Talk:Excommunication/Archive 1

RE: Disfellowshipping & Jehovah's Witnesses

I would like to state that the information posted suggesting that Jehovah's Witnesses (JWs) who have committed an offense are taken before a board of elders to be assessed for disfellowshipping is not entirely right. In my case, there was no hearing and the matter was decided in my absence without my being consulted at any given point--apart from when an associate (non-member) of the JWs informed me weeks later. The crime: smoking cigarettes! However, another JW--a known alcoholic--is still a member of the congregation. So what's the difference? In my opinion, the difference is whether you have a long line of family members within the organisation. I am happy to now be an independent-thinking human being; however, inequitible systems of judgement really grate at my ability for tolerance and compliance. In this case, right actions in judgement concerning modes of morality and spirituality are those that are applicable to all persons consenting to abide by those modes of morality. No exceptions! Furthermore, when Jehovah's Witnesses are disfellowshipped, an elder is to call on that person once every year. I have seen no evidence of this either, yet they all know where I live...I never receive a knock at "my" door when they're in the area! (Disfellowshipped persons get entered into a book as a "DO NOT CALL"). So for anyone not wanting JWs to call on them, just tell them you're desfellowshipped. You will never see them again. Problem solved!

KZ

• I know of two murder cases that took place in my home state of Oregon (one extremely well publicized, and the other hardly publicized outside of Oregon) in which men who had been disfellowshipped from the Jehovah's Witnesses murdered their families. Should this be mentioned in the article, and if so, how is the best way to handle it? Garr1984 01:25, 25 July 2007 (UTC) §

Amish and Mennonite NPOV and facts dispute

To rbj and any others who keep rv'ing my edits with no alternatives. I want this edit war to stop. Please suggest NPOV statements here along with supporting facts or leave this section alone. My issue with the version posted is blatant church POV, patent falsehoods and POV by ommission. I want to introduce this section similar to the Catholic section for flow. I insist on the 'real' discipline here as well as the 'ideal'. I expect double-bind falsehoods such as 'the person has separated himself from the church' when in fact the opposite is true to by claimed as church POV or corrected. The churches POV is no more or less valid than the excommunicants POV. I expect both to be shown here with balance. I know Mennonites from the inside and therefore I can detect falsehoods and POV with ease here. I also expect the character assasination, innuendos about 'obsession', and other psychiatric 'assistence' to stop. These forms of assaults are common in Mennonite shunning too I will note here. Please use NPOV statements here, and facts that make at least some logical sense rather than emotional insults and double bind recognitions. Also please source claims about 'majority' opinions with data.

I am willing to work with you or I am willing to write a completely separate POV here but in any case I expect a complete and NPOV study here that is not biased, false and slanderous to those who the Mennonites do excommunicate and on occasion do shun. Anacapa 07:59, 31 January 2006 (UTC)

if you take a look at Talk:Mennonite, you will see where i have a lot of back-and-forth discussion with an anonymous IP (whom i am convinced is one and same as Anacapa (talk · contribs) ) about this POV. it appears that Anacapa is or knows someone who was tossed out of a Mennonite church somewhere wrongfully and hurtfully (and has an axe to grind). that kind of shit happens. it is bad. but it is not representative of the denomination.

this kind of POV pushing might be similar to someone writing about the Roman Catholic Church as if every priest is known to have molested a kid sometime in their ministry. even if it has happened, all too often, and even though the RC Church leadership has not been forthcoming and responsible about dealing with this wrong until they were finally forced to, it would be wrong to portray the RC church as if that was normal or common (unless you really had solid proof.) Anacapa wants to represent what others believe and their positions on faith and action, and he/she simply has no right to (unless it is congruous to what they would say they believe and what they say they believe they should do). if he/she wants to represent what Mennonites/Amish/Hutterites/whomever do, in such a way that would be disclaimed by such persons, Anacapa needs to prove it, and that such behavior is systemic despite any protestations or denials of those he/she accuses. and proof more current and more broad than just a lawsuit from 1947 is needed to represent what these groups are doing now. r b-j 08:33, 31 January 2006 (UTC)

a postscript: i am convinced that Anacapa (talk · contribs) is one and the same as 128.111.95.43 (talk · contribs), 128.111.95.240 (talk · contribs), 128.111.95.210 (talk · contribs), 128.111.95.36 (talk · contribs), 128.111.95.172 (talk · contribs), 128.111.95.138 (talk · contribs), 128.111.95.60 (talk · contribs), 128.111.95.110 (talk · contribs), 63.239.232.227 (talk · contribs), and 66.15.140.3 (talk · contribs). please check the contribs, including the changes to other pages that this editor makes. it is obvious that this person has an axe to grind (it is likely that he/she was really hurt by someone wielding power over him/her). it is also obvious that this person has no intention of conforming to WP:NOT#Wikipedia_is_not_a_soapbox. r b-j 17:19, 31 January 2006 (UTC)

This is a beginning. I am indeed SOME of those users above and I think you will see that with other people I have no problems with discussions. I wish to note rbj's blatant character assassinations in the history of this article. Even now he is making innuendos about me as person and acting as if he is the calm, reasonable, mature adult here which is not how he has been treating me in these rv's. I expect this personal stuff to stop so we can focus on NPOV facts here. I have no intention to blame all Mennonites with the loathsome deeds of the orthodox Mennonite churches. I do not wish to represent what other's believe, although I do want everyone to know that Mennonites are my people too so I can detect deception here with relative ease and I can and will call double-bind statments that are false. I have no intention to slander rbj with characterizations as he is me (although I easily could from his edit history). I have no intention to prove that anything is systemic other than what the basic facts (and Mennonite theology itself) show. I have no intention of calling edit wars a 'discussion' either. I need to prove nothing here. (I added several books that show true stories of Amish and Mennonite shunning. I added a legal case involving an Amish man written up in a book on Ostracization by a lawyer.) Secular histories of Mennonites show Excommunication is an old and ongoing part of the Mennonite experience. There is even a recent media article on the Progressive Germantown Mennonite Church about mild shunning after the Gay issue came up. Excommunication/shunning is a real and significant theme in Mennonite history which occurs from extreme to mild forms in Mennonite churches worldwide but you won't see it in the main article's history...which is blatant POV by ommission I want an accurate balanced NPOV (that means non-church POV as well!) that captures the facts here. The entry in Shunning under the Bahia faith seems honest and complete to me and similar, in form, to how Mennonites shun in orthodox churches. Shunning is a hot topic because it is not nice in reality and because Mennonites want to be seen as nice, 'Peace' people. I knew going in this was going to be a fight, going in, because it has been a fight for every Mennonite shunnee to be heard.

I need help here from NPOV people with no axes to grind who can call rbj and I to the NPOV facts so he cannot continue to run and hide and so he has no excuses to character assassinate me instead of engaging in discussion that completes this article. I can separate rbj as a person from his content. I can separate rbj from his deeds. I can deal with content as content, deeds as deeds, and people as people. I expect these discussions to be idea vs idea, fact vs fact with reasonable logic here. I did not and I will not make personal attacks on rbj, slander his reputation, and make innuendos about him in what follows. I expect him to contain his emotions and use his mind too so NPOV discussion is possible here.

Here are some specific issues I have with the Excommunication/Anabaptist: Amish, Mennonite and Hutterite section.

• 1) I want the section title include all Anapbaptist churches above to eliminate repetition and to resemble the shunning article title.
• 2) I want the section intro to be about excommunication (as the Catholic do above) so the main article flows.
• 3) I want a solid discussion on blatant church POV, double-bind blame 'recognitions' and outright falsehoods (as in 'the member separates himself from the church' ), and about the excommunicants' POV in the second so-called 'ideal' paragraph.
• 3) I want to balance the 'ideal' discipline with the 'real' discipline subject to reasonable representation of the full scope of such realities in a new paragraph below.
• 4) I want make some small edits in the third paragraph with discussion to highlight the harshness of the BAN
• 5) I want sources to back the the last statement in the last paragraph about the 'vast majority of Mennonites'.
• 6) I want to include all the churches here is a way that slanders and panders to none. As far as I know there are no voices here representing Amish (who shun computers) and the communal Hutterites.
• 7) I want more information and distinctions on what are E/C offenses here. In particular I want to show that people can be E/C for no other cause than non-conconformance. I know of several excommunications, both single and group, where there was no so-called sin but there was difference of opinion.
• 8) I want to state these facts in secular language so that everyone can read them Mennonite, Christian or otherwise.
• 9) I want language here that is non-slanderous to excommunicants and non-panderous to the church. Church POV is church POV! It is not fact. Head bishops will condemn excommunicants to shunning while they commit worse offenses against the so-called 'faith'. The excommunicant POV is essential here to complete this article and to balance the immense power of the whole church against a few excommunicants. Whole churches can and do commit sins against excommunicants too. I have no need to point fingers here except to demand NPOV treatment. The church has no special priviledge or credibility to dictate POV here.
• 10) Last, I do hate Mennonite shunning with much cause. That is my POV. But I also want to see Rbj and his church get a fair shake here. I will do everything I can to balance what I say as long as there is full and complete NPOV content here with no blatant POV by omission.

For those NPOV's who can assist us here, I urge you to read the Jehovah's Witness Shunning Link in shunning. This is close to what happens in Orthodox Mennonite churches too, only even more harsh.

I will wait for comments/suggestions and failing that I will note each edit with care in the history so there is no doubt where I am coming from here. I expect reasonable, thoughtful responses back that are sourced and where Church POV is stated as Church POV.

Anacapa 07:06, 2 February 2006 (UTC)

i have deleted one of the anonymous IPs from the list above. please identify which remaining anonymous IPs in the list you claim are not you, Anacapa (be prepared if such denial is challenged). because i have dealt with sock puppets on Wikipedia before, i am wary of that now. i do not want the impression that there are multple editors with your POV when there is not. i want you to take responsibility for edits you have made in the past, so we can narrow down what is soapbox POV and what is NPOV contribution. i would like to write a nasty exposé regarding the Republican party or Rush Limbaugh or Bill O'Reilly other reactionary talking heads and all the lies they say, but if i do it here on WP, i know it will get reverted immediately.

no one here is saying that the shunning (severing of all social ties, including that of family and spouses resulting in destroyed marriages and broken families) of excluded or excommunicated (or whatever term you choose for someone who is kicked out of some particular church for whatever reason) is a good thing. the difference we have is representing this as common or endemic to the modern Mennonite Church as it is. if you are able to take ownership of your past edits to this and to the Mennonite article, i can point out clearly where edits you made were done from a soapbox. we can talk about historical positions the church had on "The Ban" but you may not mispresent what the church or any other third party says their position is. only they get to define what their position is, and if it appears to you to be not what they do, fine, document it. and if we are talking about the current state of a group or organization, you need current or very recent evidence. just because someone sued an Amish group in 1947 for the economic losses they incurred because of being shunned, does not mean that you get to imply that this is what is commonly or systemically done in the Mennonite Church today. that is misrepresentation. r b-j 20:39, 2 February 2006 (UTC)

rbj (response to paragraph one above) I just joined wikipedia (signed up), and I am still learning wiki protocol. I will sign in for all discussions here from now on so you have no need to fear 'sock puppet' impressions from now on. I will also be glad to discuss any specific soapbox edits that you take issue with and identify what were mine that apply to these articles. I also will pledge that from now on you can assume WYSWG from me here. I was learning Wiki, not trying to 'sock puppet' you or anyone else; I think from my edits you can see I have no problem standing for myself although I remain anonymous, here, because I, rightly, fear Mennonite relational aggression from Mennonite acquaintances. I have no intention of going back through all those anonymous IP's and sorting them all, out but I will be glad to have you bring any to my attention should they be problematic (for identification) or discussion here as long as the discussion is pertinent to this article and as long as the discussion moves toward completing this article in NPOV. I need write no nasty exposes here. There are quite a few books, news articles and scholarly studies on Mennnonite excommunication/shunning. All I expect is to see these negative (non-church POV) realities reflected here along with all the other positive church POV. I did and I will source what I can where sources are available. As you, no doubt, well know this is a highly censured topic which Mennonites do not disclose to the general public so there may be times I have difficulty sourcing every last fact here. I will do what I can to tone down the language too as long as there is no attempt to commit POV by ommission here. I need you to know that what some Mennonites do (and did to) to me and others is horrible to me and to all who study psychology, so I do have negative POV about some Mennonites deeds and some Mennonite faith ideas, just as you have positive POV about your church. I want to study the facts here with facts and let the POV's follow from the facts. I notice that some Mainstream Mennonites now seem to be passively appalled about orthodox Mennonite shunning. That is progress to me. That is the whole point of Wikipedia to me. I will call your attention to today's SF Chronicle Article How Google Censors It's Chinese Portal (googlenews) for what all this offense is about to me. It succinctly shows how POV is exploited depending on who has control of the windows. Google's motto is 'don't be evil'. I don't want to be evil with you here but I expect the same 'don't be evil' discussion back. My knowledge of Mennonite history makes me suspicious of evil censorship with sound cause here. So does all the positive POV with little negative balance that I see in the Main Mennonite article. I do not mean to malign you personally and I do hope to see much more substantiated studies here. Will you use substantiated edits/discussions so I can cooperate with you? Anacapa 03:04, 3 February 2006 (UTC)

rbj my response to no one is saying above. I have NO issue with how YOU ('we') see shunning. I also believe in fair and truthful representations of your (Mainstream? groups as well as fair and accurate representations of orthodox and progessive Mennonites too. I am aware that there are some things common to all Mennonites such as basic theology and some things that are different between Mennonite separate Mennonite churches. This is obvious when I watch the progressive GMC welcome gays and become 'excommunicated' from the Mainstream group. I will note, however, that the main Mennonite article is about ALL Mennonites, that is orthodox, AND mainstream AND progressive, so all Mennonite 'facts' belong there, IMO, with fair and accurate distinctions. I will be glad to identify/discuss any edits that can create constructive dialogue here. I have no interest in doing a tit-for-tat character assassination with past edits. I do regret any offense you took from presuming (falsely) that I wanted to characterize all Mennonites as orthodox. I will glad to atone anywhere your personal feelings were hurt. I know how to make distinctions between general and separate and I will be glad to make distinctions between what is 'common' and what is 'separate' WITH you as long as such distinctions match the sourced facts. IMHO you can not claim to be ONE so-called 'church' on ALL issues on ONE Main Mennonite article. You seem to represent Mainstream churches in Mennonite. I hear no voices here from GMC, Bolivia, Belize, Paraguay, or the Holdemans etc. I also want to call the 'soapbox' statement. You are on your own positive POV soapbox...we all do soapbox...Mennonite church soapbox is usually nice, banal and positive but it is still (covert) soapbox. I will tone my language down but I do intend to call 'NICE' POV here where it is POV by ommission, false, or unclaimed as Mennonite POV.

