Canon 952, §1, provides that the amount of an offering to be made for the celebration and application of a Mass is to be established by the bishops of the ecclesiastical province. In providing for this requirement, the bishops of the Ecclesiastical Province of San Francisco met on December 2, 1996, and determined that the amount of such offerings will be set as follows:
- The amount specified for a Mass to be celebrated at a time left to the discretion of the priest is $5.00.
- The amount specified for a Mass to be celebrated at a scheduled time and announced publicly in a parish or chapel is $10.00.
- When a sum of money has been left for Masses in a will or bequest with no indication of the specified number of Masses to be supplied, or when the amount of the offering is not specified, the amount to be applied to each Mass shall be $20.00.
It is permitted for a priest to receive and retain an offering in an amount larger than is specified above provided that it is freely and spontaneously given; and it is allowed for a priest to take less than the usual offering, as, for example, in the case of the poor. At no time, however, should a person be denied a Mass request on the basis of his or her inability to provide for a monetary offering.
It is left to the responsibility of each diocesan bishop to determine the manner in which a second offering received by a priest on the occasion of celebrating an additional Mass on the same day will be applied as provided for by canon. 951, § I, and with due regard for the exception of Christmas Day.
These norms have received the consent of the bishops of this Ecclesiastical Province. Hence, in virtue of my office as Metropolitan, I hereby direct that these provisions become normative throughout the Ecclesiastical Province of San Francisco at once, all customs, practices and policies to the contrary notwithstanding.
Given at the Archdiocese of San Francisco on this date, February 11, 1997.
