Editing Excommunication (section)

{{short description|Censure used to deprive, suspend, or limit membership in a religious community}}
{{for-multi|non-religious equivalents|Expulsion (disambiguation)|the 2016 album|Excommunication (album)}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=October 2020}}
[[File:Giorgio Vasari, Scomunica di Federico II da parte di Gregorio IX, 1572-73, 03 (cropped).jpg|thumb|Fanciful 16th-century fresco in the [[Sala Regia (Vatican)|Sala Regia]], by [[Giorgio Vasari]], depicting [[Pope Gregory IX]] excommunicating [[Frederick II, Holy Roman Emperor|Frederick II]]. Since few details were provided to the artist, Vasari chose to paint an excommunication scene generically. In the traditional excommunication procedure, the pope and his priests would hurl burning candles on the ground and stamp them out. The painter however here chose to show the pope personally stepping on the emperor.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Jong |first1=Jan L. de |title=The power and the glorification : papal pretensions and the art of propaganda in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries |date=2012 |publisher=Pennsylvania State University Press |location=University Park |isbn=978-0271062372 |pages=140−141}}</ref>]]
'''Excommunication''' is an institutional act of religious [[censure]] used to deprive, suspend, or limit membership in a religious community or to restrict certain rights within it, in particular those of being in [[Koinonia|communion]] with other members of the congregation, and of receiving the [[sacrament]]s.

It is practiced by all of the ancient churches (such as the [[Catholic Church]], [[Oriental Orthodoxy|Oriental Orthodox churches]] and the [[Eastern Orthodoxy|Eastern Orthodox churches]]) as well as by other [[Christian denominations]]; however, it is also used more generally to refer to similar types of institutional religious exclusionary practices and [[shunning]] among other religious groups. The [[Amish]] have also been known to excommunicate members that were either seen or known for breaking rules, or questioning the church, a practice known as shunning. [[Jehovah's Witnesses]] use the term '''disfellowship''' to refer to their form of excommunication.

The word ''excommunication'' means putting a specific individual or group out of communion. In some denominations, excommunication includes spiritual [[Damnation|condemnation]] of the member or group. Excommunication may involve [[Exile|banishment]], shunning, and [[shaming]], depending on the group, the offense that caused excommunication, or the rules or norms of the religious community. The grave act is often revoked in response to manifest [[penance|repentance]].