Privacy
Privacy policy
A plain-language explanation of the information this site receives and why.
Last updated: July 29, 2026
Information you choose to submit
When you send a church suggestion, correction, partnership request or contact message, we receive the fields shown in that form. These may include a church or organization name and location, organization type, official website or directory link, approximate parish range, available data format, authorization status, recurring Mass times, note, your name, work email address, role, declarations, message or church identifier. The representative and partnership paths request professional contact details; the ordinary community option does not. We use this information to research coverage, assess authorized data connections, verify representative authority through an official channel, respond, review directory accuracy, prevent abuse and maintain an audit trail. Do not submit credentials, confidential files or sensitive personal information.
Technical information
Our hosting and security providers may process standard request information such as IP address, browser type, requested URL, time and diagnostic data. This information supports delivery, security, fraud prevention and troubleshooting.
Privacy-preserving audience measurement
To improve directory coverage, performance and advertising capacity, Next Mass USA keeps daily aggregate counts of public page views, useful search characteristics, actions such as opening an official schedule, website or telephone link, saving an upcoming Mass to a calendar, successful community, representative or data-partnership submissions, whether an advertising space was at least half visible for one second, and categorical Core Web Vitals ratings. Calendar-save counts retain only the validated church slug, not the selected date, time, language or calendar application. Performance ratings retain only the metric, Google rating category, broad page type and mobile or desktop viewport; raw measurements and metric identifiers are discarded. Submission counts retain only the completed path category; the analytics table does not receive the form fields. Advertising-space counts describe potential inventory, not AdSense impressions or clicks. Search aggregates may include an exact five-digit ZIP code, selected language, selected day, broad selected time window and whether results existed. Free-text search terms, exact requested clock times, outbound URLs, IP addresses, cookies and visitor profiles are not stored in this analytics table. Browser “Do Not Track” signals disable these measurement requests.
Optional nearby sorting
If you select “Sort by my location,” your browser may ask for location permission. The coordinates returned by your device are sent with that directory request only to calculate straight-line distance and return nearby church cards. Next Mass USA does not persist them or add them to analytics. Denying permission leaves the original directory order unchanged.
Saved churches and visit actions
If you select “Save church,” the browser stores up to 20 public church identifiers in local storage on that device. The list does not automatically sync to another browser or device. Opening the saved-churches page sends those identifiers in a bounded request body to retrieve current public listings; Next Mass USA does not write the list to a saved-profile database. Aggregate save, remove, calendar, directions and successful share counts retain only the validated church identifier and action, without a user identifier, complete personal list, map destination URL or sharing recipient. Sharing uses your device’s share menu when available or copies the public listing link together with the Mass details already displayed on the page. You can remove individual saved churches or clear this site’s local storage in your browser.
Advertising and cookies
Next Mass USA is designed to use Google AdSense, but advertising code is not loaded until advertising is explicitly enabled and valid publisher settings are present. If advertising is activated, Google and its partners may use cookies, local storage or similar technologies to deliver and measure advertising, and to personalize it where permitted. Before serving personalized advertising in regions that require consent, the site must use a Google-certified consent management platform or Google Privacy & Messaging. When that platform is active, the footer provides a “Privacy and cookie settings” control so visitors can reopen the consent message and change their choice.
How information is shared
We do not sell contact-form information. Information may be processed by service providers that host, secure or operate the site, when required to respond to a lawful request, or when necessary to protect users and the service. A submitted correction or representative declaration may be verified with the relevant parish or diocese, but we do not intentionally publish the submitter’s name or email address.
Retention and choices
Messages, correction records and representative consent records are retained only as long as reasonably needed for review, security, rights documentation and recordkeeping. You may request access, correction or deletion of information you submitted, subject to legal and operational retention needs.
Children
This directory is intended for a general audience and does not knowingly request personal information from children.
Changes and contact
We may update this policy as the service, providers or legal requirements change. The date above identifies the current version. To make a privacy request, use the contact form and select “Privacy request.”