When you make statements about Mennonite positions, please own them as Mennonite not as fact. This where I take issue with you. For example, notorious and erring is blatant Mennonite POV that needs to be specifically claimed as church POV, not as fact, because it is slanderous to excommunicants. I will be glad to allow you to state claimed and sourced Mennonite POV as long as you allow me the same right as a non-Mennonite. I also am happy to join you in making distinctions between 'very' conservative and mainstream Mennonites. (You will notice that we have no edit wars there now.) You cannot, however, to expect me to welcome illogical statements, or logical double-binds or outright false-hoods in your statements (or vice versa!) I remember Mennonite discipline inside orthodox churches/Amish and it hasn't changed that much based on your entries so I can and will question POV there. I would like to see civil discussions about all our statements, here, so this article is not a redundant tit-for-tat of POV's. Failing that, I would like to see clean statements of opposite POV where we just state the POV's with no undiscussed edits on either side. I hear your concerns about distinctions between churches, and I will be glad to cooperate on all such distinctions as long as there is no attempt to conceal extreme practices or obsure common ideologies here.

Now as to historical vs ongoing Discipline/Excommunication/Banning. I expect you to show the whole history of Mennonite discipline in the Main article because anything else is blatant POV by ommission. Secular authors show different histories here than you do. I have no particular interest in Mennonite history other than to call for an honest depiction of the Ban there in the Main article along with HOW the Ban DID influence Mennonite history.

As far as ongoing, Discipline/Excommunication and Banning I point you to the external links in shunning which show stories of Mennonites and Amish under the BAN, right now, some going back, I believe, decades. I currently have at least 5 Mennonite relatives being banned and shunned. I know Ruth Irene Garret wrote a book on 25 other Amish/Mennonites being banned and shunned recently. There is immense relational aggression from Anabaptists against people who disclose these secrets so I welcome YOUR honest attempts to show how this is occurring (and where) accurately and fairly in orthodox Mennonite churches. To begin it would be nice to know how many orthodox Mennonite churches exist and where, worldwide, so we can get accurate assessments of what is actually going on right now. (To all Non-Mennonites who read this, what I just asked for is unlikely to come from Mennonites but, one can hope.) Last, I will add that economic losses from the Ban are not the issue to me or anyone I know. What IS at issue is loss of close bonds, systematic Parental Alienation by some Mennonites and ongoing Relational Aggression by some Mennonites in the name of God.

Now as to implications about 'systemic' issues. I have a news article about mild shunning from a woman in the extremely Progressive Germantown Mennonite church by the Mainstream group. I have added links and will add other links about orthodox churches that do extreme shunning. To me, one can imply some shunning occurs (from mild to extreme) in most Mennonite churches from this. Of course, there is no way to test this implication, across ALL Mennonite churches, because few will voluntarily disclose the facts. Please prove me wrong with facts and statistics here and I will gladly join you in making accurate distinctions. In the meantime you will notice my recent edits attempt to join yours in making non-systemic statements where I see separations. This is an encyclopedia so it is sometimes hard to general and specific at the same time. (I do notice general statements in Mennonite theology that do seem common to all Menno-nites but that is for a later discussion.)

Last as to 'misrepresentation', I intend to represent Mennonites fairly and accurately with sourced material. I will be glad to discuss things where you SHOW me so-called misrepresentations you see. I will note that you do not get to represent Mennonites to non-Mennonites ALONE here. The press gets to weigh in, social scientists get to weigh in, and, of course, the unseen excommunicants get to weigh in too. This is not the Third Way Cafe website, this is an encyclopedia where anyone can weigh in. Therefore, I expect a civil discussion that includes all POV's here. I will do my level best not to slander Mennonites as a WHOLE people. Please do your level best not to pander to positive Mennonite POV, or slander Mennonite excommunicants or non-Mennonites or me. Enough said. Please suggest places we can move ahead. Anacapa 05:40, 3 February 2006 (UTC)

it's hard to even begin to respond. there is so much plopped here (not supported but presented) that i cannot hope to answer it comprehensively and i will not try to. none of us are getting paid for this. the order of the following list is not necessarily chronological or conguent to import or any order other than i had to start somewhere.

1. you have advocated many additions, i can't deal with them all at once. let's start with many fewer, maybe a couple at a time.
2. you repeatedly demand sources from me when i am not the one adding material and yet you do not source your own. for instance, this Daniel B. Lee thing is an unpublished manuscript full of the authors personal opinion and he says so. My rejection of the established viewpoint, ... Old Order Mennonites assemble and ritualistically “uphold and reaffirm common sentiments” that individual members do not believe or even understand. This is not peer-reviewed nor apparently published in any Journal (of any repute). It doesn't count for much. It's this professor's opinion that happen to resonate with yours. i'm trying to keep out stuff. stuff that is not supported and stuff that would be considered to cast the subject in unfavorable light in disproportion to its representative portion in common understanding. in doing that, that is keeping stuff out, the onus is not upon me to cite sources.
3. for some reason you think that i pander to positive Mennonite POV. some Mennonites might disagree. i left in two entire paragraphs describing how some Amish groups and very conservative Mennonite churches (i dare not say "all" rather "some" because no one has checked all - all is hard to prove) have shunned excommunicants and at some time, in some cases (even if they have been uncommon in a denomination of 1/2 million) resulting in family breakups and much heartache. the statements are there but there is no encyclopediac reason to double or triple the size of it adding emotive invective, particularly since you offer no proof that this is endemic to the modern Mennonite Church as a denomination. stuff like this has happened, but it is misrepresentation to stuff the section with such a high proportion of invective (WP:NPOV#Undue_weight) when it is not a major identifying property of the denomination.
4. you claim that For example, "notorious and erring" is blatant Mennonite POV that needs to be specifically claimed as church POV. in fact, "notorious" in no Mennonite document that i can find, "erring" is. that is the only reason they claim to ever exclude a member from further membership ("nonconformance" or "false or goofy theology" is not sufficient justification, but basically only seriously sinful behavior). i put in "notorious" because it is when the "offending" behavior is openly seen (the best example again is when some guy dumps his wife for another woman and is openly cohabitating with the latter whether remarried or not, another more controversial case might be an openly gay couple), that is when the pressure to act meaningfully to deplore and reject such open or nototrious behavior is the greatest.
5. this is my opinion, take it for what it's worth to you: i can point to a lot of things wrong with the Mennonite Church as a denomination but more specifically to some particular Mennonite churches. taking on a sorta Moody Bible Institute conservativeness (no smoking, no drinking, no movies, no dancing, no whatever..) things some churches (not all) have done such as excluding women from leadership/pastoral roles or excluding openly gay persons. but not all of these define the denomination as a whole (the inclusion of gay-tolerant churches is still a hot issue, GMC was included in the GC denomination but was kicked out of the MC conference and when the two denominations merged there was some and continues to be some heavy debate as to the status of GMC). most Mennonite churches have male leadership but no position statement that excludes women from leadership. many Mennonite churches (certainly not most) have some women in certain leadership roles including as pastors. now whether someone likes women in the pulpit or do not or gays in the pews (or pulpit) or not is their right and both parties have the right to mutual volition in a mutually voluntary relationship. that is what a "free church" is - it is (among other things) a mutually voluntary relationship. people don't have to come to or join a church nor do churches have some legal responsibility to include any or all persons. churches do not have to associate with any particular conference or denominations and the conferences/denomination do not have to include any church they do not want to. this freedom of association (or to disassociate) should not, in and of itself, warrant a lot of attention or space.
6. you are doing very well in supporting my case that you have some personal agenda that you are trying to inject into the article. that is precisely the POV pushing that is contrary WP policy. i am not trying to "analyze" you nor patronize you nor "help" you or have any other motive in identifying this obvious agenda you carrying here, other than to expose, if not to you then to others, where this POV push is coming from. it is not coming from any journalistic origin, but a personal or advocacy origin.

r b-j 04:09, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

It is indeed hard for me too. I too see much plopped but unsupported in the Main Mennonite article and in this article too. Let's just start somewhere. You might begin with my specific list above and see where we go. As to your concerns I have attempted to respond as best I can below. I found much in your points above that were confusing to me so you might need to ask again on some points.

1. Please select the additions you can begin to deal with and we will see how it goes.
2. Fair is fair here. I will be glad to source what I show. However, please do not imply that your sourcing in these Mennonite related articles is balanced and sourced with secular peer reviewed material. As for Daniel Lee, I did not use him as a source nor do I have plans to now. I am easily able to separate my own point of view from his and they are different. I did add him to show people that there are other facts and POV's available that differ immensely with your 'ideal' positive POV's here. If you demand peer-reviewed journaled POV here, we will have to delete most of the main Mennonite article which is almost pure church POV and begin over. So what is the standard that is common in other wiki articles for sourcing? What standard do you expect us both to use here (given that as you well know your people conceal these painful topics quite well from the mass media/scholars.)? I will be glad to 'proportion' these topics with data if you can provide the data. Otherwise we can discuss proper proportion on some reasonable basis with help from neutral wikis. However, you do not get to determine 'common understanding' on a topic that your people have spent centuries concealing.
3. The reason I see pandering here is because main Mennonite article is far from a balanced study of Mennonite history or theology (see also discussion on Menno Simons). Secular texts show the negative with the positive. Also the 'ideal' section in this article with no 'real' to balance it is ridiculous positive POV which seems like pandering to me. I am non-Mennonite which is what I imagine most WIKIs who read these articles are. As such I hope to see NPOV articles about Mennonites from all sources for all people here. The standard I use here is: What are the facts from people who have no particular need to pander to or slander anyone?. I did not and will not quibble about 'some' versus 'all' without the facts. Let's both finish with the emotional invectives here as your personal assaults were no fun either. As for the represention you will notice that I make no claims in any article that you are all extreme shunners so spare me fights without cause here. I will add a source that shows mild shunning by the Mainstreams against the progressive GMC which implies that mild shunning by mainstream Mennonites occurs today. However, I am happy with the shunning section distinctions as is so let's not quibble with impossible proofs. On the other hand, please do not demean my intelligence by suggesting that no mild shunning occurs in Mainstream Mennonite churches or I will add sources about shunning Mennonite history/news where I see 13,600 hits on Google vi a vi 'Mennonite/shunning'. Finally I do insist that shunning be included in a balanced way in Mennonite/history so people can see its influence on Mennonite schisms for centuries.
4. I claim that because that is how the church sees things not how the excommunicant or how secular bystanders see things. Church POV is church POV and needs to be owned here. I will also note that Mennonites can be excommunicated/shunned for many other causes other than what you claim here. Finally, I will note that the churches are often far from sinless in these matters. I want to see the facts here from all POV's and owned by those who have opposite/different POV's. I will also note that not all Mennonite churches do things the same way here either so each church has a POV often to the exclusion of others.
5. Our personal opinions matter little here. What is important is getting a reasonably representative picture of how all Mennonites conduct themselves. There is no one 'whole' Mennonite story here because there are many differents forms of being Mennonite worlwide. These differences need to be shown preferably with data. I suspect there is a census of churches with a membership count and a measurement of which are orthodox, mainstream or progressive so that people can see the whole scope of Mennonitism here in proper proportion and make their own judgements. (This item was confusing to me so if you want to tell me what you want here I will discuss this again.)
6. Reading my mind is a form of personal aggression I had hoped not to see from a so-called Peace person. I do not read your mind. I just call your POV's with what you add on the articles so stop demeaning me personally here. I say again, I want this edit war to stop now. If you continue to demean me personally and demean my push for balanced NPOV here I will call in help from neutral wikis. The Lancaster Intelligencer Journal, a public newspaper, won a Best Public Service Award in PA for exposing domestic violence among Mennonites (See link on Mennonite article.) Shunning is even more secret and 'Silenced by Shame' than domestic violence. Mass media sources will indeed be difficult to find but that does not make shunning any less real than domestic violence. I am pushing a POV and that POV is that shunning be shown here as it happened/happens with reasonable balance because it is a significant phenomenom in Mennonite history and in some contemporary Mennonite churches---and a topic that most people find quite to be quite interesting and strange. From your edits/comments you seem to be pushing a POV that we mimimize shunning as much as possible here which is why we were warring. As we both know there is no easy way to check your POV's because most Mennonites do not welcome outsiders in to do stories on their internal policies and practices. However POV by ommission has been going on a long time now by Mennonites vi a vi painful practices and that is what I am trying to correct here. I am not trying to tar all Mennonites as being extreme shunners but I do expect reasonable representation in all these articles of this long deeply held tradition. I did own my POV. Will you own yours?

It is possible to state all POV's here.

To finish, I hope you will join me to complete this article, the shunning article and to balance the main Mennonite article. I will wait to see how you choose to handle this. The changes/comments on the shunning page were helpful. I did what I could to meet your concerns there and on the whole I am happy with where we are there. (Please comment.) I imagine something balanced is possible in this article too with the NPOV professionalism. Anacapa 07:48, 15 February 2006 (UTC)

I found and added a link on Shunning ('A complicated kind of author'), where award winning author Miriam Toews discusses shunning in Mennonite communities today. She says 'that shunning still goes on all the time in Mennonite communities" and that "People who say it isn't are in absolute denial and are showing a complete disregard for the feelings of the people who have suffered from it." Yet the Mennonite Third Way Cafe website states that "Mennonites today do not practice shunning, though it is still practiced by the Amish in some communities." Since I, personally, know at least 5 former Mennonites still being shunned today by Mennonites, I ask Where is the truth here?. This the general POV I find myself facing when I try to show the other side of Mennonite realities in these articles.

