Part Three: Of Divine Worship

§ 1. The worship of latria is owed to the Most Holy Trinity, to the individual Persons of the same, to Christ the Lord, even under the sacramental species; the worship of hyperdulia to the Blessed Virgin Mary; the worship of dulia to others reigning with Christ in heaven.

§ 2. To sacred relics also and images are owed veneration and worship relative to the person to whom the relics and images are referred.

Worship, if it is rendered in the name of the Church by persons legitimately deputed for this and through acts from the institution of the Church to be exhibited only to God, the Saints, and the Blesseds, is called public; if less, private.

It belongs to the Apostolic See alone both to order the sacred liturgy and to approve liturgical books.

§ 1. It is not licit for the faithful in any way actively to assist or have a part in the sacred rites of non-Catholics.

§ 2. Passive or merely material presence can be tolerated, for the sake of civil office or honor, for a grave reason to be approved by the Bishop in a case of doubt, at the funerals, nuptials, and similar solemnities of non-Catholics, provided that danger of perversion and scandal is absent.

§ 1. Prayers and exercises of piety are not to be permitted in churches or oratories without review and express permission of the local Ordinary, who in more difficult cases is to subject the whole matter to the Apostolic See.

§ 2. The local Ordinary cannot approve new litanies to be recited publicly.

Ministers of the Church in exercising worship must depend solely on ecclesiastical Superiors.

§ 1. Local Ordinaries are to watch that the prescriptions of the sacred canons concerning divine worship are sedulously observed, and especially that no superstitious practice be introduced into divine worship, whether public or private, or into the daily life of the faithful, or that anything be admitted alien from the faith or discordant with ecclesiastical tradition or bearing the appearance of shameful gain.

§ 2. If the local Ordinary has made laws for his territory in this matter, all religious also, even exempt, are held by the obligation of observing them; and the Ordinary can visit their churches or public oratories for this end.

§ 1. It is to be desired that, congruently with ancient discipline, women be separated from men in church.

§ 2. Men in church or outside church, while they assist at sacred rites, are to be with uncovered head, unless the approved customs of peoples or peculiar circumstances of things bear otherwise; women, however, with head covered and modestly dressed, especially when they approach the table of the Lord.

§ 1. For magistrates, according to their dignity and grade, there can be a distinct place in church, according to the norm of liturgical laws.

§ 2. Without the express consent of the local Ordinary no faithful person is to have a place in church reserved for himself and his own; moreover the Ordinary is not to furnish consent unless the convenience of the other faithful has been sufficiently consulted.

§ 3. In concessions made there is always present the tacit condition that the Ordinary can, from a just cause, revoke the concession, notwithstanding any passage of time.

§ 1. Music in which, whether by organ or other instruments or by singing, something lascivious or impure is mixed, is to be entirely kept away from churches; and the liturgical laws concerning sacred music are to be observed.

§ 2. Religious women, if it is lawful for them, according to the norm of their constitutions or liturgical laws and with permission of the local Ordinary, to sing in their own church or public oratory, are to sing from such a place where they cannot be seen by the people.