But on Feb. 15, Pope Francis issued a decree modifying some of the codes of Canon Law, including Canon 1308 on Mass intentions. The new code says that certain ordinaries — meaning diocesan bishops and supreme moderators of religious order priests — may grant permission to transfer the Mass intentions instead.
The new Canon 1308 says: “A reduction of the obligations of Masses, to be made only for a just and necessary cause, is reserved to the diocesan bishop and to the supreme moderator of a clerical institute of consecrated life or a society of apostolic life.”
On March 15, the Vatican clarified that a priest who cannot fulfill his Mass intention obligations “may still petition the Apostolic Penitentiary directly to keep them in the internal forum,” Pietrzyk said.
The Apostolic Penitentiary is the office of the Roman Curia responsible for issues related to the sacrament of confession, indulgences, and the internal forum, which is an extra-sacramental form of secrecy, or confidentiality, applied to spiritual direction.
A priest in this situation, Zehnle explained, “could contact his confessor about the situation, who then contacts the Apostolic Penitentiary and the Apostolic Penitentiary will give instructions as to how those Masses should be fulfilled or resolved.”
“Once the Apostolic Penitentiary does that, then the penitentiary makes a direct report to the pope to let him know what has happened.”
Hannah Brockhaus is Catholic News Agency’s senior Rome correspondent. She grew up in Omaha, Nebraska, and has a degree in English from Truman State University in Missouri.
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