Is it possible to get NPOV studies, facts, data from Mennonites about Mennonite Baptism/Excommunication/Shunning? If it is possible, I will be glad to discuss proper proportioning so NO non-shunning Mennonite is falsely shamed for shunning. If it is impossible to get NPOV knowledge from Mennonites, how do I show what I know here without engaging in endless edit wars that go nowhere? Anacapa 05:31, 16 February 2006 (UTC)

(the rest)

The initial definition of excommunication in this article fails to summarize it's essential nature. It is the ultimate form of religious censure short of murder. I suggest a glance at the Columbia online Encycopedia's definition which seems to cover most of the angles in one paragraph. How can we state such thoughts here and also respect Columbia's copyright? no email 1/13/06

The section on the Amish seems horribly POV. I don't know anything about Amish excommunication, but someone who does should try to put in neutral and fact-based information. As it is now, it's bad enough that I'm tempted to just remove the section if it's not fixed. Vonspringer 04:17, 16 November 2005 (UTC)

From my reading I believe that the effect of excommunication is the reverse of what is described here. Excommunication is expulsion fromt he church, but does not deprive the victim of the status of 'Christian'. I don't believe that it is assumed that the excommunicee is damned to hell.

Anyone have a reference for the list of automatic excommunications?

DJ Clayworth 17:25, 14 Aug 2003 (UTC)

---

Reverted deletion of text; although it may be covered in multiple locations, the information is still relevant to this article. Perhaps a streamline of text is more appropriate than deletion. -Visorstuff 23:31, 22 Mar 2004 (UTC)

---

"There are a few offenses for which Catholics are automatically excommunicated:

Apostasy Heresy Schism Desecration of the Eucharist Physical force against the Pope One who actually procures an abortion and all accomplices Priest who absolves a partner in adultery Priest who directly violates the sacramental seal of confession Both parties to the consecration of a bishop without a Papal mandate "

According to the Catholic Encyclopedia online, there are way more then this for auto excommunications. Please cite a source where these are the only auto excommunications, or soon I will redo this section to include these:

Those which can only usually be obsolved by the Pope 1. Publishing, defending, or materially supporting in any way the books (not simply in the list of banned books but those specifically banned by the Pope) of apostates and heretics. 2. Those who appeal to a future hypothetical council. In other words those who not only have the heresy that a council has power over a Pope, but those who say that a future hypothetical council will overrule what the current Pope is commanding. This occoured frequently during the Western Schism. 3. Those who kill any member of the Holy See or drive them from their property. 4. Anyone who uses a secular authority or government entity to interfere with the proper work of a Priest or Bishop 5. Those who force lay judges to judge ecclesiastical persons, except for certain situations allowed. 6. Those who use a non ecclesiatical entity to prevent the publication of Apostolic Letters, Bulls, or Mandates 7. All those who modify Papal letters to say something different 8. Those who take ecclesiastical property as if it was their right too. This essentially involves governments.

Other Automatic Excommuncation reasons: 1. Those who teach heresy privately that has been condemned under the pain of autoexcommincation (these are only a select group of certain teachings) 2. Those who are violent in any way towards monks or nuns of the opposite sex 3. Those who fight duels 4. Those who join the Freemasons Carbonari or other similar groups, and those who do not reveal secret knowledge they might have about those groups 5. Those who violate or assist in violating the assylum afforded to criminals or anyone by being within a church 6. Those who illegaly sneak into nunneries 7. Women who illegaly sneak into monastaries 8. Simony 9. Trafficking in Indulgences 10. Siphoning money from mass stipends 11. People who are a not a priest who administer extreme unction except in a case of necessity. 12. Those who illegal steal relics from Roman cemetaries 13. Those who assist or help persons explicitly (and not simply automatically) excommunicated by the Pope 14. Clerics who give communion to persons explicitly (and not simply automatically) excommunicated by the Pope Also "Both parties to the consecration of a bishop without a Papal mandate" is not found in there. Wilfully creating schism is however.

Keep in mind that the Catholic Encyclopedia (including the online version) dates from 1913. The 1983 Code of Canon Law should be consulted for what is an automatic excommunication.--Kadett 23:22, 17 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Just for clarification, canon 6 of the 1983 code states "When this Code comes into force, the following are abrogated: ... 3. all penal laws enacted by the Apostolic See, whether universal or particular, unless they are resumed in this Code itself." Since those extra offenses were not resumed in the 1983 code, they no longer incur automatic excommunication. Pmadrid 03:31, 19 July 2005 (UTC)

In this same vein, those things that did result in excommunication and are no longer listed in the new code (example duels)automatically cease to have censure. So basically, when the law came into effect, the excommunication also ceased. This was also true of some irregular marriages.

---

The list from 1919 seems a bit out of date. Anyhow, should the entries for LDS and Jehovah's Witnesses be grouped under the heading of Christianity? -- Kizor 00:32, 4 May 2005 (UTC)

Tom Murphy, DNA & Mormonism

The appologists are wrong. Tom Murphy has the letter from his stake president calling him to the court. I attended the original meeting between Tom and Stake President Latimer at the Lynnwood LDS Stake Center and a court was scheduled after they came to the conclusion that Tom would not discontinue publishing his work on Native Americans and the church, which included research on the DNA evidence. The court was officially cancelled AFTER the press frenzy but the threat did occur and was absolutley valid. The publicity happened as a result of an actual threat.

updating excommunication

I agree with the others below (above?). The Excommunication is not well written, and in fact contains legal errors vis a vis the Roman Catholic understanding of excommunication.

1. No one is EVER said to be condemned to hell. Only God gets to make that call.

2. The "AUTOMATIC" is more correctly "latae sentensae" (pls pardon my bad Latin).

3. Even automatic excommunication aren't always automatic, esp for abortion (Pls see John Huel's book _Pastoral Companion_.

4. Cardinal electors are NOT excommunicated if they break the seal of conclave, according to _Universi Gregis Domenici_ by JOhn Paul II (however, they are urged to moral secrecy).

5. Some excommunications can be absolved by any priest, some are reserved to Rome. It would be worth noting these distinctions as well.

Dave

Uh, are you not reading the same article that I am??

1. is covered in the 1st paragraph of the RC section.
2. is also covered.
3. is incorrect. When a latae sentiate excommunication is culpable, it occurs. It may not actually have a legal effect yet (that requires an ecclesiastical court or extra-judicial decree), but it has a moral effect in that the person who is aware of his or her automatic excommunication is to act accordingly. This is stated in the paragraph after enumerating the automatic excommunications.
4. you are right about #4. This has been updated, since non-electors who reveal the details do in fact receive automatic excommunication.
5. 5 is covered under this paragraph:

The removal of the excommunication incurred by offenses 4 through 8 is reserved to the Holy See, either personally by the Pope or through the Apostolic Penitentiary.

And, to be more correct, excommunications can only be absolved by any priest when there's a danger of death. A priest needs the faculty from the local bishop to absolve normal excommunications. The person who can absolve non-reserved excommunications, though, should probably be listed in the text.

Did someone erase this stuff a while ago causing these comments and then do a revert? This is why I'm confused, because they're right there in the text.

Pmadrid 17:43, 17 January 2006 (UTC)

I don't see how a priest can be automatically excommunicated for absolving someone of adultery. How then is one who has committed adultery to obtain absolution? I must be missing something. Is adultery an "unforgivable sin"? Or is absolution from it reserved to a higher authority (such as a bishop)? Anyone? Carolynparrishfan 09:21, 7 September 2006 (UTC)

The excommunication only applies when the priest himself commits adultery with someone, and then attempts to absolve that person, his "partner in adultery", of that sin. -- Cat Whisperer 02:46, 8 September 2006 (UTC)

Ahhhh, thank you; you've no idea how much sleep I lost over that. So the partner, if penitent, must go to another priest? Carolynparrishfan 17:57, 9 September 2006 (UTC)

Correct. (Assuming that the excommunication that we are discussing has not been incurred, that is, that the priest didn't try to absolve the partner first. If this has happened, then the Vatican (Apostolic Penitentiary) needs to lift the excommunication.) -- Cat Whisperer 18:36, 9 September 2006 (UTC)

Updating Excommunication article

Agree with the above stated comments. This article is not well written and in fact contains error, as the Roman Catholic Church has used anathemas and it is in their power to do so again. The Council of Trent used anathemas and it was only with the Second Council of the Vatican that the Roman Catholic Church began a process of declining the usage of anathemas in major doctinal decisions and positions. This article is also limited in scope as it doesn't mention the Roman Catholic concept of interdict, which is a form of excommunication. The article is also limited in that it only makes mention of the three major Abrahamic faiths and does not include any of the Dharmic faiths (eg Buddhism, Hinduism, Jainism, etc) nor any other eastern philosophies and/or religions such as Confucianism, Shinto, Taoism, etc - simonmatt1100

Interdict is already in the article in the RC section:

Some ecclesiastical offenses incur an automatic interdict, which for a lay person is virtually equivalent to excommunication.

I guess you missed the text.

Pmadrid 17:49, 17 January 2006 (UTC)

Still, the distinction between anathema and excommunication made in the article is a false one. Formal anathemata were issued by the Catholic Church at least as recently as the First Vatican Council (whose Canons & Decrees can be found easily online). According to the online old Catholic Encyclopedia, there were three forms of excommunication: minor excommunication (which ceased to exist in 1884), major excommunication (the kind we think of), and anathema (a form of major excommunication promulgated with great solemnity). See the following article for the historical view of these types: http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/05678a.htm. To the best of my knowledge, the latter two (major & anathema) are still theoretically possible, just rarely used.

A few responses:

• Minor excommunication = personal interdict. If you read the effects of minor excommunication in the Catholic Encyclopedia article, they are equivalent to personal interdict in modern canon law. A link to interdict is provided in the article.
• Anathema is no longer part of canon law (canon 6, 1983 Code of Canon Law). It is true that the Pope could put it back into law in the future, but until that occurs, we can only talk about anathema historically since it no longer exists in modern canon law.

Pmadrid 23:32, 31 January 2006 (UTC)

Updating Excommunication

A quick google of 'shunning' shows me that there is little reality reflected here from the point of view of the shunned. It seems to me that there should be a full study of each church's sanctions here so that excommunication is known in all it's glory. I see much study of the methods of determining who is excommunicated here with few specifics on what happens to those excommunicants following excommunication. Churches that shun or otherwise sanction their former members should show how those specific sanctions sanction former members too. Since by it's very nature excommunication silences other viewpoints we must listen to excommunicant voices with particular care here. (unsigned)

By study do you mean original research? DJ Clayworth 15:44, 24 February 2006 (UTC)

merge

It seems like all the information here is repeated in a very similar way in Shunning. I think the two should be merged into the Excommunication article. Having an article about shunning is just defining what it is, like a dictionary, then repeating the excommunication stuff with a slight twist. Cuñado - Talk 18:17, 20 January 2006 (UTC)

to me shunning is exclusion (by avoidance) and abhorence (eg. deliberate social aggression against the shunned.) Excommunication, dismembership and disfellowship are separation which may or may not include shunning. I too see repeated info here but believe that each article should remain separate so we can see such distinctions. I suggest repeated information be moved to the proper article and the repetitions be deleted elsewhere.

Given that the current tone of shunning is religious, and excommunication is almost entirely a word used in a religious context, I can see the connections and similarity. Before this happens, however, are there other non-religious contexts that might disambiguate the two. Are there non-relgiious communities that practice shunning? Could this be called excommunication anyway? I've got no good answers here, but thoguht it's worth a quick think before we get too far into a merge. -- Christian Edward Gruber 19:25, 20 January 2006 (UTC)

It seems to me that there are a good number of variations of this, some cultural and some religious (eg. Ostracism, Social rejection, Shunning, The ban, Disfellowship, Takfir, and Cherem, some of these have their own articles, some not. I would perhaps find another name for any kind of casting-out of people from a group, have an article discussing the sociological/ psychological effects of these types of bans, form a category for it, and remove most redundancies between these articles, and include a link to main article. But I'm no sociologist, so I don't feel equipped to do it myself, just that this would be my ideal. Makemi 19:39, 20 January 2006 (UTC)

Alright you get the idea credit. I agree that there should be one main article, a category, and everything else relating back to the main article. I guess the Excommunication article is what I would vote for as the main one. Cuñado - Talk 23:32, 20 January 2006 (UTC)

I don't know that I would make Excommunication the main article, since in my experience it has such strong religious connotations, whereas what I'm thinking of would have both religious and social meaning. I guess the colloquial term I would use for the whole phenomenon is Ostracism, in the less specific English use of the term. Makemi 23:37, 20 January 2006 (UTC)

to me Excommunication is the formal separation while shunning is one form of sanction following excommunication. Also I know that shunning occurs outside religious groups wherever totalitarian tendencies exist. I would like to see the two as separate distinct articles and maybe decide which article to put redundancies in. -unsigned by 128.111.95.138 20 jan 06.

Alright, then choose an article and get rid of redundancies. Right now the two articles are a patchwork of redundancies. I would assume just redirect the shunning article to this one, since this is an encyclopedia and not a dictionary. Cuñado - Talk 23:20, 21 January 2006 (UTC)

to cunado I will get rid of the reduncies I added and sharpen distinctions between the two articles as soon as I can. However there is ongoing discussion so it will take time. These are complicated, usually well concealed, topics loaded with much POV and much passion and will take time to sort out. Anacapa 01:12, 27 January 2006 (UTC)

Part of the problem is that excommunication is a legal term used only in particular Christian denominations, which, while it shares some ideas in common with similar incidences of "shunning"-style behavior in other communities, is rooted in specific Christian notions of Communion/Community (on a side note, someone with some theological training might want to throw in a paragraph about this connection). I would support Makemi's suggestion of an overarching page on religious/social outcast status (whatever term be employed). But Takfir, Cherem, and probably Disfellowship (though I don't know enough about the Jehovah's witnesses to be certain), should be linked independently to that category, parallel to excommunication, rather than having them link here & using this as a sort of ad hoc main article. So the set-up should be: main page on "socio-religious outcasts" (or whatever you want to call it) with a sub-page for the manifestation of this casting out in each particular community. This would also allow us to address the objection above (below?) on similar practices in Dharmic & Eastern religious communities, by having separate parallel pages for those practices linked to the main one. And it would allow the removal of redundancies from this article, since they would be covered in the main page.

