Music and texts and copyrights… Oh my!
Are you writing music for Mass in the USA?
There’s a lot you need to know.
You’ve had questions, and now we have some answers.
After unwittingly running afoul of the formal process for liturgical approval & copyright, I was presented with the opportunity of having a zoom call with someone directly in the USCCB’s own offices, to discuss all of the intricacies and issues surrounding proper approvals for liturgical music — an opportunity which I eagerly accepted. Wishing to “light a match rather than curse the darkness,” (and knowing all-too-well that other composers were just as confused as I was!) I put out a clarion call for questions, and now I have prepared the following notes from that very detailed discussion. (Special thanks to M. for being so generous with her time!)
These notes have been reviewed and approved for accuracy by the staff in the USCCB’s Copyright and Secretariat of Divine Worship offices, and permission has been granted for me to share them publicly with all of you, in the hopes that they will both dispel some misinformation which is commonly in circulation, as well as prevent others from unwittingly making some of the same mistakes I did. I am certain there is something in this post for everyone, so please share this blog post with your colleagues, as well as in various fora & social media groups.
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A final note before we get into the details:
The purpose of this post is to help bring clarity to an admittedly obscure (and in some sense, complicated) process, not to stir up any drama about the policies themselves. There are many composers posting questions in various social media groups, and many more who are simply unaware there is a policy to begin with. Couple in the fact that the USCCB’s resource section on its website has no dedicated music subcategory, finding answers to music-specific questions can be legitimately difficult. We hope that the information offered below proves a helpful & easy resource.
If you have further questions after reading the article, please use the form at the bottom of the page, and I will collate the responses and submit them for further clarification. Now, what you need to know:
At a glance:
All liturgical music needs approval prior to use in the liturgy. This comes in two forms:
Approval via the Secretariat for Divine Worship [hereafter ‘SDW’] for “all musical settings for the texts of the Ordinary of Mass, for the people's responses and acclamations, and for the special rites that occur in the course of the liturgical year” [GIRM, no. 393].
Approval from your local Ordinary [Bishop] for any other texts (hymns, prayers, etc.) which are not directly part of the Lectionary or Missal.
Any Missal / Lectionary text that is reviewed by the SDW must also be licensed for use [copyright] which is a separate classification from “approved for liturgical use”.
Licensing may be issued by the USCCB, CCD, or ICEL, depending on the composition and copyright of the text. Unless otherwise specifically exempted, licensing does incur a modest fee to support the operation of the SDW.
[United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, Confraternity of Christian Doctrine, or the International Committee on English in the Liturgy]
What needs Licensing?
All settings of the ordinary [“mass parts”] — NB: these must present all options, such as all three separate Mysterium Fideis
All Psalms & Gospel Acclamations
Other Acclamations or Antiphons in the Missal (e.g. – antiphons for Holy Week)
NB: Here we speak of copyright licensing; as noted above, works still need to be approved for liturgical use, even if the text is not directly copyrighted by one of the entities mentioned above.
What is the proper sequence for obtaining approval?
First, make an initial inquiry via the USCCB’s general contact form.
To find this:Go to header “About USCCB”
Scroll down to Contact
Provide your details and indicate in the comments that you would like to submit music for review
For Topic, select: Liturgy/Mass/Prayers
For Office, select: Divine Worship
Your initial inquiry will be reviewed and then someone from the Secretariat for Divine Worship will send you a link to which you can upload your PDF(s).
The SDW / Copyright Office will review your work (text). This process can take up to 6-8 weeks, although the goal is always to review as quickly as possible.
Once any/all necessary corrections are made, (and presupposing there is no issue with the text from a liturgical perspective,) a license will then be granted for use from the SDW. There will be conditions to this usage.
Any piece(s) requiring licensing from ICEL will then need to be forwarded to their office, at which point you can negotiate a second, separate license with ICEL.
Once all necessary conditions are met and licenses satisfied, your piece may be used and/or published.
How to make your submission a success:
Plan ahead. The copyright office & SDW operates with a small staff, who manage thousands of submissions annually. Review of musical submissions is only one part of the many other responsibilities of these offices. If you have an important event for which your music needs prior review, please grant at least 8 weeks lead time. These offices will always strive to return a review much more quickly.
For Responsorial Psalms and Ordinaries, make sure that you use the official text, exactly as presented in the Lectionary or Missal. Do not change wording, punctuation, etc. For other antiphons, limited manipulation is acceptable (such as repeating a phrase), but the integrity and meaning of the text must remain indisputably intact.
