? Of course. From the Catholic perspective, however, everyone is born with Original Sin (hence, baptism). So why is killing someone with that Sin worse than killing one who's been baptized without it? Or does a person have to be born in order to have the stain of Sin, but in the womb is without and completely innocent?

I just... don't get it.There seems to be something missing, like logic, or, perhaps, the voice of women in the Church Hierarchy.

~

*Stanford, Peter. "Teach Yourself Catholicism." U.S.: The McGraw Hill Companies, Inc., 2008.

** http://www.intratext.com/IXT/ENG0017/_P50.HTM ; http://www.vatican.va/archive/ENG1104/_INDEX.HTM

Holy Anorexia

Tomorrow is Good Friday, which for Catholics has traditionally meant fasting. Although previously Catholics were encouraged to abstain from meat on all Fridays (a sacrifice of their own to remember Jesus' sacrifice of himself), in the 1960s, Paul VI suggested alternatives: those who were between the ages of 18-60 should fast (eat one meal a day) on Good Friday OR find some other sacrifice as befitting their consciences . In some places, this sacrifice could be refraining from an activity and giving that money to the poor, or spending a part of that day doing community service.

For some people, especially girls in high school, Lent and the fasting days are an excuse to diet - give up something fatty, or don't eat as much with the excuse of religion. Women and the connection to food and religion goes back a long time. Eve eats fruit and gets expelled from Paradise (but don't get me started on what Catholic tradition has done to that story), and some pretty famous women saints have fasted themselves to death.

In "Teach Yourself Catholicism" Peter Stanford discusses a few instances where, what he calls "the link between women's sinfulness and food" has led to disastrous consequences (127). Apparently religious starvation reached its peak in medieval times (but really, are we surprised by that?) when religious women refused food except at the Eucharist. Here are a few examples of the extremes:

• Saint Margaret of Cortona (1247-97) wanted to "die of starvation to satiate the poor" while she worked with the destitute of Cortona, Italy
  
• Saint Catherine of Siena (1347-80) would only drink water and eat bread and raw herbs, which led to her untimely demise (or perhaps she did it on purpose? She died at age 33, the same age Jesus supposedly died)
• Saint Veronica Giuliani (1660-1727) reportedly acquired marks like a crown of thorns on her head (in Catholic terms, stigmata) while she refused to eat
• Mary Magdalen de'Pazzi (1566-1607) denied herself food to be one with the poor.

So the reasons for fasting seem mixed: either as a penance (i.e. Catherine) or to be in solidarity with the poor (Margaret and Mary). I wonder among Catholic lay people if fasting is still prevalent today? In the U.S. you don't hear about a lot of people suddenly flocking to homeless shelters on Good Friday to do service, so do you think people are giving up food or doing something else? Or perhaps "the day my God died" (for dramatic effect) isn't as important as it used to be.

Do you ever fast? If so, what are your reasons?

Until next time,
The Unfasting Theologian (when medicine says take 4 times a day before meals, I'm not going to mess with it)

~

Work Cited:
Stanford, Peter. "Teach Yourself Catholicism." U.S.: The McGraw Hill Companies, Inc., 2008.

Have any popes ever been assassinated?

The answer is: Yes.

Several for sure, many more died under shady conditions.

I suspect there are some juicy stories out there, but for now I will leave you with this:

In her book, Saints and Sinners, Eamon Duffy says, "A THIRD* of the popes elected between 872 and 1012 died in suspicious circumstances...

• John VIII (872-82) - bludgeoned to death by his own entourage
  
• Stephen VI (896-7) - strangled
• Leo V (903) - murdered by his successor, Sergius III (904-11)
• John X (914-28) - suffocated
• Stephen VII (939-42) horribly mutilated, a fate shared by the Greek antipope John XVI (997-8), who, unfortunately for him, did not die from the removal of his eyes, nose, lips, tongue, and hands

"Most of these men were maneuvered into power by a succession of powerful families... John X, one of the few popes of this period to make a stand against aristocratic domination, was deposed and then murdered by [those] who had appointed him in the first place" (104).

If I find out any more bloody details, I will be sure to share them.

Until the next question arises,
Your Unemployed Theologian with way too many books

~

Duffy, Eamon. Saints and Sinners: A History of the Popes. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2006.

*formatting added for emphasis