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The Vatican has ordered the excommunication of Catholic priest Greg Reynolds over his support for women priests and gays.
The Australian news site The Age reported that the excommunication document – written in Latin – was dated May 31.
Reynolds, who resigned as a parish priest in 2011 and last year founded Inclusive Catholics, said he had expected to be laicised (defrocked), but not excommunicated.
”In times past excommunication was a huge thing, but today the hierarchy have lost such trust and respect,” Reynolds was quoted by The Age.
”I’ve come to this position because I’ve followed my conscience on women’s ordination and gay marriage,” he said.
Excommunication is the strongest sanction and means one can not hold any office or receive any sacraments. Being laicised means one is no longer a priest.
In the same article, Melbourne Archbishop Denis Hart said Reynolds was excommunicated because after his priestly faculties were withdrawn he continued to celebrate the Eucharist publicly and preach contrary to the teachings of the church.
Reynolds is not the first Australian Catholic to be excommunicated. Sister Mary MacKillop was excommunicated by her local bishop but was reinstated. In 2010 she became Australia’s first saint.
Sources
Image: Angela Wylie/The Age
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