Asking EWTN about Defining "Public"

The Video for "Open Line Wednesday with Fr. Mitch Pacwa - 06/11/25" where this information was aired can be found HERE

10:50- 12:05

So anyways, my question is… looking into indulgences, I know a partial indulgence is associated with public novenas, but I guess I don’t know exactly what ‘public’ means for novenas. Like I see some invitations on Facebook from parishes.

Right

Or do you have to go in?

A public novena is when a group in the church agree to have a novena. For instance... the parish where I help out, St. Elias, has a novena every year to St. Therese of Lisieux. They do that starting in September and they do that every year. And people get together to pray the novena out loud as a parish. We have a Christmas novena as well. And these are public novenas because they are prayed in public at an agreed time. So that’s what makes them public.