Liturgical Year and Calendar

The Office for Worship has compiled resources to help you facilitate an encounter with Jesus Christ in parish liturgies.

• USCCB Liturgical Calendar 2024
• USCCB Liturgical Calendar 2025
• Table of Permissibility: Ritual Masses, Masses for Various Needs, or Votive Masses

Holy Days of Obligation 2024

¹In the Ecclesiastical Province of Los Angeles the Solemnity of Mary, the Mother of God, is not observed, except on Sunday, as a holy day of obligation.
²The solemnity of the Ascension of the Lord is transferred from May 9^th (Thurs) to Sunday, May 12^nd.
³When this solemnity falls on either a Monday or a Saturday the obligation is abrogated.

Reminder for Schools: “School communities are expected to offer the celebration of Mass as a school community on Holy Days of Obligation when those fall on a school day.” See section 4.3.5-Liturgical Education and Celebrations

Masses for the Dead

Funeral Masses may be celebrated on all days except Solemnities which are holy days, Sundays of Advent, Lent, or Easter, on Holy Thursday and Easter Tridiuum. Funeral rites on these days make use of liturgy of the Word, closing with the rite of Farewell, as found in the Order of Christian Funeral, Part I, no. 4 (nos. 177-203)

How to celebrate marriage, as directed by the Order of Celebrating Matrimony:

33. In the celebration of Marriage within Mass, the rite described in Chapter I is used. In the celebration of Marriage without Mass, the rite should take place after a Liturgy of the Word according to the norm of Chapter II.
34. Whenever Marriage is celebrated within Mass, the Ritual Mass ‘The Celebration of Marriage’ is used with sacred vestments of the color white or of a festive color. On those days listed in nos. 1‑4 of the Table of Liturgical Days, however, the Mass of the day is used with its own readings, with inclusion of the Nuptial Blessing and, if appropriate, the proper formula for the final blessing. If, however, during Christmas and Ordinary Time, the parish community participates in a Sunday Mass during which Marriage is celebrated, the Mass of the Sunday is used.

Nevertheless, since a Liturgy of the Word adapted for the celebration of Marriage has a great impact in the handing on of catechesis about the Sacrament itself and about the duties of the spouses, when the Mass ‘For the Celebration of Marriage’ is not said, one of the readings may be taken from the texts provided for the celebration of Marriage (nos. 179‑222).

Those days numbered one through four are as follows:

1. Paschal Triduum
2. Sundays and major feasts in the seasons of Advent, Lent, and Easter
3. Solemnities of the Lord, Mary, or saints.
4. Observances of patrons appropriate to the nation or city, parish, or the parish’s dedication anniversary. Also, the founder of a religious order connected to the community.

These resources will be updated regularly.