Wikipedia is not a dictionary. The subtle difference between being excommunicated and shunned can be mentioned in the same article. Is there a group that excommunicates but doesn't shun? Is there a group that shuns but doesn't excommunicate? and if there is, why can't we still combine the pages? I don't see a credible argument that excommunication is the Christian equivalent of Takfir and Cherem, it's the English word used to describe it. Cuñado - Talk 07:28, 26 January 2006 (UTC)

Actually, I just noticed that there is a page for the Christian version of excommunication, it's Anathema. So can Excommunication be the central page now? Cuñado - Talk 07:31, 26 January 2006 (UTC)

Cunado The difference between excommunication and shunning is far from subtle. Many mainstream churches excommunicate/dismembership with no shunning so shunning should be a separate article from excommunication. I use the dictionary to make these distinctions so we can sort out all the confusion/redundancy and yes I too have been guilty of such redundancy here. Excommunication is a formal one-time process of dismembership. Shunning is an ongoing form of sanction. I see these articles as separate and distinct. 'Shunning' seems to be shaping up. I will do what I can to clean up my pieces in 'Excommunication'.Anacapa 01:20, 27 January 2006 (UTC)

I edited the Excommunicaton intro to make distinctions between excommunication and possible follow on censures/sanctions eg shunning. I also deleted all shunning related info in Amish/Mennonite and will summarize that info later in Shunning. please comment Anacapa 01:45, 27 January 2006 (UTC)

Ok, I hereby retract my request to merge. I think with the recent changes to the intro and content they seem fine. Cuñado - Talk 02:18, 27 January 2006 (UTC)

Looking at some of the concerns about Dharmic/Eastern groups above, I suggest we ask about whether these groups use formal dismembership and on what basis...and stick that in the excommunication article. I also suggest we ask whether these groups shun former members and on what basis and include that in the shunning article. In shunning the organization seems to be clean as Jewish and Bahia groups are separate from Christian groups but the excommunicaton article seems much less clean. 128.111.95.55 07:35, 31 January 2006 (UTC)

Introduction

I am going to add statements in the introduction that show general aspects of Excommunication and that reflect the rest of the article. If you have a problem with these statements being false or non-general please state the group that you have concerns about and add sourced material to show me what your concerns are. The basic statements will include the idea of condemnation and shame here that are part of formal excommunication in many of the faiths studied here. Please be specific with your POV in your discussion/edits. Anacapa 02:04, 3 February 2006 (UTC)

One True Churches link/ relevancy to Excommunication

I added a link to One True churches which exlains why leaving or being excommunicated from such churches is so traumatic from the point of view of cult exiters. This is directly relevant to many of the churches in this article and to excommunication therefore I insist on it being included here. These One-True church statements can be found in the official theologies of some of these churches here too. Since there is sourced material here to compare against please do not revert these links before reasonable NPOV discussion. Anacapa 02:26, 23 February 2006 (UTC)

What you write above is relevant only to a few of the organisations mentioned here. Anacapa, you seem to be trying to make a case by taking a few extreme examples and extending them to cover all of Excommunication.

That is not my intention. I am simply trying to balance POV and point out holes in what I see in this article to induce balance and discussion. I make no claim about knowing how all Mennonites excommunicate. I also suspect no Mennonite can make such a claim either. There are no known NPOV sources here either. This is also a subject that all Anabaptists tend to conceal so I have sound cause to question statements made here. Somehow I want NPOV balance that represents some reasonable reality and one that includes the extremes but doesn't show the extremes as if all Mennonites are extreme. Please suggest how to do this with few credible NPOV sources available and without edit wars. Anacapa 07:13, 27 February 2006 (UTC)

Also Anacap you write: "However, since most Mennonite churches use no formal forums to fact-find, these assessments are sometimes based on false accusations and/or internal political issues.". That statement reads a little bit weaselly, because sometimes every discipline process is based on false accusations or internal politics. But putting the statement in here implies that Mennonites are in some way special in this regard, which you have not shown. Please find some supporting evidence for this. (Incidentally you are certainly wrong in some cases - many Mennonite churches do have a formal process for excluding from membership). DJ Clayworth 16:07, 23 February 2006 (UTC)

I welcome sources on Mennonite churches who actually use formal forums to fact-find vi a vi accusations of so-called sin, dissent or whatever. Traditionally Mennonites do not fact find with formal forums. I included this because the consuequences of some Mennonite excommunications can be so serious. Therefore Mennonites are special here because fact finding matters so much in some cases. We can discuss how to show this but I insist on some statement about how this fact finding is done in reality. Anacapa 07:20, 27 February 2006 (UTC)

I also cleanued up some of the Mennonite section. While a Mennonite church will continue to pray for a member who has been excluded, it is not always as a 'fallen sinner'. If the disagreement is over doctrine rather than behaviour then the prayer can be for renewed understanding, or for eventual reconciliation. Reconciliation attempts are almost invariably in private (not usually) and I would want to see edivence of any case where private reconcilation was not attempted before public exclusion. Incidentally Mennonite churches don't generally use the word excommunication. DJ Clayworth 16:16, 23 February 2006 (UTC)

DJ What do they pray for is all I was after here... fallen sinner or whatever. I added links to the official Mennonite encyclopedia on excommunication. If contemporary Mennonite discipline differs widely in tone or terms with what is described there then it should be shown here with the proper definitions and realistic representation. I am not going to quibble over words but I do know that excommunication from Mennonite churches usually involves some sort of judgement or in extreme cases condemnation which is church POV rather than objective fact. I have no argument with the public/private issue above. Usually privacy rules in Mennonite churches which can be good and bad. If some other terms are used for discipline excomm or dismembership than show em here please. Excommunication is used in Amish and conservative Mennonite churches. Anacapa 07:48, 27 February 2006 (UTC)

Anacap, is it possible that all the stuff you are trying to say about Mennonites and Anabaptists in general is actually only applicable to the Church of God in Christ, Mennonite? DJ Clayworth 02:00, 24 February 2006 (UTC)

DJ, I added a few statements to attempt to balance the POV's here. Since there are no known sources to check on contemporary Mennonite Excommunication across all denominations it is going to be impossible to gain accurate sourced NPOV here. I do not insist on exact terms but I do insist on representative content and tone. I know Mennonite discipline from the inside and from reading earlier entries made here (by I assume Mennonites) so I see the basic method has stayed about the same. I don't know if you call the Holdemans Mennonite or not, if not this should be stated in the main Mennonite article because they obviously call themselves Mennonites and share much in common doctrinally with orthodox Mennonites. What I am trying to say is applicable to orthodox and all forms of Mennonites who use traditional methods of Mennonite discipline. From reading news articles it seems as if even the progressive Mennonite churches face traditional although less extreme Mennonite forms of discipline. See Daniel Lee's study of Weavertown Mennonites in PA in the links for a somewhat orthodox example of Mennonite traditions. I am going to look over your changes. Please suggest how you want to proceed so we don't waste time in useless delete's/changes. Anacapa 07:04, 27 February 2006 (UTC)

I have no problems with you adding things to sections about Old Order Mennonites. My knowledge of their disipline is not very large. I don't know who the 'Orthodox Mennonites' are exactly - they appear to be closedly related to Old Order, but at least in Canada I don't think they are one of the subgroups of it. Are they a US group only? Maybe you could explan how they fit into the Mennonite tradition.

I'm not sure where your sources are from for saying that "progressive Mennonite churches face traditional although less extreme Mennonite forms of discipline". Daniel Lee's study was on Old Order Mennonites, and even there he says that "In contrast an 'expelled' Weaverton Mennonite can continue to attend worship services with their families, and engage in social activities. It is not uncommon for oficially excommunicated members to attend church services.". So the thrust of the article is that even in Old Order Mennonite communities, the 'ban' is a good deal less than total. DJ Clayworth 19:07, 27 February 2006 (UTC)

DJ please glance at the comments below on 'orthodox'. Stettler is adding content that shows the whole picture with distinctions and with data. I hope he/she will go the whole way toward real representation as he/she makes distinctions between the various denominations and how they discipline. This should meet a lot of both our concerns. As for progressives, I lost track of a source from a Germantown Mennonite Church member who wrote an article about her hurt feelings after mild shunning from the Mennonite Church USA of the whole GMC church over the gay issue. I hope to find it again and reference it here for you. As for Daniel Lee paper, he did not study excomm, the ban or shunning as such. He did study the unthinking nature of Mennonite rituals. He did point out that members were often excommunicated and the other church members had no idea WHY. This is relevant to how some Mennonites excommunicate not to Shunning per say. I want study shunning in Shunning and excomm in this article to prevent repetition and confusion. Hope this explains things a little. Again Stettler is doing some good work here too so check out that content and comment. Anacapa 04:44, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

Can I safely take the 'disputed' tag off the mainstream Mennonite section? DJ Clayworth 19:12, 27 February 2006 (UTC)

DJ Before we pull that tag I have the following concerns:

• 1. Who are the Mainstream Mennonites? This should be well stated with statistics in the main Mennonite article with links back to them here. Ditto for the progressives. I added some content in the Mennonite article under Mennonites today. I have no idea what the stats are for Mainstreams/Progressives in Canada and around the world. What is clear is that the Mennonite Church USA is a minority and declining portion of total Mennonite membership in the US. This mainstream/progressive representation must be shown here and in the main article so people do not falsely assume that mainstreams and progressives are the majority of all Mennonites or that they speak for all Mennonites. The (mainstream?) Mennonite Church USA's Third Way Cafe website, for example, is full of outright positive POV falsehoods and ommissions and it falsely implies that all Mennonites are ONE people when in fact the Mennonite Church USA appears to contain a declining minority of Mennonites in the US.
  2. I need NPOV sources/content on how mainstream and progressive Mennonites do indeed discipine and excommunicate or 'dis-member' members or whole churches and for what common reasons. To me, a genuine Mennonite Excom./discipline/shunning history belongs in that longwinded History section in the main Mennonite article with links back and brief referals here to save space. I also take issue with that MacMaster statement. See the Vision, Doctrine, War: Mennonite Identity and Organization in America 1890-1930 reference in Mennonite for another POV. As I read this section it is far from clear to me HOW Mainstream and Progressive Mennonites discipline WHO...for WHAT so-called causes and how they differ from or are similar to orthodox methods. (see 'orthodox' discussion below.)
  3. I want to see NPOV balance between church POV and the POV of the former members. It would be nice to hear from former members of Mainstream or progressive churches here so their POV is included about how they were handled too. I also have questions about a number of statements here that appear to have implicit or concealed church POV that I will be glad to discuss with you.

However, despite these concerns, I see a lot of progress toward balanced NPOV here. We just need to get the facts and insist on genuine representation here so that we can eliminate opinion-based judgements and edit wars. I will wait to see more NPOV sources before I make wholesale changes here. Please comment. Anacapa 05:41, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

Orthodox Mennonite refers to a very specific group of Old Order Mennonites who live in two counties in Ontario and who have little more than 200 members. However this group does not shun, in fact the only difference with the larger Old Order Mennonite body in Ontario is that the men wear beards. So I don't think this group is what this article aimed at refering to. For this reason I removed the term Orthodox Mennonite Stettlerj 07:57, 28 February 2006 (UTC)

I used the term 'orthodox' from the dictionary to make distinctions between Old Order and other denominations of Mennonites including the Holdemans who as the dictionary says about orthodox: 'ahere to the accepted or traditional and established faith'. I did not use 'orthodox' as a name for any specific denomination. However now that you are beginning to describe and make specific distinctions between Anabaptist demonimations, I can dispense with this dictionary generalization here. I do want to point out however, that contrary to some statements made here, extreme excommunication, and banning and shunning is indeed orthodox Anapabist tradition, rather than a pathological aberration. A glance at the early faith confessions, Menno Simons statements and Anabaptist history show how 'orthodox' the Anabaptist Ban is. Anacapa 04:25, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

Sam Harris who wrote The End of Faith, notes there that the most honest religious people are those so-called fundamentalist fanatics who follow the bible literally while the nice, gentle, moderates falsely try have their cake and eat it too. He calls the moderates the most numerous, the most hypocritical and the most dangerous because they conceal their hate and are covertly hypocritical. There is no doubt where orthodox Anabaptists stand because all one has to do is study the early Anabaptist faith confessions which are specific and clear. For me, moderate Mennonites are the real mystery because I have no idea what in fact they stand for or against.Anacapa 04:22, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

The truth is I'm not sure what we mean by 'meanstream Mennonite'. I'm assuming it means 'Mennonites apart from Old Order', but I realise that's hard to define. I'm thinking primarily of the Mennonite Church and Mennonite Brethren and similar groupings. It would probably be a really good idea if someone with the knowledge put a list of the biggest conferences and other groupings in the Mennonite article. Are we counting Brethren in Christ here too? DJ Clayworth 18:51, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

Parenthetical to a mention above of Daniel Lee's study of Weavertown Mennonites, one may want to see whether the Weavertown Amish Mennonite Church page is adequate. The Beachy Amish and Moses M. Beachy articles also relate.

for fewer generalisations...

In order to avoid generalisations such as "Mennonites do this..." "Amish do that..." I have tried to break the article down into the particular Mennonite groups. However there are many more subgroups that can be talked about, this is just a start and i don't know if they all should be included. There is the Kleine Gemeinde, the Old Colony, there are 4 different types of Hutterites, Lehrerleit, two groups of Schmiedleit, Dariusleit and a fifth if we include the Prairieleit, there are the Holdeman Mennonites, Automobile Old Orders, there are a bunch of Conservative groups... probably we can resume some of these groups or as I would prefer, just give a sampling, as I have, of some of the groups, and then perhaps mention that there are more of these little groups, some of which practice various degrees of shunning of the excommunicated. Otherwise it becomes a Mennopage and Mennonites are by no means the only ones who excommunicate, and to just mention Mennonites as if they are the only people who exist - that would be non-NPOV in itself. Stettlerj 07:33, 28 February 2006 (UTC)

Stettler, this appears to be some fine content you added although as I am unfamiliar with the sources I will have to do some research to check it out. I am glad to see distinct denominations shown here because this is how we begin to see a data-based view of the all the diverse groups called Anabaptist/Amish/Mennonite/Hutterite. This will prevent much false steoreotyping and begin to represent who these specific peoples really are. This also goes a long way toward meeting my goal of balanced NPOV studies of Anabaptist discipline. What you have added is better than anything found in the mainstream secular or religious print encyclopedias which gives me hope that centuries of intense Anabaptist (and yes Mennonite) struggle over internal discipline will be finally given due diligence here. I welcome more of the same.Anacapa 03:00, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

May I make some suggestions/ask questions about your concerns about space, little groups and various degrees of shunning as follows?

