Excommunication

EXCOMMUNICA'TION, n. The act of ejecting from a church; expulsion from the communion of a church, and deprivation of its rights, privileges and advantages; an ecclesiastical penalty or punishment inflicted on offenders. Excommunication is an ecclesiastical interdict, of two kinds, the lesser and the greater; the lesser excommunication is a separation or suspension of the offender from partaking of the eucharist; the greater, is an absolute separation and exclusion of the offender from the church and all its rites and advantages.

NEW: Google Full-Text Search of Webster's 1828 Custom Search Search Webster's 1828 Advanced Search

You can also look up words at dict.sorabji.com