Updated: Laicization in Phoenix provides opportunity for precision in language

But sadly, that opportunity was missed by the diocesan spokesman, says Ed Peters:

The Diocese of Phoenix is dealing with an unfortunate situation brought on by one Msgr. Dale Fushek. I know nothing about the case beyond what I've seen on-line, but the steps taken by the bishop seem reasonable to me. Still, a comment by diocesan spokesman Jim Dwyer concerning an associate of Flushek, one Fr. Mark Dippre, who abandoned ministry and married civilly a few years ago, caught my eye: "Dippre has never been formally laicized, Dwyer said, but the diocese considers him 'functionally laicized' because he has not been in ministry and has had no ties to the diocese for several years."

I think that kind of description is going to confuse people. Describing AWOL priests as "functionally laicized" or as "permanently inactive" or as "resigned from ministry", and so on, might seem more palatable to the public, but it masks a serious problem: none of those categories exist canonically, and easy resort to such labels, in my opinion, just puts off dealing with the problems.

[Learn more about Laicization here.]

update: And - *wow* - as if on cue, this story breaks today:

Archbishop Burke seeks laicization for renegade Polish priest

Archbishop Raymond Burke of St. Louis, Missouri, has begun formal proceedings to defrock a priest connected with a schismatic Polish Catholic community.

The archbishop is seeking the laicization of Father Marek Bozek, a Polish native with a checkered history. In 2005, Archbishop Burke had excommunicated Bozek, a priest of the Springfield-Cape Girardeau diocese, for his involvement in St. Stanislaus Kostka Church, a congregation in St. Louis that has rejected the archbishop's authority. - CWNews

Why *wow*, you ask?

Because Ed Peters called it back in December of 2006:

"Fr. Bozek should stop and think"

Fr. Bozek needs to know something here: contumacy for an excommunication imposed for an act of schism is itself punishable, this time, by penal dismissal from the clerical state (1983 CIC 1364 § 2). Moreover, once imposed, penal dismissal from the clergy--not being a censure (1983 CIC 1336 § 1, 5°)--is not reversible by what amounts to offering a sincere apology. Indeed, reinstatement of a "defrocked" priest is reserved to Rome (1983 CIC 293) and is so rare as to be non-existent. - In the Light of the Law

And that, my friends, is one of the many reasons why it pays to read blogs....