• 1. To me, (Stettler's) paragraph above, itself, is rich with information that is not shown in the main articles. The vast majority of Mennonites seem to worship in these little, independent, distinct, and diverse denominations. To me, representation of this diversity belongs in the main Mennonite/Amish/Hutterite articles so we can link to them here and save space/repetition here. This diversity seems to be a special Anapbaptist trait that needs to be shown so people know who Anabaptists were and are today in all their distinction denominations. I hope to see someone identify all these groups from conservative to progressive along with their estimated membership. Please comment.
  2. Who are the mainstream Mennonites groups referenced here? Is the Mennonite Church USA the so-called Mainstream conference? Are they the only mainstream Mennonites?
  3. To save space, I suggest a table that shows all the distinct groups with their associated discipline/excomm/shunning from extreme to mild. If we go back to general 'sampling' statements we risk false steoreotyping of distinct groups again. Unlike most other churches, Mennonites and the other Anapbaptist groups cannot be fairly represented as ONE people with ONE distinct type of discipline. To me, your data-based distinctions go a long way toward a distinct and representative study here. This kind of representative research can prevent opinionated edit wars too.
  4. To save space and eliminate repetition, I also suggest we put historical content in the associated main articles and use Excomm for current practices. I also suggest that as much as possible Excomm be used to show discipline up to and including excommunication but that shunning and other sanctions be linked to related studies in the Shunning article. Excommunication itself is a complicated and controversial subject in Anabaptist denominations. We risk repetition and running out space if we try to do it all here. Please glance at the merge discussions above and suggest ways to include all your content cleanly and distinctly so we see the FULL scope of all forms of Anabaptist discipline both here, and/or in the associated main Article histories and in Shunning.
  5. Would it be possible, once we have basic consensus on the source credibility/facts here, to condense some of this content to save space?

Please comment and suggest how to go forward here. I might make minor changes to some content (with edit comments) but I will hold off on all big changes until I discuss them here. Again, I am delighted that genuine light is beginning to be shed on a topic heretofore concealed for centuries and silenced with shame. I thank you for adding all this well-sourced content. Anacapa 03:43, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

To those who have concerns about who is who here, I, along with others, added new data-based content on population that might help with discussions we have here. Let's see if we can get to fact-based discussions where possible to cut confusion. Clearly based on membership numbers in North America and Worldwide the Mennonite Church USA and Mennonite Church Canada have no right to dominate representation in these articles. Much more data is needed on the other autonomous groups if we are to have a credible article here and in Mennonite I acknowledge Stettler for beginning that search. Is there an accurate census somewhere on these autonomous groups that gives us some idea how they worship too? Anacapa 03:57, 4 March 2006 (UTC)

Hershey

You're right, Anacapa, his mother was devout Reformed Mennonite but nowhere does it say Milton himself was. I suppose I assumed he grew up Reformed Mennonite if his mother was a devout Reformed, but it should probably just say his mother was a devout Reformed Mennonite so as not to make assumptions. However I did read that as an adult, once each year he went to a Reformed Mennonite Church service, but of course that does not make one a Reformed Mennonite and he was not particularly religious. One interesting thing about the Reformed Mennonites is that, even though they are plain, they do not believe in dressing their children plain. Stettlerj 01:55, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for that clarification. I also suggest we state his mother as just a Reformed Mennonite (RM) unless there are facts to show how devout she indeed was. Sons often do silly things to make their mothers happy (no offense please) so who knows why Hershey went to church...what is quite clear, (from his bio), is that his Mennonite background did have a big effect on him...but that is a topic to mention in the Mennonite article IMHO. As far as RM's and dress, that is quite interesting and quite significant as plain dress is a powerful form of social control. This suggests, to me, that RM's might respect their children enough to allow them to choose their faiths as 'adults' rather being forced to be Mennonites as children with no conscious choice allowed. These kinds of interesting distinctions would make the main Mennonite and other Anabaptist articles much more readable, representative and authentic to non-Mennonite readers (and I imagine Mennonite readers too). Please comment. Anacapa 02:48, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

"Milton Hershey's mother was a devout member of the Reformed Mennonites (Scott, 1996:116)" Not that it is really important for the article about excommunication but perhaps important for the article on Hershey himself. I am not sure about what should be done with the Mennonite page, I never have really followed it closely. To me, it is too complicated for me to touch. I would suggest the Mennontie article give a quick history and then break up into smaller articles about each particular group. Stettlerj 05:41, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

Sources and possible biases

Can you tell me who Scott is and who his publisher is? Good Books in Intercourse PA looks like a Mennonite publishing house. If so, one has ask about POV, credibility and possible conflicts of interest here...(no personal offense please)given how obviously loaded this topic is for most Anabaptists. As for Hershey's mom, from what I know about orthodox Mennonites they ALL had better be 'devout', or else be banned so I wonder what fact(s) Scott based this on. As for history, I too hope to see the Main article contain a short, all-emcompassing and representative history of ALL Mennonites with links to each particulary group and its specific history so we waste little time here and in Shunning rehashing common Mennonite themes. Anacapa 06:10, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

What do you suspect Scott is lying about? Good Books is in Pennsylvania and is run by a Mennonite family (Good is a "Mennonite last name"). Scott is not Mennonite, although he writes about them. So based on that if you want me to retract everything i wrote in the article I could if you don't trust it, but I don't see why. I don't think I have anything more to say about it, when you find a history of Mennonites written by a Catholic, let me know. In fact, I don't think anyone is more critical of Mennoites than Mennonites are (remember we are not all "one"). Stettlerj 06:34, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

Please no personal offense here. This is a fine contribution. I accuse no one of lying! I just want to know who is who here. I don't want you to retract anything now. I am just asking who the source is get to get some sense of POV that's all. Everyone has a POV, a bias and a blind spot. All I want to do is make sure people own these POV's so no one is blind-sided that's all. Please do not get mad and quit just because I asked a question all scholars ask. You have a right to ask me about my POV, biases too and I have stated them above. I also did a lot of cleanup that is not personal in any way so please do not become personally offended. Anacapa 08:05, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

No offence taken. I suppose, I don't see what it matters if the person writing is Mennonite or not. It should be judged on its accuracy etc, not what ethnicity, religion the author is. From my experience, often those writing about mennonites, amish etc. who are not Mennonites, amish are the sources with the most problems (for example showing the mennonites as a perfect little community, or by ignoring the different kinds of mennonites, or by thinking all mennonites are "cousins to the amish" and speak German with blond hair, etc.). Usually some of the best sources for Mennonite, amish history and culture (but not always) are "mennonite" and "amish" sources (I would consider for example Garrett an "amish" source and this does not hurt credibility), but of course you want to be critical of all work, no matter who wrote it. The best sources to judge the merit of Mennontie Theology however would not be Mennonite sources. I think a difference should be made between Mennonite sources that talk about Mennonite history and Culture, and those that talk about Mennonite Theology, they are not the same and the POV issues are not the same. The best way to be critical is to know a lot already about a certain subject. No offence taken, and i agree with your general statement that the mennonite page talks probably too much about the Mennonite Church USA but the people who would probably have the greatest problems with that would be other Mennonites from other groups (you see, mennonites can be very critical amongst themselves). Stettlerj 16:43, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

I am glad no offense was taken here. To me, it is critical who writes what about who, how, because possible conflicts of interest, biases, and outright falsehood abound everywhere in the American media today. I suggest you google Esquire magazine's Greetings from Idiot America article (11/05) to understand one basis for my concerns here. I question ALL sources, Anabaptist and non-Anabaptist and that includes Ruth Irene Garret and other sources critical of Anapaptists as well as those Anabaptists sources who pander to positive Anabaptist POV. I will be back later to expand on this and address your specific comments above. Anacapa 01:05, 4 March 2006 (UTC)

As for Mennonite sources here is my general POV. I mean no offense. It is my POV.

• 1. Because Anabaptist people have long been secretive and insular, there is no objective way of knowing how they excommunicate, discipline and/or shun from the outside. I know Anabaptists know much more about this than is shown in the mass media or in these articles (with the exception of your content) but I rarely see them tell what they know or encourage excommunicants to do so. Sometimes secular researchers lie their way into congregrations and do 'objective' research but that is wrong and fraudulent. The end result is that Britannica and the Encyclopedia of Religion make no real mention of the long history of these 'special' Anabaptist/Mennonites conflicts/schisms/sanctions despite the immense pain and suffering they can and do cause their targets. This makes one wonder how honest Anabaptists have been with earlier mass media researchers and has led me to question the NPOV balance of Anabaptist sources on Anabaptism. It is quite strange to me that Main Mennonite article goes on forever about positive POV history and makes little genuine mention of Mennonite discipline, the deep schisms it has caused over the centuries and the people who have fought it...ditto the Anabaptist history and yet this is studied in the Mennonite Encyclopedia. The Amish put it right up front in their article which is cool. To me, ALL Anabaptists need to show all sides especially the uncomfortable sides to be credible. I have found that NPOV balance is rare among Anabaptist sources. Your content is a welcome breath of fresh air.
  2. I have a big problem with falsehood, and misrepresention wherever it is. I am glad that Mennonites call falsehoods too. However, I want this encyclopedia to be credible to researchers, publishers and regular people the world over, who come here to know more about Mennonites.
  3. I believe that Mennonites and other Anabaptists sometimes, silence, shame and conceal uncomfortable topics for self-serving reasons at the expense of others. The title of that Lancaster paper's article Silenced by shame reflects this concern. This is why I sometimes fight so hard here to make sure the facts come out here. Your content is a FIRST in an encyclopedia as far as I can see!

Hope this helps.Anacapa 04:55, 4 March 2006 (UTC)

Mennonite section: Size, Organization and 'false impression'

I think this is getting a little too big and detailed. Once we have started writing whole sections about sects with 400 members If we did this for every Protestant group we would have an article that ran to thousands of Kb. Can we write a summary of Old Order Mennonite groups and then put the specific information in the articles on the specific groups?

While I'm here, can I remove the NPOV section tag from the Hutterite section? It hasn't been edited in a long time. And what exactly is the dispute over the 'Mainstream Mennonite'section? DJ Clayworth 18:44, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

I agree. However, whatever the version chosen, the Mennonite and Old Order Mennonite sections should not give the false impression that excommunication implies shunning for the majority. That would be my concern, and I am not even Mennonite, so I have no personal interest here, except that it stays factual. I mentioned the numbers to show how small these groups are the strict shun the excommunicated, kind of to show just that, that it is almost too small to receive much more than a slight mention in the Mennontie sections (as opposed to focusing on these groups). Stettlerj 19:06, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

That's fine by me. I think we are at least going to have to make some division between those Mennonites that consider themselves a distinct community spearate from the world (Old Order etc) and those that don't (MC, MB etc). I realise it's not possible to draw a hard and fast distinction, but I think we should discuss the differences. DJ Clayworth 19:13, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

My last edit i made I reverted a lot of stuff, you might want to check out what I reverted. Maybe you want to revert it back. The main thing that had been taken out prior to my revert which restored it was the history of excommunication among early Anabaptists. Stettlerj 19:15, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

No offense please, however, I am going to revert back to tighter version I cleaned up for these reasons:

• 1. Write ups about Anabaptist, Amish, Mennonite and Hutterite history need to be done honestly in those articles which study ALL members of those groups. Otherwise this Excom article will become much to big, repeat and often contradict what is stated in those articles and will become irrelevant to excommunication itself. Please glance at the opening of this article and how the other non-Anabaptists churches have handled excommunication. I'll note that Amish article seems fairly honest so we could use it as a link for Amish history to eliminate repetition and content not directly relevant to Excommunication.
  2. We cannot have all these little groups of Mennonites sub-titled separately here unless we do the same for all other Amish, Hutterite, Catholic, or Mormon groups in this article and that is impossible without a book length article. All Mennonites groups belong beneath the main Mennnonite section. It is possible to meet DJ's concerns above with language in that section that makes distinctions between the Mainstreams and the many other groups of Mennonites who seem to contain the vast majority of members (from the Mennonite Church USA statistics on this (see Mennonites today) Stettlers content makes these group distinctions well with specific data. We cannot claim to have a problem with general statements and then go right back to general steoreotypes again. Somehow we have to show all these groups/membership counts and make distinctions between them so readers can make their own judgments here. I ask that DJ write up data-based statements about who the Mainstreams are worldwide and how they do Excom differently from other Mennonites conservative and progressive. I doubt very much that progressives use the same excom methods as Mainstream either. Stettler is leading the way here with facts. Let's follow her(?) example with so we have facts to compare facts with here. I insist on seeing the little groups here in short tight summaries as well as the larger groups too. False impressions are best shattered with hard work and facts rather than endless opinions. We need much more data and sourced facts on the Mainstream and progressive groups here to match Stettlers content on the conservative or orthodox groups IMHO.
  3. As far as false impressions go, I/we could easily write a few general distinctions once we have sound facts and data to show what the specific distinctions between Mainstream and other groups on both sides are here. So let's not make false impressions an excuse to squelch the full scope of Mennonite excommunication here..(no offense meant). DJ, I ask you to provide us specific NPOV sources on the Mainstream groups about who and where they are, how they do indeed discipline and excommunicate and how their excom differs from or is similar to the other groups on both sides. I do not believe the 'mainstreams' can speak for the 'progressives' either so I welcome input from progressive sources here too.

I welcome comments and suggestions. I also ask that DJ read the responses I made to his comments concerning POV and other issues. I am leery of removing the Hutterite POV template because of what Stettler said about the other Hutterite groups. To be fair we must show all groups with proper distinctions and proper data. What make Anabaptists 'so much fun' here is that there are so many independent and distinct Anabaptist groups as opposed to say the Catholics or Mormons. We need to capture the full scope of Anabaptist groups here to have a crebible article here...and yet be short, tight, and clean so the other churches have space too. Anacapa 02:01, 4 March 2006 (UTC)

For those who want to check false impressions, I suggest a glance at the new content on Population. Clearly the Mennonite Church USA/Canada is a minority in the US and worldwide while the autonomous groups are a majority. To be credible, these Mennonite sections (I include Shunning sections) and the main Mennonite article must fairly represent the majority of Mennonites not just the minority Church Mennonites. Is there a census somewhere that breaks down all these independent groups be they conservative, mainstream, or progressive along with some idea about how they worship: excommunicate, sanction and/or shun? Anacapa 04:12, 4 March 2006 (UTC)

Je vais me coucher moins niaiseux ce soir. Je sais que ce n'est que vous tout seul qui possède le savoir nécessaire pour déterminer ce qui est une source crédible ou non avec toute vos connaissances du sujet. Pour qui est-ce que vous vous prennez? Vous avez toute une attitude. Je sais que ce n'est que vous qui possède la vérité, nous autres on n'est que des sources biésés mais n'est-il pas un peu biésé de votre part de faire des présuppositions sur nos motivations, de toute façon, j'ai aucune raison d'être biésé, j'suis même pas mennonite. Vous n'avez aucune autre motivation que la vérité et je suis un peu sarcastique quand je dis ça. Mais j'applaudi sincérement certaines de vos contributions, et vous nous poussez des fois à améliorer des articles, mais vous me semblez un peu condescendante. Stettlerj 15:18, 4 March 2006 (UTC)

For the love of little apples can whoever wrote this be more precise: "...as is evidenced by the recent excommunication of certain churches recently from certain conferences". Who, when, and why would be good questions to start by answering.

