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The Vatican has defrocked a US-based priest for "blasphemous" social media posts and activism in support of former President Donald Trump. A letter to US bishops from the Vatican's US ambassador accused the priest, Frank Pavone, of "persistent disobedience". In 2016, Mr Pavone, who heads the anti-abortion group Priests for Life, put an aborted foetus on an altar and broadcast it online. His defrocking cannot be appealed. Defrocking - the process of being reduced to a 'lay state' in which clerical status is taken away from a priest - is among the harshest sanctions available in the Catholic church's canon...

I would like to start (IMMEDIATELY) the process to dispose of Rhino John McFrain McCain. I need to know the documents necessary to start that process (IMMEDIATELY - not tomorrow but TODAY). I need to know who to start the process with, Documents necessary and anyone who would be able to start a web site just to get signatures and get the ball rolling. JonGaltSr (Freeper since 1995 (or manybe it was 1996). Thanks

Cardinal Claudio Hummes / Archbishop Mauro Piacenza Vatican City, Jun 5, 2009 / 11:54 am (CNA).- During an interview today with Vatican Radio, Secretary of the Vatican’s Congregation for Clergy Archbishop Mauro Piacenza, clarified that bishops around the world have not been granted with "automatic" powers to defrock priests, but only with the capacity to proceed more speedily in cases that were not considered by the current Code of Canon Law approved by Pope John Paul in 1983.The new powers granted to bishops were announced by a letter sent to all episcopates by Cardinal Claudio Hummes on April 18...

ROME -- A priest who openly professed his love for a parishioner has been defrocked by the Italian Church despite an overwhelming show of support from his congregation, press reports said Tuesday.Padua Bishop Antonio Mattiazzo issued a decree on Monday forbidding Don Sante Sguotti to hear confession in Monterosso, near the northern city of Padua, and replaced him with another priest.But the daily La Repubblica reported that "only four faithful, all elderly women, attended mass celebrated by the new priest Monday evening, a sign of Monterosso's solidarity with the rebel priest."Young people in the town have even had T-shirts...

A former priest for the Diocese of Steubenville is stripped of his duties forever by the pope. Word of the decision came Friday, and follows a jail term already completed by the former priest. Father Anthony Jablonowski worked within the Diocese of Steubenville for about ten years, and as far as anyone knows, committed no crime there. But before he came to Steubenville he served in Wyoming, and committed immoral and indecent acts with a minor. Jablonowski pleaded guilty to this in the spring of 2004. He was given a 15-month to seven year sentence but was granted an early...

Three more priests accused of sexually abusing children have been defrocked, bringing to 17 the number of priests in the Philadelphia Archdiocese who have been defrocked since the clergy abuse scandal broke four years ago.The Vatican defrocked Edward V. Avery, Stanley M. Gana and James E. McGuire over credible allegations of abuse, the archdiocese announced in a notice Thursday inside its weekly newspaper, the Catholic Standard & Times.None of the 17 priests faces criminal charges because of Pennsylvania's statute of limitations for prosecuting sex crimes. Avery, Gana and McGuire were named in a grand jury report released in September that...

CINCINNATI -- The Vatican has removed from the priesthood a man accused of sexually abusing girls at a Catholic high school where he was chaplain.Thomas Brunner, who resigned in 2003 as pastor of St. Patrick Catholic Church in Troy, is permanently stripped of all clerical functions and privileges, the Archdiocese of Cincinnati said Wednesday. Brunner had been on administrative leave, barred from functioning as a priest, because of the abuse accusations stemming from his time at Mount Notre Dame High in the late 1970s and 1980s.Pope Benedict XVI approved Brunner's petition for what the church calls "laicization." Brunner signed documents...

A former vice chancellor of the Boston Archdiocese and six other priests accused of molesting children have been defrocked by the Vatican, church officials announced Friday.In a statement, Boston Archbishop Sean O'Malley expressed his "deepest sorrow for the grievous harm" done by Monsignor Frederick Ryan and the other Boston priests."The violations of childhood innocence, under the guise of priestly care, are a source of profound shame," O'Malley said.Ryan was one of the highest-ranking church officials to be accused of child molestation since the Boston sex scandal broke in 2002. He resigned that year after being accused of abusing two boys...

By Dan SapirThe Observer has confirmed that former St. Joseph Church Priest, Monsignor Frederick Ryan has been defrocked by direct order from the Vatican. The process, referred to as being "laicized", is the result of either a self-petition or initiated by the church administration responsible for Ryan. It is unclear as to what option resulted in the latest decision from Rome.Ryan, the highest ranking church official to be accused of sex crimes in 2002 for incidents which occurred 25 years earlier, served as a Vice Chancellor in the Arch Diocese in Brighton. Ryan is now stripped of all priestly powers...

CINCINNATI -- A man accused of sexually abusing several boys in the Cincinnati area has been removed from the priesthood by the Vatican.Lawrence Strittmatter's dismissal from the clergy was announced by the Archdiocese of Cincinnati on Wednesday. Strittmatter had requested the removal _ referred to as laicization by the Roman Catholic church _ and Pope Benedict XVI approved it January. Because Strittmatter made the request, the removal falls short of defrocking, which is imposed.The archdiocese hopes the move brings "peace, comfort or satisfaction" to the men who have accused Strittmatter, spokesman Dan Andriacco said.Church officials requested in 2002 that Strittmatter...

Disciplinary news from the Methodist case on the ex-Rev Shroud, a self-avowed, practicing lesbian who defied the denominational rules. First, she was convicted and defrocked by her annual conference. She appealed to the regional (Jurisdictional) committee and they overturned the conviction (and defrocking) on a process technicality. The denomination's highest court (The Judicial Council has just upheld the original conviction and defrocking. One other important case (The Johnson vs Viriginia Bishop Kammerer case) remains to be decided. Johnson was unfairly fired from his church by his radical, liberal bishop when he refused to accept into membership an unrepentant, self-avowed, non-celibate...

Church to defrock disgraced bishop By Greg Roberts July 28, 2004 THE Anglican bishop at the centre of the child sex abuse controversy that forced the resignation of Peter Hollingworth as governor-general is to be formally stripped of his holy orders. A church tribunal headed by Queensland Supreme Court judge Debra Mullins has unanimously resolved that Donald Shearman, 77, be defrocked for seducing a teenage schoolgirl boarding at an Anglican hostel at Forbes in western NSW in the mid-1950s. Church sources said the unprecedented defrocking will be performed by Brisbane Archbishop Phillip Aspinall in the Darnell Room of St Martin's...

Proposing a new translation for an ancient ritual To: Editor et al. From: Siege of Constantinople I just recently came across this old, pre-ICEL ritual. It does one’s heart good to recite it, and gives one a warm lasting glow inside. Teach it to your children. This is from the Roman Pontifical of Pope Benedict XI (Tertia Pars, Mecklenburg 1862, pp.114f). The rubrics are in square brackets. The Degradation of a Bishop [If the degradandus be an archbishop, the degrading prelate removes his pallium, saying:] We deprive thee of the rights and privileges of the episcopal dignity, symbolized in this...