Article One. On Excommunication in General.

33. Notion. Excommunication is a censure by which a Christian man is deprived of communion with the faithful.

a. There is a threefold communication of the faithful: a. merely internal, consisting in faith and charity, by which the faithful are mystically united among themselves and with Christ; b. merely external (in civil matters), which consists in external profane actions, namely in the common life, conversation, commerce, etc., of the faithful; c. mixed (in divine matters), consisting in external religious actions which by their institution produce internal spiritual fruit, such as the administration and reception of the sacraments, the suffrages of the Church, which in the sacrifice of the Mass and in other public offices are founded for all the faithful, indulgences. Now the Church deprives no one of the communion of merely internal goods, nor can she deprive anyone of it; but she can deprive a disobedient and contumacious man of external and mixed communion, and in fact deprives him of it through excommunication.

b. Excommunication is the gravest of all ecclesiastical penalties, than which there is none greater in the Church: for since it deprives one of all the goods of the Church, it virtually contains in itself the other censures, which deprive one of the same goods only partially. Therefore the Council of Trent admonishes ecclesiastical judges not to use this penalty unless when no other remedy remains.¹

c. By the name anathema there is designated either excommunication itself, or excommunication inflicted because of heresy or suspicion of it, or excommunication which is denounced against the excommunicated person with a certain extraordinary solemnity.²

¹ Sess. 25, c. 3, De reform.

² Cf. C. Debent 106, c. 11, q. 3, where the mode and form of solemn excommunication is described.

34. Division of excommunication. Excommunication was previously divided, from its effect, into greater and lesser; the former deprived one of all common goods, the latter only of part, namely reception of the sacraments and passive election to dignities and benefices. But now, lesser excommunication having been removed by the constitution Apostolicae sedis, only greater excommunication is in force.¹

Lesser excommunication was formerly incurred by those who, against the prohibition of the Church, communicated with an excommunicated person to be avoided. Those communicating with an excommunicated person to be avoided today fall into greater excommunication, but only in those cases which are expressly indicated in the constitution Apostolicae sedis.

¹ Holy Office, December 5, 1883. Cf. Acta sanctae sedis XVII, p. 555.

35. Distinction among excommunicated persons. Some excommunicated persons are to be avoided, whom the faithful are bound to avoid; others are tolerated, whom the faithful are not bound to avoid. This distinction, taken from the chief effect of greater excommunication, must still be attended to today.

a. In antiquity all persons excommunicated by greater excommunication were to be avoided. In the Council of Constance the constitution Ad evitanda was issued, confirmed by Martin V and afterward by Leo X, which a. removes the prohibition of communicating with excommunicated persons, with three cases excepted, yet b. does not intend to relieve the excommunicated persons themselves in anything or in any way to favor them, but to avoid scandals and many dangers and to aid the consciences of the faithful.

b. Therefore not only is it prohibited to excommunicated persons to be avoided to communicate with the rest of the faithful, but there also lies upon the faithful an obligation in conscience of omitting commerce with excommunicated persons to be avoided. But with respect to tolerated persons, they indeed are bound to abstain from commerce with the rest of the faithful in divine matters; however, the faithful can licitly communicate with them both in divine and in human matters. But if the excommunicated persons have been anticipated by the faithful, they too can licitly communicate even in divine matters.

c. Therefore by reason of excommunication, sacraments can licitly be asked from an excommunicated person (tolerated) even without necessity; but from another reason it can happen that sacraments cannot be asked from him without necessity, namely if he is in sin.

36. Who are to be avoided. Therefore, from the new law introduced through the Council of Constance, excommunicated persons to be avoided are:

1. Those excommunicated by name and publicly, whether by the Roman pontiff or by a bishop.

2. Those who by name and publicly have been denounced as excommunicated by the pope or by a bishop, namely where it concerns a censure of a sentence already passed.

a. By name, i.e. by an expressed name or by another title which certainly designates the person and therefore is equivalent to a name, e.g. we excommunicate the dean of this place.

b. Publicly, i.e. in the mode by which promulgation of law is made, either by affixing the name in a public place or by reading it in church at the time of Mass or sermon, etc.

c. Therefore we licitly communicate with heretics and schismatics who, because of their heresy, have been excommunicated and denounced publicly as such, because they have not been excommunicated and denounced by name.

3. Notorious strikers of clerics, even if they have not been denounced as excommunicated.

But in order that a striking inducing censure be notorious, notoriety of fact does not suffice; rather, notoriety of law is also required, i.e. that the crime be known by sentence of a judge or by confession of the guilty person in judgment (n. 10).¹

¹ Holy Office, January 9, 1884. Cf. St. Alphonsus n. 144.