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Definitions

American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition

  1. v. To deprive of the right of church membership by ecclesiastical authority.
  2. v. To exclude by or as if by decree from membership or participation in a group.
  3. n. A person who has been excommunicated.
  4. adj. Having been excommunicated.

Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia

  1. Eccles., to cut off by an ecclesiastical sentence, either from the sacraments of the church or from all fellowship and intercourse with its members. See excommunication.
  2. Hence To expel from and deprive of the privileges of membership in any association.
  3. To prohibit on pain of excommunication.
  4. Cut off from communion; excommunicated.
  5. n. One who is excommunicated; one cut off from any privilege.

Wiktionary

  1. adj. Excommunicated.
  2. n. A person so excluded.
  3. v. To officially exclude someone from membership of a church or religious community.
  4. v. To exclude from any other group; to banish.

GNU Webster's 1913

  1. adj. Excommunicated; interdicted from the rites of the church.
  2. v. To put out of communion; especially, to cut off, or shut out, from communion with the church, by an ecclesiastical sentence.
  3. v. To lay under the ban of the church; to interdict.

WordNet 3.0

  1. v. oust or exclude from a group or membership by decree
  2. v. exclude from a church or a religious community

Etymologies

  1. Middle English excommunicaten, from Late Latin excommūnicāre, excommūnicāt- : Latin ex-, ex- + Latin commūnicāre, to share (from commūnis, common; see common).

Examples

  • “This is it that the faithful stood in fear of, as long as they stood excommunicate, that is to say, in an estate wherein their sins were not forgiven.”

    Leviathan, or, The matter, forme, & power of a common-wealth ecclesiasticall and civill

  • “It is time to "excommunicate" those who tarnish the reputation of the GOP with infidelity, scandal, and lawbreaking actions.”

    Johnston says Palin lost his vote

  • “One of the tactics that has been used by some elements of the official structures of American Jewish organizations has been to attempt to "excommunicate" some critics of Israel by calling them "self-hating Jews" or "enablers of anti-Semitism.”

    Rabbi Arthur Waskow: Renewing Jewish Culture or Excommunicating Jewish Thinkers?

  • “They wouldn't use terms like 'excommunicate' and 'anathema', of course.”

    Archive 2007-07-01

  • “Athanasius, but had the impudence to "excommunicate" Pope Julius himself.”

    Saint Athanasius The Father of Orthodoxy

  • “When those within a community try to "excommunicate" and dishonor truth-tellers, it is our obligation and responsibility to speak out vehemently on their behalf and on behalf of the truth they bring.”

    MRZine.org

  • “Your Excellency, the words "excommunicate", and "mortal sin" come to mind ...”

    Latest Articles

  • “This might be funny, if it weren't for the fact that 1) the catholic church has done nothing to those accused of paedophilia, and has gone so far as to shield the abusers, and 2) they probably would "excommunicate" the women that become "priests"!!!”

    AlterNet.org Main RSS Feed

  • “This is the leader of the church which has yet to excommunicate the man born in Austria in 1888, and baptised Catholic.”

    Besieged Pope heads to Britain

  • “In the old days (that is, before codified law), they had a term for an excommunicate who passed one (nb: one) year without seeking reconciliation: Insordescence, a status that made one (especially clerics) liable to heightened penalties.”

    Dr. Ed Peters on Milingo and Insordescence

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‘excommunicate’ has been looked up 1134 times, loved by 1 person, added to 15 lists, and has a Scrabble score of 28.