I don't think we can fill up the Mennonite section with statements about churches with 400 members. Why don't we do what we usually do: write a general section on Excommunication in Mennonites and then a larger article giving more detail. What we have now is still way too detailed. DJ Clayworth 20:00, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

Suggested criteria for the Amish/Mennonite/Hutterite section

I am going to suggest some criteria for this section to complete balanced, NPOV, and yet representative content in the least space possible so the other Churches share equal space.

• 1. we put general historical content about each group's history in that group's main article or in anabaptist
  2. we put excommunication content (see article intro) in Excommunication and shunning content in Shunning (see that article's intro and merge discussions above here) and match section titles for flow between the articles.
  3. we figure out and show who is who and who worships what in the main group's articles before we decide how to handle specific groups here. (Stettlers detailed content was a huge contribution because it ended a bunch of baseless edit wars and gave us a basis for going forward. I want more details before we condense this because it is clear that the 'devil is in the details' and that having endless edit wars over unsourced generalizations is a waste of time.) For example, the Amish represents the Amish history well enough that we can link back to it and focus on just Amish Excommunication here. I wish the same could be said about Mennonites and Hutterites so we could link back to their articles too and save useless repetitions here. In the end, I suspect that data and the balanced NPOV, histories/facts in the MAIN articles will make it fairly easy to write a general section and include all specifics HERe too. Failing that we will be back to 'he said-she said' shouting from sources who make vague general claims or worse using our own opinions instead.
  4. we show the extreme and orthodox forms of excommunication well because they are so serious to target members and so interesting to Non-Mennonites. We also show how modern and progressive Mennonites (etc, etc) have become less orthodox and less extreme and why. Anything else risks POV by ommission.

These are just some beginning ideas. I am open to suggestions but I am also quite concerned about about pandering to positive POV here so please show me balanced NPOV alternatives with sources to go forward. - contribution by User:Anacapa on 07:17, 14 March 2006 (added by mennonot on April 23 for clarity)

I understand what you are saying here. I believe that including very detailed information on smaller sects is problematic, though. You are going to find all kinds of odd beliefs when dealing with small denominations or non-denominational churches. Those kinds of things really belong in a page about that specific sect. Making notes for every small sect represented by someone with an axe to grind strikes me as problematic.

please refrain from unnamed 'ax to grind' innuendos such as editor Rbj seems to enjoy using in his long history of character assasinations with edit comments...that is an old an ugly Anabaptist Relational aggression tactic See Sattlers letters. I share these concerns. I would prefer to see excomm explained here with examples of extreme, moderate and mild excomm so we see the whole scope of this topic.Anacapa 01:49, 27 April 2006 (UTC)

I also think shunning practices should be generally linked to that article, rather than trying to explain shunning here again. Whether or not some groups practice shunning should be the extent of it.

That is exactly what the suggestions above say too. Did you read them? The history should go to the appropriate articles too. We don't need to know much about Amish or Mennonite history here as this is about Excomm content.

Maybe I'll get reverted, in which case I'll leave it alone.Sxeptomaniac 22:51, 29 March 2006 (UTC)

Looking at the current version, there is far too detailed information on the issue of excommunicating churches that accept homosexual behavior in the Mennonite section. For one, it details information that is completely unnecessary, and for another, it isn't a specifically Mennonite issue. I specifically know that some churches in the American Baptist Congregation were excommunicated, and I believe that a number of other denominations are dealing with the issue in various ways. A sentence or two is all we need, if that. Sxeptomaniac 21:04, 25 April 2006 (UTC) On further consideration, there is some good information in those two paragraphs, but I feel they would be better suited in the Mennonite Church USA and/or Mennonite Church Canada articles, or possibly just the main Mennonite one. I think it is a much broader issue than excommunication. Sxeptomaniac 21:55, 25 April 2006 (UTC)

The important thing here is to show the main reasons for why excommunication occurs. This seems alright to me as we the Progressive subsection in Mennonite will likely show differences in doctrine between the many types of churches. I have no problem with a sentence or two on this either. Anacapa 01:43, 27 April 2006 (UTC)

Hutterites

Can I remove the dispute tag on the Hutterite section? I don't know if it is actually accurate now, but no-one has edited it for a long time (except me). DJ Clayworth 15:11, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

DJ I would prefer to leave this template in place until we have Hutterites themselves balance this POV. I am afraid that we may be emphasizing only the extreme here. That is why I put the POV check on in the first place...so that like you no one would feel unfairly associated with one particular extreme group. Anacapa 22:40, 29 March 2006 (UTC)

wow you guys are longwinded! do you do this for a living?

Editor Rbj's edit war with perjorative edit comments

Editor Rbj engaged in an unresolved edit war with me as shown above. He continues to make perjorative statements with his edit comments. As I insist that he discuss his issues before he makes changes to this content because it is highly loaded and full of POV.

As for his false statements about 'my' content or POV...I would like to mention that as far as I know editor DJ Clayworth added most of the content in question. I insist that he refrain from using edit comments to continue his war with me. I insist that he discuss his POV issues with us on this page instead.

Anabaptist forms of excommunication are highly loaded topics as they are seen differently by the targets as opposed to the targeters. I insist that we include all POV's here.Anacapa 07:02, 24 April 2006 (UTC)

Continued POV issues about Anabaptist/Mennonite content

I pulled in the Anabaptist section content from the last edit and added my issues with facts and POV to show that I am quite able to be reasonable here. I insist that editor Rbj either discuss his disputes here or call for arbitration as he seems to hit and run rather than discussing his issues. This is a loaded topic that is seen from opposite perspectives which depends on who is the target and who are the targeters. Both POV's need to be shown here with complete, balanced NPOV. My POV issue is that historically Anabaptists have gotten away with silencing the POV's of those they 'discipline' with excommunication, with falsely minimizing its occurence and with failing to represent all sides of their sanctions.

However, this section seems far better than it was when I began to do what editor Rbj falsely calls 'axe grinding'. Many editors have brought content in that shows a much more complete, balanced and NPOV picture here. However, IMHO we still have quite a distance to go because what we have now is far from reflective of the full scope of specifically Mennonite content that is shown in Scott and many other sources (such as My Family Disowned Me, Cosmogirl.com Feb 2004) I for one also need to see much more balanced POV here. The teen in the article above was told by her Mennonite father (in Park Hall MD) "You're destroying the Body of Christ and this family" when she decided to go to college. However, the FATHER was the ONE doing the disowning rather than the teen who was losing her beloved family. This insidious double-bind blame is a POV I insist on showing here as it is fact.

As for Rbj if you can contain your hate, discuss your disputes and be somewhat professional with your edit comments, I will be glad to work with you. However, if you begin that old ugly game of character assassinations with edit comments I will go for help again. I also ask that you refrain from using henchmen to come in sight unseen and make 'axe grinding' innuendos or whatever. There are many valid POV's here in addition to yours. The facts in the Encyclopedia of American religions and many other sources show that the Ban was the primary form of sanction for Anabaptists as a replacement for the status quo sanctions to discipline 'heretics' (such as roasting on a stake etc etc) used by other Christians of the era. We need to show the full power of excomm and the ban as it was intended by Menno and others. To water it down to serve modern Mennonite political POV's is POV IHMO. Anacapa 04:38, 27 April 2006 (UTC)

CURRENT CONTENT with FACT/POV issues I see:

Anabaptist tradition The neutrality of this section is disputed. Please see discussion on the talk page.

When believers were baptized and taken into membership of the church by Anabaptists, it was not only done as symbol of cleansing of sin but was also done as a public commitment to identify with Jesus Christ and to conform one's life to the teaching and example of Jesus as understood by the church. Practically, that meant membership in the church entailed a committment to try to live according to norms of Christian behavior widely held by the Anabaptist tradition.

In the ideal, discipline in the Anabaptist tradition requires the church to confront a notoriously erring and unrepentant church member, first directly in a very small circle and, if no resolution is forthcoming, expanding the circle in steps eventually to include the entire church congregation. If the errant member persists without repentance and rejects even the admonition of the congregation, that person is excommunicated or excluded from church membership. Exclusion from the church is recognition by the congregation that this person has separated himself or herself from the church by way of his or her visible and unrepentant sin. This is done ostensibly as a final resort to protect the integrity of the church. When this occurs, the church is expected to continue to pray for the excluded member and to seek to restore him or her to its fellowship. There was originally no inherent expectation to shun (completely sever all ties with) an excluded member, however differences regarding this very issue led to early schisms between different Anabaptist leaders and those who followed them.

(The intro section above is PACKED with one-sided official-POSITIVE POV. It attempts to blame the victim and ignores the corruption and conflicts inside churches that Scott chronicles. It makes no room for the excommunicants' POV's about excommunication. It makes no mention of the POV's of Michael Sattler, Menno Simons and other Anabaptist leaders' POV about the 'abominable' excommunicants)

Amish

(This content seems to be fairly representative, of what I see from sources, but some of the history is too much. Also there is no mention of how the Amish handled widely publicized cases of rape and incest with excommunication which shows what issues the Amish see as significant vi a vi excomm)

Jakob Ammann, founder of the Amish sect, believed that "the Ban" (i.e. excommunication along with shunning) should be systematically practiced among the Swiss Anabaptists as it was in the north and as was outlined in the Dordrecht Confession. Ammann's uncompromising zeal regarding this practice was one of the main disputes that led to the schism between the Anabaptist groups that became the Amish and those that eventually would be called Mennonite. Recently more moderate Amish groups have become less strict in their application of excommunication as a discipline. This has lead to splits in several communities, an example of which is the Swartzedruber Amish who split from the main body of Old Order Amish because of the latter's practice of lifting the ban from members who later join other churches. In general, the Amish will excommunicate baptized members for failure to abide by their Ordnung as it is interpreted by the local Bishop if certain repeat violations of the Ordnung occur.

Excommunication amoung Amish results in shunning or the Ban, the severity of which depends on many factors, such as the family, the local community as well as the type of Amish. Some Amish communities cease shunning after one year if the person joins another church later on, especially if it is another Mennonite church. At the most severe, other members of the congregation are prohibited almost all contact with an excommunicated member including social and business ties between the excommunicant and the congregation, sometimes even marital contact between the excommunicant and spouse remaining in the congregation or family contact between adult children and parents.

[edit] Mennonites

(This section makes no mention about where Menno himself stood on excommunication. It also seems to be focused on the Moderate groups which are a declining minority of Mennonites. The more Conservative groups deserve more space at the top here to reflect their size and the amount of excomm they do do. This is also a somewhat POSITIVE POV section that fails to reflect the excommunicants' POV's. It seems to falsely imply that the Mennonite Church is a single Church when in fact it is a faith with hundreds maybe thousands of separate independent and distinct churches that in total make up more than the Moderate Conferences' membership)

In the Mennonite Church excommunication is rare and is carried out only after many attempts at reconciliation and on someone who is flagrantly and repeatedly violating standards of behavior that the church expects. Occasionally excommunication is also carried against those who repeatedly question the church's behavior and/or who genuinely differ with the church's theology as well, although in almost all cases the dissenter will leave the church before any discipline need be invoked. In either case, the church will attempt reconciliation with member in private, first one on one and then with a few church leaders. Only if the church's reconciliation attempts are unsuccessful, the congregation formally revokes church membership. Members of the church generally pray for the excluded member. (The facts don't match here about "rare" as per Scott. This PP is one side's Positive POV. We need excommunicant POV too here.)

Some regional conferences (the Mennonite counterpart to dioceses of other denominations) of the Mennonite Church have recently acted to expel member congregations that have openly welcomed non-celibate homosexuals as members. Active homosexual behavior continues to be believed to be contrary to biblical teaching and continues to be explicitly proscribed by the confession of faith of most or all Mennonite conferences. This expulsion of some Mennonite churches has been and continues to be controversial in the broader denomination, particularly when there are some U.S. Mennonite congregations that welcome active servicemen or women of the military as members when paricipation in violence, war, or the military is equally proscribed by Mennonite faith and practice.

