We encourage you to support the SCJ missions also by ordering Mass intentions: Individual, Gregorian, Nazareth (to the Court of Heaven) and perpetual. We celebrate Gregorian Masses for 30 consecutive days for one deceased person. We celebrate Nazareth Masses for 30 consecutive days for living persons.

If you are interested, please contact Father Mark, a long-time Sacred Heart missionary in South Africa, currently working at the Foreign Missions Secretariat in Olsztyn. You can reach him by phone or email. Fr. Marek is "on call" at the disposal of Donors from Monday to Friday from 9:00-11:00 a.m. and from 15:00-17:00 p.m.

Fr. Mark Przybyś SCJ
+48 797 535 622
[email protected]

(We would very much appreciate it, if you do not communicate via SMS)

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Gregorian Masses

The Gregorian Mass owes its name to Pope Gregory the Great, who initiated the custom of celebrating 30 Masses for a soul suffering in purgatory.

It is related to the story of a Benedictine monk whom Gregory the Great was superior of before he became the pope. This monk, named Justus, hid gold coins from the community. In terms of the monastic rule, which dictated that no monk should have personal property, this was a grave sin. After his death in 604, Gregory I, then abbot of the monastery, ordered 30 Masses to be said, day after day, for Justus' soul. 

After 30 days, the monk appeared at night to his native brother (also a monk) saying that he had been freed from purgatory and joined the community of the saved. Thanks to Gregory the Great, the practice of the so-called Gregorians spread first in Rome and then throughout Europe. In 1884, the Congregation for Indulgences of the Holy See recognized that: "the confidence of the faithful in the Gregorian Masses as being particularly efficacious for the release of the deceased from the punishment of purgatory is to be considered reasonable and consistent with the faith."

Nazareth Masses

The Nazareth Masses, also known as Masses to the Heavenly Court, are an assault to Heaven for the intentions of the living. The priest celebrates Mass for the next 30 days for the entrusted intention.

The Heavenly Court is Heaven, where Mary, the Angels and the Saints reside, that is, all those who have received the grace of seeing God. Through their intercession, we ask our Father in Heaven to help us in the affairs of our loved ones, which we are often humanly unable to solve.   

Perpetual Masses

Perpetual Masses are ordered for the intention of a single living or deceased person. For the intentions of those entered in the Book of Perpetual Masses, the Priests of the Sacred Heart of Jesus celebrate one Mass every day. They will continue to do so until the end of the Congregation's existence (hence the name "perpetual"). An entry is made once. If someone has ordered a perpetual Mass for a living person, it will also be celebrated after that person's death.