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History
OCP—serving the Catholic community for almost 100 years
As the Church has changed, OCP has always sought—and will continue to seek— to grow and change with it. From our beginnings almost 100 years ago as a beacon of information for Catholics in Oregon to the publisher of the most widely distributed missal programs in the U.S., we have certainly come a long way.
1922: In the early 1920s the Ku Klux Klan was rampant in Oregon and the persecution of Catholics was one of its main goals. To combat the Klan, Archbishop Alexander Christie established the Catholic Truth Society of Oregon—the original name of OCP. The stated purpose was to provide Catholics and non-Catholics alike with information about the Church and the activities of its educational and charitable institutions.
1925: The Catholic Truth Society of Oregon prints and distributes a quarter million pamphlets about the Church to 25 states, the Philippine islands and some parts of Canada.
1928: The Catholic Truth Society incorporates and acquires the Catholic Sentinel, which had been the diocesan newspaper for the state of Oregon since 1870, and continues to be one of the most successful, award-winning diocesan newspapers in the United States.
1934: The Catholic Truth Society makes the historic decision to begin publishing My Sunday Missal. At the time, Mass was still celebrated in Latin, so My Sunday Missal was printed to present each Sunday’s liturgy in English so that congregants could follow along. It took off in popularity and by the early 1940s, My Sunday Missal was being distributed throughout the U.S.
1960s and ’70s: The Catholic Truth Society revises My Sunday Missal in order to increase participation in Mass among congregants.
1971: The missal is expanded to include a broader selection of music and rebranded as Today’s Missal.
1980: The Catholic Truth Society changes its name to Oregon Catholic Press in order to reflect its growth from an informative service organization to one of the largest publishers of Catholic music and liturgical resources in the world. This change also ushered in a new age of successful growth and outreach, including the publication of OCP’s own collections of liturgical music.
1982: OCP launches the popular missal Breaking Bread, an annual resource with synopses for each of the weekly readings and more than 800 hymns and songs. OCP also publishes its first hymnal—and the first Spanish-language hymnal published in the US—Canticos de Gracias y Alabanza.
1989: OCP publishes Flor y Canto in order to serve Hispanic communities. Now, in its third edition, Flor y Canto is far and away the best-selling Spanish Catholic hymnal in the US.
1994: OCP acquires the music and products of North American Liturgy Resources (NALR), including the most popular Catholic hymnal ever published, Glory & Praise. Soon after, OCP publishes an expanded version, which includes many songs originally published by OCP, in Glory & Praise, Second Edition.
1998: OCP increases its library of resources even further through the acquisition of Pastoral Press, the book publishing division of the National Association of Pastoral Musicians.
2001: OCP decides to share its success with parishes throughout the United States with the Parish Grants Program. This annual program provides Catholic parishes with direct financial assistance in order to enhance the worship experience for their congregations. As of 2015, OCP has awarded more than $2.2 million to thousands of parishes all over the country.
2003: OCP launches Liturgy.com, a web-based liturgy preparation program that has helped thousands of parishes prepare more fulfilling liturgies for their assemblies.
2006: OCP begins publishing Breaking Bread with Readings, which includes the full version of the weekly readings, and is now the most widely used missal program in the United States.
2009: OCP publishes Thánh Ca Dân Chúa, the first-ever Vietnamese hymnal in the US, to provide for the liturgical and musical needs of Vietnamese-American assemblies.
2014–15: OCP releases Spirit & Song All-Inclusive Digital Edition. This revolutionary new service offers subscribers unlimited access to downloadable editions of the music featured in the Spirit & Song hymnal. Breaking Bread Digital Music Library launches next, giving parish music directors full, digital access to all the music, accompaniments, choral settings, recordings and responsorial psalms in Breaking Bread.
Today: OCP administers more than 20,000 music copyrights and publishes hundreds of music collections and more than 3,000 octavos/sheet music. Two-thirds of all parishes in the U.S. subscribe to at least one of OCP’s missal programs. Beyond its publishing efforts, OCP conducts more than 500 events each year in parishes and dioceses across the country and exhibits its products and services at many national and regional conventions and conferences. OCP’s suite of online tools includes ONE LICENSE, a jointly owned company between GIA and OCP that provides non-commercial reprint permissions for more than 100,000 songs from over 340 different publishers and copyright holders.
With more than 150 employees dedicated to serving the needs of the church through publishing the finest worship materials, both digitally and in print, OCP remains as dedicated to service as it was at the beginning. First locally, then nationally, and now globally, OCP retains the passion of its founders in being a shining light of hope and truth in the world, and is determined to continue that passion long into the future.