Some of these expelled congregations were dual affilated with the Mennonite Church and the General Conference Mennonite Church, the latter which did not act to expel the same congregations. These two Mennonite denominations voted to merge in 1995 and formally completed such merger in 2002 to become the new Mennonite Church USA and Mennonite Church Canada denominations, after which it was still not clear, in all cases, whether or not the congregations that were expelled from one denomination yet included in the other are considered to be "inside" or "outside" of the new merged denomination. Also some Mennonite conferences have chosen to maintain such "recalcitrant" congregations as "associate" or "affiliate" congregations in the conferences rather than to expel such congregations. In virtually every case, a dialogue continues between the disciplined congregations and the denomination as well as their current or former conferences. [1]

The practice among Old Order Mennonite congregations is more along the lines of Amish, but perhaps less severe typically. An Old Order member who disobeys the Ordnung (church regulations) must meet with the leaders of the church. If a church regulation is broken a second time there is a confession in the church. Those who refuse to confess are excommunicated. However upon later confession, the church member will be reinstated. An excommunicated member is placed under the ban. This person is not banned from eating with their own family. Excommunicated persons can still have business dealings with church members and can maintain marital relations with a marriage partner, who remains a church member. (This is way too little content for so many groups (Scott) with so many forms of often extreme excommunication and with so many members. It is also full of Positive POV that fails to show all POV's such as those in the Holdeman Survivors blog (see link on Holdeman article))

[edit] Hutterites (I am fine this section as it seems to have balanced POV now. However it needs cleanup for flow and sources that show those "arrangements")

The separatist, communal, and self-contained Hutterites also use excommunication and shunning as form of church discipline. Since Hutterites have communal ownership of goods, the effects of excommunication could impose a hardship upon the excluded member and family leaving them without employment income and material assets such as a home. However, often arrangements are made to provide material benefits to the family leaving the colony such as an automobile and some transition funds for rent, etc. One Hutterite colony in Manitoba, Canada had a protracted dispute when leaders attempted to force the departure of a group that had been excommunicated but would not leave. About a dozen lawsuits in both Canada and the United States were filed between the various Hutterite factions and colonies concerning excommunication, shunning, the legitimacy of leadership, communal property rights, and fair division of communal property when factions have separated. Anacapa

At the time Sattler promoted the use of the Bann, the Lutherans, the Reformed, and the Catholics killed those who left their churches. So should someone write in the Lutheran excommunication section that a true Lutheran kills excommunicated members as taught by Martin Luther? I don't think we should. You have to put it in its historical context. Stettlerj 14:13, 27 April 2006 (UTC)

True Lutherans who would STILL kill excommunicated members TODAY as taught by Martin Luther long ago would make the news today. Some self-described true Mennonites who still faithfully do follow Menno Simons shunning traditions today do make the news now and rightly so.This is current events backed by a long history of extreme excommunication and severe shunning that some orthodox, Old Order or conservative Mennonites still practice today. Most moderate Mennonites today decline to castigate shunning, much less acknowledge its central place in Mennonite history while fundamentalist Mennonites continue to shun as before. Would we tolerate Lutherans today who see no need to condemn the past killing of Lutheran excommmunicants? Why do we tolerate Anabaptists who see no need to condemn shunning by other Anabaptists here and now? This "historical context" argument is trick to hide the foundations of historical and present day Mennonite 'discipline' be it mild, moderate or severe depending on the distinct Mennonite (or Anabaptist) church. Why I ask do moderate Mennonite editors and their friends fight so hard to hide shunning some Mennonites do? Would they stand by and allow THEIR friends and families to be so shunned? Do they care at all about the human condition? Anacapa

Editor RBJ's response to Anacapa's POV issues with Anabaptist content

i am loathe to respond to you, Anacapa. we have been around the maypole so many times on this talk page and on Talk:Mennonite and i do not have the time for debate by use of Proof by verbosity. i will say two things:

who the blank is 'we' RBJ? Do you lead this little gang or do you offer sourced content to discuss issues. My experience with you is that you character assassinate when you cannot back your case and character assasinate me in the coldest cruelest ways possible. This indeed how I remember Mennonites behaving during shunning so I am not suprised but spare me the poor little pathetic round and round sob story because YOU personally have never responded to anything I offered with reason or evidence much less credible sources. Anacapa

thank you for leaving the Anabaptist section for others to edit/cleanup. i can certainly live with the "totally disputed" tag. i was the one who removed the POV tag at the top and put it in the sections where it belongs. (how come the other religious traditions in the article aren't having this level of dispute? considering that question is revelatory.)

I can see now that given Wiki's rules people like you will usually rule on wiki which will make wiki much less credible over time. Most of the other religious traditions do indeed induce much dispute in the mass media. But as you know Anabaptists almost always refuse to talk to the mass media so very few outsiders know how Anabaptists manipulate Anabaptist realities to coddle favor with the larger world. What is and will be relevatory is that people like me are beginning to talk and what they say is being heard. You want to play in the real world then open your ideas and conduct up to the real world. Anabaptist articles written by and for Anabaptists and or their friends hardly qualify as credible articles. If I were from a fundamentalist Mormon or Moonie background I would be just as concerned with THEIR inhumane crimes against other human beings in the name of religion too. I loath Catholic coverups of sex abuse cases but there I have the free press to show us all what Catholic leaders do. Here I edit almost alone but that will change in time as the free press opens up Anabaptist abuses too. Anacapa

• as before, i do not buy your protestations to not injecting POV or of not grinding an axe. since creating your WP account, you have edited (besides Usertalk pages) hundreds of times to Torture, Psychology of torture, Mind control, Parental alienation, Parental alienation syndrome, Relational aggression, Domestic violence, Hate, Shame, Abuse, Child abuse, Child sexual abuse, Statutory rape, Pedophilia, Incest, Rape and then to Feminism, Religion, Anabaptist, Mennonite, Amish, Old Order Mennonite and then to Excommunication, Shunning, and three bios Donald Kraybill (a Mennonite), Camille Paglia (a feminist), Mary Kay Letourneau (a statuatory rapist). that's it. no other topics! nothing on food or music you love or poetry or science or sports or art or happy things or trivia. and there is no other broad religious group or class of persons that you are targeting. it's not about Catholics and mind control or about ornithologists and sexual abuse. also it is clear that you are repeatedly getting in POV disputes with other persons regarding many of those other topics, not just here.

RBJ I had awesome examples of violence, vice, and covert incest...namely a bunch of vicious Ban, shun and shame Mennonites and their look-the-other-way buddies in the larger Mennonite 'world'. Like Oprah I believe that one must give back to those kind non-Mennonites who gave so much to me and to warn the world that all is far from nice within Anabaptist groups since these groups are quite totalitarian and so far have managed to silence most people who need to talk about terrible Anabaptist crimes. I suggest you read Linda Espenshades Silenced by Shame; Hidden in Plain Sight series in the Lancaster (PA) Intelligencer Journal. That comes from the heart of Anabapist country so spare me more character assassinations to cover inside crimes. I am about religion but the Religion article is far less POV than Anapbaptist articles are and my edits there were fine. I detest religious respect-rapes the world over (see The Guru Papers: Masks of Authoritarian Power for why or watch the Indian film Water). Anacapa.

Anyone good is goin to get into POV disputes a lot as all our great scientists did. Let's be honest your great leader Menno Simmon's writings were one long POV dispute for a thousand plus pages. Spare me POV dispute accusations here because you obviously hold too a tight POV too. What I have a problem with is a gang bang approach by people inside some groups (Anabapists, feminists, and others) to protect their POV's with loathsome lies which is also quite a common tactic in Communist China. I do like Camille Paglia because she makes such shameless people squeal. As for my loves why would I expose myself to a people who use lie-love to take, use and toss people I love? I have a cousin who is being shunned by her own people for nothing more than leaving a cruel Mennonite cult. This needs to be shown as a Mennonite tradition here minus all these character assassinations psycho-analyses.

Anacapa

now none of us need to be Fellini nor Freud to figure that out. you have an agenda here at WP. it is painfully and overtly clear. it is painfully and overtly clear who (from which group) did what to you or someone you care for. Wikipedia cannot be and must not be a theraputic solution for whatever it was that some obscure group of Mennonite/Amish/whatever did to you (or the other person). it is simply untrue that responsibility for this negative and focussed experience can be laid at the feet of the larger group of people who simply don't do what it is that you're implying. even here, in this talk page you are mixing issues such as Relational agression to the issues of shunning and excommunication. this is creating a false impression. as i said 2 months ago, i is very much similar to someone writing about the Roman Catholic Church as if every priest is known to have molested a kid sometime in their ministry. even if it has happened, all too often, and even though the RC Church leadership has not been forthcoming and responsible about dealing with this wrong until they were finally forced to, it would be wrong to portray the RC church as if that was normal or common (unless you really had solid proof.) Wikipedia is not your soapbox and the portion of Mennonites who do whatever abuse it is that you're hung up about is no greater than the portion of the general population and possibly less. to repeatedly try to connect Mennonites to this kind of abuse is to misleadingly imply that this abuse is endemic to the denomination. i'm 5 decades old, and i have never seen anything like what it is you are trying to portray Mennonites as. i can also tell that there is some "dilettance" in usage of terms that do not exist in this subject, except by your introduction (e.g. "Orthodox Mennonites" or "double bind" whatever it is or what Menno Simons taught about it - Mennonites are not Lutherans, Menno Simons was not the founder of the faith nor has more influence in defining it that other 16th century leaders). You are simply misrepresenting people as a group, creating false impressions, trying to define what other people believe (instead of letting the other people define it for themselves), and trying to mold historical events into your concept of present day reality regarding a group you seem to know so little about.

RBJ It might come as some surprise to you that EVERY wiki editor has an "agenda" here. I do have an agenda and so do you and other Anabaptists or those who pander for Anabaptists. Spare me your relational aggression and your character assassinations and stick to the topics at hand. I tend to find character assassinations from people who claim to be Peace people quite absurd.

Mennonite, Amish and Hutterite(?) shunning is a form of relational aggession, parental alienation and psychological torture. It resembles in form what the Chinese Communists did in the Red Revolution under the great leaders Maos' reign of terror. By the time the Communists ended up murdering their victims they had stripped them of almost all that made them human. There are many sources here that state how terrible Anapbaptists traditions are to those on the recieving end. Blame the victim or double bind blame is a favorite tactic for tyrannical churches and regimes the world over. It was and is used by some Mennonites to excommunicate those who challenge the church's authority, traditions and often corruption inside churches. My issues here is that you and some other editors wish to pander to positive POV about Anabaptists and censor shunning and other cruel traditions that were and are part of the Mennonite third way. To compare Mennonites with Catholics is absurd. There is one Roman Catholic church under one great leader, the pope but hundreds? of distint Mennonite churches (from fundamentalist to progressive) and you a Mennonite? of five decades decline to claim any Mennonite leader much less the "great leader" Menno Simons. I have been quite willing to make these distinctions because I know that not all Mennonites use extreme excommunication or severe shunning to control their flocks but some orthodox Mennonites do. Most moderate? Mennonites like you refuse to recognise realities because other Mennonite shunning makes you look justifiably bad much as sex abuse by a few hundred Catholics and their loathsome leaders makes all Catholics look bad. The Mennonite Third Way Cafe flatly states that no Mennonites shun which is a loathsome lie in a world in which at least 20,000 Mennonites in several distinct groups still shun. As for all these accusations about me molding beliefs I suggest you look at non-Anabaptist sources (which match most of what I have added here). You and your groupies do whatever you can to stifle sources that have no axe to grind here which makes me wonder who is indeed grinding whose axe here.

your inability to recognize how you appear to others is indicative of just "not getting it". no one can look at your edit history and not quickly conclude that you are here pushing an agenda, big time, despite your denial. (it ain't just a river in Egypt.) it's only been "put to rest" in your imagination. Rbj 05:39, 28 April 2006 (UTC)

RBJ you are a master at character assassination as a way to distract people from well-known Mennonite and Amish facts and a very poor psychoanalist I might add. To use the cliche "not getting it" (whatever YOUR 'it' is) is an ugly form of social aggression that some fascist second-wave feminists also use against third wave feminists so spare me more meannesses here please. I find your refusal to discuss specific content with sources regretable and shameless. Mennonites have a long and well known history of cult-like conduct. Rape and incest and domestic abuse occur do indeed occur inside some extreme Mennonite or Amish Churches somewhat similar to what we saw with our FBI's most wanted Warren Jeff's fundamentalist Mormon church. Excommunication of Amish victims and severe pressure on Mennonite victims for disclosing such crimes has been in quite a few news articles and TV shows nationwide so spare me that character assassinations and show us all what really goes on inside extreme Anabaptists churches. I am interested in showing systemic 'crimes' like shunning and the systemic coverup of terrible crimes inside SOME Anabaptist groups rather than adding content about the human failings of a few Anabaptists. To me excommunication for reporting incest, child-rape or whatever is a terrible church crime that ALL Anabaptists should speak out about. Is your age in the way here? Anacapa.

Seminal Anabaptist justification for Excommunication and POV about Excommunicants

The content below is from the Michael Sattler's 1527 Scheithiem Confession. It shows the method used the OVERT basis for and the POV about those excommunicated. What is not shown here is the COVERT basis for excommunication which were doctrinal differences with the leadership (as Sattler covertly alludes to in his opening letter). I added bolding for possible POV and fact checks in this article's tone/facts/POV. Scott's book on 'old fashioned' Mennonites is full of stories about schisms formed from conflicts/excommunications over doctrine.

Second. We are agreed as follows on the ban: The ban shall be employed with all those who have given themselves to the Lord, to walk in His commandments, and with all those who are baptized into the one body of Christ and who are called brethren or sisters, and yet who slip sometimes and fall into error and sin, being inadvertently overtaken. The same shall be admonished twice in secret and the third time openly disciplined or banned according to the command of Christ. Mt. 18. But this shall be done according to the regulation of the Spirit (Mt. 5) before the breaking of bread, so that we may break and eat one bread, with one mind and in one love, and may drink of one cup.

Third. In the breaking of bread we are of one mind and are agreed [as follows]: All those who wish to break one bread in remembrance of the broken body of Christ, and all who wish to drink of one drink as a remembrance of the shed blood of Christ, shall be united beforehand by baptism in one body of Christ which is the church of God and whose Head is Christ. For as Paul points out we cannot at the same time be partakers of the Lord's table and the table of devils; we cannot at the same time drink the cup of the Lord and the cup of the devil. That is, all those who have fellowship with the dead works of darkness have no part in the light Therefore all who follow the devil and the world have no part with those who are called unto God out of the world. All who lie in evil have no part in the good.

Therefore it is and must be [thus]: Whoever has not been called by one God to one faith, to one baptism, to one Spirit, to one body, with all the children of God's church, cannot be made [into] one bread with them, as indeed must be done if one is truly to break bread according to the command of Christ.

Fourth. We are agreed [as follows] on separation: A separation shall be made from the evil and from the wickedness which the devil planted in the world; in this manner, simply that we shall not have fellowship with them [the wicked] and not run with them in the multitude of their abominations. This is the way it is: Since all who do not walk in the obedience of faith, and have not united themselves with God so that they wish to do His will, are a great abomination before God, it is not possible for anything to grow or issue from them except abominable things. For truly all creatures are in but two classes, good and bad, believing and unbelieving, darkness and light, the world and those who [have come] out of the world, God's temple and idols, Christ and Belial; and none can have part with the other.

To us then the command of the Lord is clear when He calls upon us to be separate from the evil and thus He will be our God and we shall be His sons and daughters.

He further admonishes us to withdraw from Babylon and the earthly Egypt that we may not be partakers of the pain and suffering which the Lord will bring upon them.

From this we should learn that everything which is not united with OUR (I added emphasis here) God and Christ cannot be other than an abomination which we should shun and flee from. By this is meant all popish and antipopish works and church services, meetings and church attendance,* drinking houses, civic affairs, the commitments [made in] unbelief and other things of that kind, which are highly regarded by the world and yet are carried on in flat contradiction to the command of God, in accordance with all the unrighteouness which is in the world. From all these things we shall be separated and have no part with them for they are nothing but an abomination, and they are the cause of our being hated before OUR Christ Jesus", Who has set us free from the slavery of the flesh and fitted us for the service of God through the Spirit Whom He has given us

Anacapa

McMaster's comments of the church discipline

..."In the last decades of the seventeenth century, Swiss Mennonites in Alsace and the Palatinate also subscribed to the Dordetcht Confession (DC) of Faith, ... That confession probably never replaced the 1527 Schliethiem Confession as an accurate expression of the Swiss Anabaptists' fundamental understanding of their faith. However it was the only such statement available in print and thus was the only one widely read by the Swiss in areas along the Rhine and later in America. The DC spelled out the biblical and theological framework of Mennonite thought and offered specific detail on both faith and practice, including the foot washing rite and the ban."