Your own accuracy will greatly speed the efforts of the proofreaders. If your scores are full of errata, this takes the proofreaders longer to review, and will result in your setting being returned to you without approval until necessary corrections (and another subsequent review) have been accomplished. Repeatedly submitting your works with errata wastes the time of the proofreading staff, as well as your own, and also takes that time away from other composers whose works also need reviewing.
Wherever possible, please provide the specific Lectionary (or Missal) citation with your submissions. This helps the proofreaders pull up the correct text quickly, rather than having to go hunting for your source(s).
Other helpful information for music directors & composers:
The current lectionary texts are still the liturgical norm; psalm settings which use the current translation will still be reviewed, and are still being granted approval.
Composers interested in transitioning their compositions to the Abbey Psalms & Canticles translation (which will be the psalm translation in the forthcoming lectionary) should contact the USCCB for more information.
There are known errata in the current lectionary; the SDW is doing their best to make sure these are all corrected in the new lectionary. This does mean that in rare cases, versification may change for certain psalms in the new lectionary.
The new lectionary is not anticipated any sooner than December (Advent I) of 2028, with a very real possibility of further delay until December of 2029.
Once the new lectionary is officially promulgated, there will be a grace period of three years for composers to fully transition their works (or compose new settings) to accord with the new translation. After the grace period concludes, all psalm arrangements which set the former lectionary text must be retired from use as responsorial psalms, although they could be theoretically used in other ways during the liturgy (such as during communion or as preludes).
When in doubt, contact the SDW/Copyright office.
If you have already been publishing (or even simply sharing) settings of psalms, antiphons, etc., it is important to reach out to the USCCB so that you may be regularized ASAP.
There is a practical limit to how much music you can submit to the office at any given time, since other composers also need to have their works reviewed. Please consider prioritizing your most important works (or those of temporal necessity) first, and adding others to the queue later. It may take a number of months for larger catalogues of works to be fully reviewed. This is merely due to the sheer volume of works which are submitted each month. (It also needs to be noted that review does not happen in a vacuum, but must be accommodated along with the other duties of these offices.)
More technical information about the policy for composing music for the liturgy in the USA can be found in Appendix IV of the Guidelines for the Publication of Liturgical Books. (Link)
Please Note: Parishes which make weekly worship aids must obtain reprint licenses to reproduce the readings from the lectionary every week. Occasional/Special event usage (Ordinations, weddings, etc.) is permitted without a license (see this page for more details) however regular printing or posting requires a dedicated license.
A postscript…
While many recent online discussions have lamented that any of this is even necessary, it is worth mentioning here that maintaining copyright & reviewing all liturgical texts / music is a requirement from Rome, based in Canon Law and other liturgical legislation such as Liturgicam Authenticam & Magnum Principium (among others). What initially felt to me like the glories of Byzantium resurrected was, in truth, a ‘necessary evil’ (if we can call it that).
Each Bishops’ conference has been formally charged with guarding the integrity of the liturgy within its borders, and what is outlined above is the mechanism currently in place to accomplish these directives within the USA. Review of your works is not, therefore, punitive in any way, nor is it intended to make it difficult for composers to get their works into the hands of others. In a certain sense, the USCCB’s hands are just as tied as anyone’s.
And for what it is worth, my interlocutor was able to share with me some very real examples of abuse that her office was able to prevent as a result of this review and licensing process, and this is undoubtedly a good thing. (And since I can hear the charge being leveled already: yes, we are all aware of abuses that have slipped through in previous decades… but those should not preclude the legitimate review that is happening now, whose purpose is to curb such occurrences in the future.)
Is it lamentable that things are this complicated and legally intricate? Yes, and it is fair to admit this. But as the old adage goes, “there are two sides to every story,” which I came to appreciate during the 2 hour zoom call. There are some very good and very legitimate reasons that some of these policies are now in place, even if they do complicate the process, and even if these processes could ideally be streamlined in the future. I am not claiming that there is no room for improvement, just that there are reasons why things are the way they are.
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To close, since the bishops are currently at their annual meeting in Baltimore, now is as good a time as any to implore the Holy Spirit to guide their governance of Holy Mother Church in our lands, and to equally implore His grace upon all those who work under the bishops who put these initiatives into action. They are working on shoestring budgets to help us the best they can. Trust me. Last of all, let us implore the Holy Spirit for beautiful liturgies and music.
If necessary, please use the following form to submit any further questions you may have after reading this article. Please submit questions that are—by their nature—of general interest. If a critical mass of questions is received, I will collate and anonymize all the responses, and submit them together to the USCCB for further clarification, and possibly a Pt. 2 to this article.
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