Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- v. To strip of priestly privileges and functions.
- v. To deprive of the right to practice a profession.
- v. To deprive of an honorary position.
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- Same as unfrock.
Wiktionary
GNU Webster's 1913
- v. To divest of the frock, i. e. to deprive (a priest, minister, etc.) of official ecclesiastical authority; -- of church officials.
WordNet 3.0
- v. divest of the frock; of church officials
Examples
“A senior Catholic Church official has threatened controversy by saying that it would be safer not to "defrock" priests who had been convicted of sexually abusing children.”
Telegraph.co.uk: news, business, sport, the Daily Telegraph newspaper, Sunday Telegraph
“Years of correspondence between Father Ronan's superiors discussing his alleged abuse of minors in Ireland were first sent as attachments to the Vatican in February 1966, Mr. Lena said, as part of a request from his religious order to defrock Father Ronan—a request that was granted weeks later.”
The Wall Street Journal: Vatican Releases Files in Bid to Rebut Claims of Coverup
“The Vatican began its crusade to defrock Father Bourgeois in November of 2008 with the threat of excommunication.”
The Huffington Post: Michele Somerville: A Frock Does Not A Priest Make
“Roy Bourgeois made the front page of this past Saturday's New York Times, and I was glad for the good news at hand: 157 priests signed a statement in support of Father Roy Bourgeois, whom the Vatican has begun to defrock.”
The Huffington Post: Michele Somerville: A Frock Does Not A Priest Make
“If they defrock him, they set him on a path to official or unofficial sainthood.”
“The church on Wednesday presented its highest-level official response yet to one of the most explosive recent revelations regarding sex abuse — a story the Times broke on the church's decision in the 1990s not to defrock a Wisconsin priest accused of molesting deaf boys.”
Holy Thursday: Pope washes feet, Vatican slams media amid scandal
“He added: Compare how long it takes to defrock paedophile priests with how secular organisations work.”
The Guardian: Pope's UK visit prompts increase in sex abuse allegations against church
“I hereby defrock the FF and restore the title to the Frua-bodied 1952 Ferrari 212.”
The Wall Street Journal: A Showroom of Regrets: What I Got Wrong in 2011
“The NYT had a story the other day about a priest accused of sexually molesting teenage girls here in the US who returned to his native India where the local bishop declined to defrock him.”
The Volokh Conspiracy » Remarkable Window into Amnesty International’s Worldview
“Whelan, the archbishop of Wisconsin who urged the Vatican to defrock Martin, the priest who allegedly abused more than 200 boys at a Catholic school for the deaf over the years, was himself secretly engaged in a homosexual relationship (with a consenting adult!).”
The Volokh Conspiracy » Remarkable Window into Amnesty International’s Worldview
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘defrock’.
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GRE Barrons Wordlist
A complete Barron's Wordlist for GRE preparation. Your online flashcard replacement.
abase, abash, abate, abbreviate, abdicate, aberrant, aberration, abet, abeyance, abhor, abject, abjure and 4084 more...
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Unknown
coalition, cabinet, tweet, defuse, steep, ancestral, mindset, breach, infraction, egregious, curb, backbite and 280 more...
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End in -ock
Inspired by fbharjo (see spitchcock).
spitchcock, hillock, willock, peacock, pajock, penock, yapock, sycock, bittock, bawcock, burrock, cammock and 168 more...
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Undo
A list of terms that denote separating one thing from another, or deconstructing a thing into its parts or to a former state. E.g., untie, divorce, unscramble.
untie, divorce, unscramble, disunite, disjoin, undo, separate, disassemble, uncouple, unhitch, disassociate, disaffiliate and 178 more...
hernesheir (v): Literally, to remove the frock or vestments of church officials, and thus their authority. Dec 30, 2008