"Dutch and Swiss Anabaptists had agreed in principle on the need for church discipline, including some version of the ban. (...) But none of the south German or Swiss Anabaptists or Mennonites had ever carried the ban idea as far as the Dutch who followed Menno Simons on the point. The southerners were not willing to separate a family from ordinary, everyday relationships with an errant spouse, parent, child or neighbor. Their practice was simply not to allow the erring one to participate in communion or the Lord's supper." Anacapa 06:08, 27 April 2006 (UTC)

Exactly what we've been saying. Shunning was never part of the Swiss-South German Anabaptist tradition (note, "Bann" = Excommunication; "Meidung" = Shunning). Also, it is really an accident of history that Mennonites are named after Menno Simons. They could just as easily have been called Grebelites or Stattlerites or something similar. Menno Simons joined the Anabaptists and was an extremely influential leader, especially in the north, but was not the founder and his teachings are not necessarily the basis of Mennonite thought, and I would categorise him as an early Harold S. Bender. Stettlerj 13:25, 27 April 2006 (UTC)

Stettlerj, please spare us such "have your cake and eat it too" babble about the great leader Menno Simons or at least make sure all the other articles related to Mennonites and Menno Simons match your personal opinions. Since Wikipedia has no credible method to ensure ETHICAL consensus I see no need to waste my time with people here who see no need to represent who Menno Simons was and how he IS indeed seen by most Mennonites today. I know Menno Simons is being hidden because he indeed wrote down some shameless shaming ideas such as marital avoidance or spouse-spouse shunning to control his people. Rewriting history is a favorite tactic of totalitarian groups to cover past and present crimes. It will be almost impossible to attain NPOV here unless other NON-Anabaptists editors establish some reasonable standards for dialogue. You are pandering to positive Mennonite POV here which hides some terribly ugly facts about Mennonite history and current conduct well within the Mennonite tradition. I suggest other editors read Enclycopedia of American Religions for some sources of my POV issues about Anabaptists here. Anacapa

I know what you are saying. Iran, Iraq, North Korea, and Churchtown, Pennsylvania. By the way, I am not Mennonite. Stettlerj 17:43, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

Sorry, i don't know how i did that...

[1] . i must have inadvertedly edited an earlier than current version and that stuff about the R.C.C. (of which i know little to nothing about) slipped back in. i didn't intend that. r b-j 06:57, 22 June 2006 (UTC)

Not a problem. I figured that might be the case, but I wanted to be clear about my reasons for removing it. Sorry if I seemed a bit short. I found this particular insertion ridiculous, because it would be difficult to find a Christian tradition that would say it is possible for a Christian to be damned, since a Christian is, by definition, saved.

I have a limited knowledge of the R.C.C. myself, but found the claim that excommunication=damnation dubious, from what I know of their current doctrine. On research, it just wasn't supported. It's possible that a doctrine like that was in effect at some time in R.C.C. history, and I'm attempting to research that next. Sxeptomaniac 15:38, 22 June 2006 (UTC)

you weren't short. i just assumed that the anonymous edit "attacked" again, but when i saw it was me, i was a little sheepish. i understand your frustration with the RCC edits (that may create a false impression). coming from a Mennonite background, i was trying to hold the line on that from a single editor that seems to edit only articles about abuse, sexual abuse, etc. and wanted to portray the Mennonite church as some kind of abusive cult and i wasn't willing to let that happen. r b-j 21:37, 22 June 2006 (UTC)

Islam and excommunication section

I just added more information on Islam and excommunication. I thought the section was too short and needed more clarification. There are many themes to be taken into account which I didn't, But i Think it is important someone does. the main themes I see necessary:

• Islam as a noninstitutionalised religion. and therefor the lack of authority to practice takfir.
• Takfir's root in islam. There are certainly some writings in the Quran that refer to "Murtadin"- or renegades.
• It is traditionally believed that the "Murtad" should be punished by the death penalty. Other punishments include amputation of limbs or exile- someone needs to research this.
• The Prophet's Hadith refered to in the edited section is a clear indication to the graveness of the act of takfir.
• recent instances I mentioned three, I also mentioned the divorce implication. Does anyone know of other implications (maybe disinheretance- since kafirs cannot inherit muslims?) or other cases for that matter? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 83.244.10.46 (talk • contribs)

See apostasy in Islam. Andries 18:58, 20 July 2006 (UTC)

Milingo removed

Sections removed for two reasons:

1. this is a specific example. We'd have to add an example for each crime listed, if we add this.

2. Milingo was excommunicated latae sententiae NOT for "spreading confusion" but for the very specific crime of ordaining a bishop (a bunch in fact) without an apostolic mandate, which is a very specific offense. We have to be accurate.

This should rather be an entry under Milingo.HarvardOxon 01:03, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

This seems reasonable. I just wanted to show the full flavor of excommunication from both POV's. How do we show the excommunicants' POV here?

1. please sign comments 2. I don't think we have to show either POV. The point of the article (at least the Catholic section) should be to describe what excommunication is, how it works, what the law is, etc. Here are the facts and definitions. Good, bad, like, dislike, fair, unfair -- that's the scope of an editorial, or laying out pro/con of a particular case, not of an article on excommunication itself.HarvardOxon 03:48, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

Communion v.s. communication

It is said at the very beginning of the article: "The word literally means out of communion". This doesn't sound right. The word literally means "out of COMMUNICATION". Now, two things: either the article take for granted that COMMUNION and COMMUNICATION are the same thing, that they express the very same concept (and than the article should say so and explain why) OR it aknowledges a difference between the two concepts (and explains the nature of this difference).

Thanks

In standard Modern English, a person who receives communion in a church is known as a communicant. In standard Modern English, the infinitive used to express that one takes communion in a church is "to communicate." "John is a communicant of the Methodist Church." "During the Mass, Cardinal Jones communicated." See, for instance, Merriam-Webster Dictionary (the one even every high school student should have on desk or disk), "communicate," 1st definition for use as intransitive verb (of six definitions offered overall).

In theological terms, the word communion also signifies the relationship of unity within the community of believers - a bishop is either in communion with the Pope or not, that is, either shares a recognition of common dogma and doctrine and is a relationship of good standing, or not. The Anglican Communion are those churches who recognize a shared theological heritage and common doctrinal definitions.

These all come from the Latin, communicare, which means to give to another, to impart, to make common among several people, or to participate in - the word in Latin does not mean "to talk to" somebody, in the narrow sense of the single one of several English definitions you have chosen. That it "doesn't sound right" to you does not mean that it is not right, has not meant this and been used this way for approximately 600 years (that is, to the 14th Century in English, and to the 4th Century in Latin).

Ex, in Latin, means from, out of. Hence, the word means, and has always meant, the act of placing someone oustide of communion -- both in the broad sense of outside the commonality of a unifying relationship, and in the narrower sense of oustide the reception of the Sacrament of Holy Communion, which is so named because it signifies the deepest relationship between believers, and betgween those belieers and God.HarvardOxon 00:38, 19 November 2006 (UTC)

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Thanks for this rich explanation. I think it should be somehow integrated to the article (maybe in a digested form) unless of course one think it is too much of a digression (which I would understand). And, again, thanks for your intervention.

Can the pope still excomunicate?

From what I've understand, pope still keeps himself the right to excomunicate people, doesn't he? And if he does, what was the last time he used it?

Yes, certain occasions will result in the Pope himself declaring a person excommunicate. This is quite unusual, however. A more recent case would be Archbp. Milingo for example. On other occasions, when the pope COULD declare someone excommunicate, he has choosen not to do so.DaveTroy 11:35, 18 February 2007 (UTC)

Eastern Orthodox

What is up with this quote concerning the EO after declaring someone anathema, "will be unable to rot in their grave?"

Deleted. The writer needs to quote a source.71.101.43.156 14:25, 26 February 2007 (UTC)

Apostasy

How can the Catholic Church excommunicate an apostate when the apostate is technically no longer a Catholic and is therefore not subject to Catholic rules or punishments? This is kind of a "You can't fire me I quit" situation. Emperor001 21:39, 8 June 2007 (UTC)

The apostate is technically still a Catholic, even after he or she is excommunicated. The article should make this clear. For example, see the first two footnotes and the associated article text. -- Cat Whisperer 00:37, 9 June 2007 (UTC)

How is an apostate still Catholic. I thought that to be an apostate, one had to leave his/her religion. For example, if a Catholic left to become a Protestant, wouldn't that mean that the person is now a Protestant, not Catholic, and therefore cannot be excommunicated? I was under the impression that if one is guilty of apostacy, that means that they left their religion. Emperor001 16:20, 13 June 2007 (UTC)

Here is an analogy: One day, I wake up and decide that I no longer wish to be considered a citizen of the United States. I stop paying taxes. When the IRS sends over an agent, I tell the agent that I no longer recognize the authority of the government to collect taxes from me. When the police come to arrest me, I tell them I do not recognize their authority to take me away. When the judge sentences me to jail, I tell the court that I do not recognize its authority over me. But in the end, I still end up in jail. Apostasy is same way. The apostate no longer recognizes the authority of the Catholic church. Nonetheless, the Catholic church still exercises its authority over the apostate, and can still impose excommunication on the apostate. The rule of canon law is "once Catholic, always Catholic." Anyone baptized into the Catholic church, or received into it after non-Catholic Christian baptism, is subject to the ecclesiastical rules and penalties of the Catholic church. -- Cat Whisperer 18:44, 13 June 2007 (UTC)

Gotcha. But what if a person who is baptized as an infant into Catholicism leaves the Church upon becoming old enough to choose his/her own religion. Are they still condidered apostates and excomunicated or are they left alone since they never chose to be Catholic. Also, with your analagy about citizenship, there is a way to end your citizenship just as there is your religion. If you want to give up your American citizenship, all you gotta do is move to another country and become a citizen there. You are then no longer subject to your former country's laws just as apostates are no longer subject to Catholic rules. Emperor001 02:54, 27 July 2007 (UTC)

A minor (someone under 18 years old) is not subject to automatic excommunication for any reason. For an act performed after the age of majority to count as apostasy, I believe the requirement is that the person be aware that they were baptized a Catholic. It doesn't matter whether the person chose to be Catholic in the first place; it's the act of deliberately choosing not to be a Catholic any more that defines apostasy. And even then, the Catholic Church still considers the apostate to be a Catholic, just a "bad" Catholic. This is due to the "once Catholic, always Catholic" rule. -- Cat Whisperer 03:15, 27 July 2007 (UTC)

That sounds like a good analogy. Another way to look at it is that if someone leaves the Church, they're declaring that (or in some cases just acting like) they're no longer part of it. If the Church excommunicates them, it is basically formally agreeing with them that they're no longer in communion with the Church. Or to use your analogy of "You can't fire me, I quit!", both employer and ex-employee agree that the latter is no longer employed. The mechanics matter little; someone leaving the Catholic Church isn't likely to want or need a reference from them to join some other religion. Wesley 16:53, 12 July 2007 (UTC)

Cleanup

This looks like a good article to me. What remains to be cleaned up before the cleanup tag is removed? RJFJR 03:51, 11 July 2007 (UTC)

Well it basically all needs to be cleaned up. Who cares about some religious mumbo jumbo? Not worthy of a wiki page. It is all fake. npapadon 11:12, 18 July 2008 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 208.58.149.18 (talk)

Question about Mormon excommunication

I have heard through anecdotes that in order to rejoin the LDS church after excommunication or apostasy, one has to go through an interview process? Is that true? If anybody can point me in the right direction I would greatly appreciate it. Is there any need to add that information here, or is the scope going to be held narrowly to excommunication? Greenw47 (talk) 14:49, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

More examples needed

There are very few examples quoted of what warrants or warranted an excommunication from the catholic church. Does anyone have any examples to add to the article? Mike0001 (talk) 12:42, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

I think that a good topic for discussion is the evident favoritism that the Catholic Church shows to certain individuals. The best example is Senator Edward Kennedy (D-Mass.) who openly supports abortion, who cheated at Harvard, who panicked at Chappaquiddick, who remarried after divorce, and who otherwise thumbs his nose at the moral teachings of the Catholic Church. Yet, the Catholic Church has taken no public action against him. Likewise, Bernard Law, involved in the reshuffling of pedophile priests, far from being excommunicated, has been rewarded with a cushy position in the Vatican. 130.13.9.232 (talk) 07:05, 26 March 2008 (UTC)John Paul Parks130.13.9.232 (talk) 07:05, 26 March 2008 (UTC)

List of people excommunicated by the Roman Catholic Church - Second Discussion

I have made a proposal for a discussion to limit the List of people excommunicated by the Roman Catholic Church to those excommunicated by Papal decree (papal bull, etc.) only, rather than automatic excommunications. If you have an opinion on this, please respond on the talk page for the list. JRP (talk) 02:34, 18 June 2008 (UTC)

Non-excommunication of pedophile priests

There are several notable misconceptions on the nature of excommunication and its legal effects. For instance, many people complained that pedophiles priests and former nazi leaders were never excommunicated. Although it would not be impossbile to excommunicate them one day, if they are still alive, it would first have to be approved by the Council for Legislative Texts and the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, which are in practice in charge of Canon law and legislation on excommunication. As of today, pedophilia and ideological racism are considered to be serious sins, although they really are just sins, taken from the much broader notion that the Church is a Church of sinners in dire need of repentance. ADM (talk) 21:38, 17 March 2009 (UTC)

Illustration

The current illustration is the only one in the article, and frankly it isn't that exciting - unless you knew already, you'd have no idea what the pic was supposed to represent. I'd suggest replacing the current top picture with this one: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Anthonis_van_Dyck_005.jpg which gets the idea of excommunication across, I think, a lot better (you could actually guess what's going on just from looking at the picture. Added benefit that it's depicting one of the more famous and influential excommunications in history) and moving the other down further into the article. Thoughts? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 134.10.176.172 (talk) 05:25, 23 November 2009 (UTC)