High Quality Content by WIKIPEDIA articles! To defrock, unfrock, or laicize ministers or priests is to remove their rights to exercise the functions of the ordained ministry. This may be due to criminal convictions, disciplinary matters, or disagreements over doctrine or dogma. It may also be voluntarily for personal reasons (taking over a family business, declining health, running for civil offices, old age, or for various other reasons). Various Christian denominations have different procedures for doing this.