About Lingua Sacra
An app for Catholics who want to pray the Mass, the Rosary, and the Vulgate in the Church's own language — built with care for orthodoxy, beauty, and beginner clarity.
Ministry and ownership
Lingua Sacra is a ministry owned and operated by St. Patrick Priory, Inc., a separately incorporated religious nonprofit. The Priory owns and supports the app, its original intellectual property, and its ministry revenues. Lingua Sacra remains the product name.
Who's behind this
What Lingua Sacra is
Lingua Sacra teaches Ecclesiastical Latin — the Church's Latin, the Latin of the Mass and the Vulgate — through the prayers Catholics already know. The Pater Noster, the Ave Maria, the Salve Regina, the Confiteor, the Mass ordinary, the Liturgy of the Hours, and the Psalms become entry points into the language, not abstract grammar drills.
The core of the app works offline, syncs across devices when signed in, and combines:
- Structured lessons with spaced repetition (202 lessons, 2,137 vocabulary words)
- The complete Latin Vulgate with verse-by-verse word lookup
- Pre-recorded ecclesiastical pronunciation for every prayer and word
- Patristic, theological, and CCC context behind key Latin terms (Traditio Amplior)
- Mass companion, Stations of the Cross, Liturgy of the Hours, and sacramental rite texts
Editorial standards
All Latin content is sourced from canonical references and verified against ecclesiastical-Latin tutors:
- Scripture: Nova Vulgata (1979) cross-checked against the Stuttgart Vulgate and the PROIEL annotated corpus
- Prayer texts: Roman Missal (2002 editio typica tertia), Liturgia Horarum, and Compendium of the Catechism
- Vocabulary & etymology: Lewis & Short, Du Cange, the Catechism of the Catholic Church (Latin), and Sancti Thomae de Aquino opera omnia
- Pronunciation: Ecclesiastical (Church) Latin — the pronunciation used at the Holy See and in the traditional Roman Rite. Classical-Latin support may follow if there is demand.
Lessons and translations are reviewed before publication. If you spot an error, please report it (see contact below) — corrections ship in the next OTA update.
Privacy & trust
The app collects no analytics by default; the optional cloud sync runs on Supabase and stores only your progress and email. The web property uses a custom 1KB privacy-first PostHog snippet — no cookies, no third-party retargeting pixels, no Google Analytics. Do-Not-Track and Global Privacy Control are honored. Full privacy policy →
Frequently asked questions
Which Latin pronunciation does Lingua Sacra teach?
Ecclesiastical (Church) Latin — the pronunciation used at the Holy See, in every Catholic seminary, and in the Roman Rite worldwide. It follows Italian phonetic rules: c before e/i is "ch", gn is "ny", v is "v" (not "w"). Classical Latin support may follow if there is demand; grammar and vocabulary are identical.
Is Lingua Sacra free?
Free to download on iOS, Android, and the web. Every account gets a free tier: the first 5 lessons, the four core prayers, Vulgate Genesis and the Gospel of John, the Liturgy of the Hours, and the Mass companion. Full Access (every lesson, every practice tool, the whole Vulgate, every prayer with recordings, the chant, and the rites) is an in-app purchase — $19.99/year (auto-renewing subscription) or $79.99 one-time for lifetime access. No free trial, no ads.
Does Lingua Sacra work offline?
Mostly. On iOS and Android, core lessons, prayer text, quizzes, progress, spaced-repetition review, and review audio work without a connection. Expanded audio and most Vulgate books download the first time you open them, then stay on the device. Cloud sync is optional and only runs when you sign in.
Where does the audio come from?
Pre-recorded MP3s tuned for Ecclesiastical pronunciation. Prayers, lessons, and vocabulary use recorded audio: core clips are bundled with the app and the rest download the first time you play them. The app does not call out to a text-to-speech service for Latin at runtime, so audio sounds identical whether you are online or offline.
What sources are the prayers and Scripture from?
Scripture text comes from the Nova Vulgata (1979) cross-checked against the Stuttgart Vulgate and the PROIEL annotated corpus. Prayer texts come from the Roman Missal (2002 editio typica tertia), the Liturgia Horarum, and the Compendium of the Catechism. Vocabulary and etymology references include Lewis & Short, Du Cange, the Catechism (Latin), and Sancti Thomae de Aquino opera omnia.
Is the content reviewed for theological accuracy?
Yes. Lessons and translations are reviewed before publication against canonical references. Lingua Sacra is built by a Catholic priest with theological training; the project welcomes correction reports from clergy, religious, and lay readers — reach out via the contact section below.
Can I use the printable PDFs in my parish or classroom?
Yes — the printable cheat sheets, prayer cards, and pronunciation charts at /downloads/ are free for personal, parish, classroom, and homeschool use. Please keep the Lingua Sacra footer intact when redistributing. For a parish-specific or feast-specific version, contact the team.
Contact
For corrections, partnership questions, or feedback, use the in-app Feedback screen or email us at support [at] linguasacra.app. For press inquiries, email press [at] linguasacra.app.
Try Lingua Sacra
Free to download on iOS, Android, and the web. Full Access is $19.99/year or $79.99 lifetime.
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