[Beowulf9]

“Mr Reynolds said that his being excommunicated would not make a different to his ministry.”

In the Middle Ages, formal acts of public excommunication were sometimes accompanied by a ceremony wherein a bell was tolled (as for the dead), the Book of the Gospels was closed, and a candle snuffed out — hence the idiom “to condemn with bell, book, and candle.”

[Mrs. Don-o]

"The Excommunication of Robert the Pious"
by Jean-Paul Laurens

I've long advocated the restoration of the full "Bell, Book and Candle" treatment.

[Biggirl]

Nah.............too formal in this high tech/hard paper copy era.