The letter, in the very first paragraph, says that this is "unofficial."
Excommunication is attached to specific acts, such as procurement of abortion. Also, there is always a remedy provided in every excommunication. In the case of abortion, reinstatement is given to any priest in the Sacrament of Reconciliation.
A declaration of Kerry's excommunication would also provide a remedy. I see no remedy in this letter.
I know how anxious everyone is for an "October surprise," but don't count on it coming from the Vatican. It's simply not going to happen.
Dear sinkspur,
Although it is unofficial, it is also at the request of the Vatican. But that's a red herring.
If an abortionist commits the heinous crime of abortion, and he had been a baptized Catholic, he automatically incurs excommunication. It requires no official pronouncement from the Vatican for the excommunication to have happened.
No declaration is needed.
If one were to send a dubium to Rome and ask, "Is Dr. So-and-so, notorious abortionist, excommunicated," it is unlikely that Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger himself would respond and say, "Yes, of course he is excommunicated."
Why? Because it's clear, it's simple, and it's automatic. He'd send the dubium off to a trusted theologian, and say, "Here, this is relatively uncontroversial, low-level stuff. You write the answer. But remember, you're not the Curia, so your answer is unofficial."
And the theologian would reply as we've seen here.
No official pronouncement must be made in a case of automatic excommunication. As to the remedy, that's already in Canon Law - go talk to your bishop, repent, confess, be reconciled.
Now, as to recognizing that the automatic excommunication has taken place, certainly, one will expect Mr. Kerry to continue to lie about that, and his status as a Catholic.
But this is usually about as "official" as it gets with an automatic excommunication. It might eventually get kicked up a level or two, and an official pronouncement may eventually be made on it, or not.
But Canon Law operates here, without the need for any official pronouncement.
Mr. Kerry is an excommunicant.
Along with Chappaquiddick Ted, Olympia Snowe, Ahnold, George Pataki, and the rest of them.
sitetest
The theologian here, at the request of the Vatican, has
But wait. Has Kerry really ever said that he personally believes abortion is okay? It seems to me that he agrees with the teaching but won't impose it on others. I am not so sure he's a heretic. But he is a public sinner giving grave scandal to the church by advancing the cause of abortion and he is in material cooperation with evil.
And HERESY! (i.e., a Catholic publicly and obstinately supports the civil right to abortion)
Automatic excommincation is also the result of heresy.
Canon. 1364 §1 An apostate from the faith, a heretic or a schismatic incurs a latae sententiae excommunication, without prejudice to the provision of Can. 194 §1, n. 2; a cleric, moreover, may be punished with the penalties mentioned in Can. 1336 §1, nn. 1, 2 and 3.
For more information, I would suggest one read and study Ad Tuendam Fidam and the CDF's commentary on "Professio Fidei".
The Church's teaching on the grave immorality of direct and volutary killing of an innocent human being requires the "assent of theological faith". To deny or doubt this results in heresy, an offense which incurs automatic excommunication.
No equivocations to the contrary are legitimate.