The Vatican granted permissions last year for the celebration of the Traditional Latin Mass in parish churches across 34 dioceses, according to the Dicastery for Divine Worship’s newly published 2025 index of decrees.
The figures, reported by AdVaticanum, are contained in the dicastery’s Summarium Decretorum, which records 34 decrees concerning the use of the 1962 Roman Missal in parish churches.
Seven of the decrees were issued before the death of Pope Francis, while 27 followed the election of Pope Leo XIV on 8 May. Twenty-nine of the permissions extended existing arrangements for a further two years, with several decrees covering multiple parishes within the same diocese.
The total is lower than the 55 decrees published for 2023 but unchanged from 2024, when the dicastery published 34. The Vatican’s online collection currently begins in 2023, two years after Pope Francis promulgated Traditionis Custodes.
However, the figures should not be interpreted as a worldwide count of locations where the Traditional Latin Mass is celebrated.
A specific category of permission
The Summarium records a particular type of permission: authorisation for the 1962 Roman Missal to be used in parish churches under Article 3 §2 of Traditionis Custodes.
The article restricts celebrations according to the 1962 Missal in parish churches. Where a diocesan bishop seeks an exception, the matter is referred to the Dicastery for Divine Worship, whose response is reflected in the published decree.
As a result, the Vatican index records the Roman permissions granted in response to such requests—not every celebration of the Traditional Latin Mass taking place around the world.
This distinction is significant in Europe, where traditional Masses continue in several parish churches that do not appear in the Vatican’s published lists.
France, for example, does not appear in the 2025 index. No parish church in Paris appears in the dicastery’s published dispensations for 2023, 2024 or 2025.
Yet the Traditional Latin Mass continues at Saint-Eugène–Sainte-Cécile, where it has been celebrated since the 1980s and remains listed on the parish’s daily and Sunday schedule. Sainte-Odile likewise lists a Sunday Mass according to the 1962 rite.
England presents a similar situation. No dispensation for a London parish church appears in the dicastery’s published indexes for 2023, 2024 or 2025.
The absence of a parish from the Summarium, however, does not by itself establish that the Mass celebrated there is unauthorised. The index records a narrower legal category: written permissions from the Dicastery for Divine Worship for the use of the 1962 Missal in a particular parish church.
What the index does—and does not—include
The published decrees do not cover every location where the Traditional Latin Mass may be celebrated.
Masses offered in chapels, oratories, shrines, seminaries, former parish buildings and other non-parish churches do not fall within this particular category. Nor does the index include celebrations by institutes formerly operating under the Ecclesia Dei arrangements in their own churches.
The Summarium should therefore be understood as a record of specific Roman permissions rather than a comprehensive survey of traditional Catholic worship.
This also helps explain the significant number of American entries in the 2025 index.
Parish churches in dioceses including Sacramento, Seattle, Alexandria, Gaylord, Brownsville, Los Angeles, Lincoln, Nashville, Des Moines, Denver, Saginaw, Harrisburg, Davenport, Milwaukee, Springfield, Savannah, Cleveland, Trenton, Sioux City, Ogdensburg and Fairbanks appear among the decrees.
Several permissions cover multiple churches within the same diocese. Denver received permission covering three churches, while Milwaukee and Trenton each received decrees covering four.
Outside the United States, the index contains entries involving two Polish dioceses, as well as Taipei, Glasgow, Dublin, Kyiv-Zhytomyr, Copenhagen, Toronto and Halifax-Yarmouth.
Permissions generally attached to churches
The wording of the decrees also indicates that the permissions are normally attached to a particular location rather than to an individual priest.
The standard formula refers to a “licence to celebrate according to the Roman Missal promulgated by St. John XXIII in 1962” in a specified parish church. In most cases, the permission is granted “for another two years”.
The published entry therefore identifies the diocese, church, liturgical book and, generally, the duration of the permission. It does not identify a particular priest, establish a Mass schedule or state that an individual priest has received faculties.
Nor is the Summarium itself the complete legal decree. The full legal act takes the form of a letter addressed to the diocesan bishop, while the Vatican website publishes the operative portion in summary form.
Renewals and new permissions
Most of the permissions published for 2025 were renewals.
The Latin phrase in aliud biennium, meaning “for another two years”, indicates that an existing permission has been extended.
Other entries record a new or fresh grant. Some use ad biennium, meaning “for two years”, while others use perlibenter concedimus, without a duration appearing in the published line.
St. Patrick’s in Iowa City, for example, received a renewal in aliud biennium. St. Alphonsus in Davenport received a novam licentiam, or “new licence”, for two years in the same decree.
A specific change was also recorded in Glasgow. On 5 November, the dicastery granted a two-year licence for St. Vincent de Paul in Thornliebank, stating that the new dispensation “abrogates and replaces” the 10 March licence for St. Bridget’s in Toryglen.
Separate permissions for priests
The authority of a diocesan bishop concerning celebrations of the 1962 Missal within his diocese is distinct from the Roman permission required for its use in a parish church under Article 3 §2 of Traditionis Custodes.
Permissions concerning individual priests—including priests ordained after July 2021—are a separate matter and are not recorded in this index.
Likewise, the arrangements governing institutes such as the Priestly Fraternity of St. Peter and the Institute of Christ the King Sovereign Priest in their own churches fall outside the scope of the Summarium.
The 2025 index therefore provides a useful, but limited, picture of the Vatican’s implementation of Traditionis Custodes. Its 34 decrees document specific permissions granted for the 1962 Roman Missal in parish churches, but they should not be taken as a complete register of where the Traditional Latin Mass is celebrated worldwide.
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