On Christmas Eve, Pope Francis will open the Holy Door in St. Peter’s Basilica, marking the beginning of the Jubilee Year 2025. This sacred tradition, occurring every 25 years, is marked by pilgrimages to Rome, prayer, and reconciliation.
Pope Francis on the Jubilee
“The coming Jubilee will thus be a Holy Year marked by the hope that does not fade, our hope in God,” the Holy Father wrote in his bull announcing the Jubilee. In that bull, Pope Francis underscored pilgrimage as one of the fundamental aspects of the year. “Setting out on a journey is traditionally associated with our human quest for meaning in life.”
The pontiff hopes that those who go on pilgrimage, especially to the city of Rome, will make a good confession, “the essential starting-point of any true journey of conversion.” In the sacrament of Reconciliation, “we allow the Lord to erase our sins, to heal our hearts, to raise us up, to embrace us and to reveal to us his tender and compassionate countenance.”
Pope Francis also wrote of the need to discern the signs of the including the need for peace and for an openness to life. “The first sign of hope should be the desire for peace in our world.” With so much of the world entrenched in war, the Holy Father desires that the Jubilee Year be marked by concrete steps to put down the arms of war. Additionally, the Pope underscored the need for a future filled with children. Many countries around the world are facing declining birthrates, yet the Holy Father noted that “Openness to life and responsible parenthood is the design that the Creator has implanted in the hearts and bodies of men and women, a mission that the Lord has entrusted to spouses and to their love.”
History
The Jubilee tradition is rooted in the Book of Leviticus. The Law of Moses prescribed every 50th year as a holy jubilee, which was “intended to be marked as a time to re-establish a proper relationship with God, with one another, and with all of creation,” according to the Vatican.
In the year 1300, Pope Boniface VII announced the first ordinary Jubilee. At that time, the Christian world was enduring a time of “great suffering caused by wars and diseases such as the plague.” Marked by a desire to grow in holiness thousands of pilgrims made a journey by foot to pray at the tombs of Sts. Peter and Paul. When the Pope heard of the great faith of the people, he marked the year 1300 as a “year of forgiveness of all sins.”
Pilgrimage with Relevant Radio
Next year, Relevant Radio will be participating in the Jubilee Year 2025 by taking pilgrims to Italy. Fr. Rocky will lead a pilgrimage to the holy sites of Rome, Assisi, Loreto, and San Giovanni Rotondo to name a few. This will be an extraordinary opportunity to grow in faith and walk in the footsteps of some of the Church’s great saints.
Local Pilgrimage
In addition to the Pilgrimage to Rome, the Pope encourages mini-pilgrimages from parishes to local Cathedrals which “can serve to symbolize the journey of hope that, illumined by the word of God, unites all the faithful.”
For more information about the Pilgrimage to Rome, click here.
