Dear Pilgrims of Hope, I invite you to read my first ever blog entry, as we embark on our Advent journey, in the context of the ongoing Year of Prayer, in preparation for the Jubilee 2025:
Rome gets ready: The excitement is tangible around Rome as the final preparations are carried out for the Jubilee Year. Construction work on the roads and railway lines from the city’s central station, Roma Termini, to the Vatican, shows that Rome, indeed, wasn’t built in one day. In fact, the Eternal City seems to be getting a major “face-lift”! Well, with all roads leading to Rome for the Holy Year, one would expect the basilicas and shrines to be ready to welcome the estimated 35 million pilgrims said to descend on the “Caput Mundi”. In the midst of it all, we should not neglect the interior spiritual preparation we have been invited to embark upon in this Year of Prayer leading up to the Jubilee.
The Holy Door: The Vatican has since clarified that, unlike the Extraordinary Jubilee Year of Mercy in 2015, only the Holy Doors of Rome will be opened for the Ordinary Jubilee of 2025. In addition to the four major basilicas, Pope Francis will open a Holy Door in Rome’s Rebibbia Prison. So, if part of your Christmas traditions includes watching “Midnight Mass” live from the Vatican, there will be a special feature this year, the opening of the Holy Door at St Peter’s Basilica. With this, the Jubilee Year officially would have commenced, following a tradition dating back to the 1300s, when Popes started proclaiming Jubilees every 25 or 50 years. The Jubilee 2025 will also lead us to the year 2033 when we will celebrate 2000 years of Redemption through the passion, death and resurrection of the Lord Jesus. The risen Christ is our hope (cf. 1 Cor 15:12).
Hope for all: Often during my visits to the various basilicas and churches of Rome, I post some pictures on my social media platforms. I once received this comment, “what’s behind that door, Father?” It was a picture of the concrete slab behind the Holy Door of St Peter’s. Browsing through YouTube, I am not sure which of the last two Ordinary Jubilee Years was more dramatic, 1975, when some of the debris hit Pope Paul VI as the cement was being struck down, or, in 2000, when the ailing Pope John Paul II knelt in front of the Holy Door. This must’ve contributed something to their cause for sainthood!
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| The Holy Door of the Basilica of St John Lateran |
Before St John Paul II led the Church into the Great Jubilee 2000, he chose “Crossing the Threshold of Hope” as the title of a book interview with the noted Italian publisher, Arnoldo Mondadori (incidentally, in 1994). With the upcoming Jubilee, we are therefore, on the threshold of hope. Having lived through the highs and lows of the first quarter of the Third Millenium, it is now the opportune time to rediscover the virtue of hope. This holds true for the entire Church and the whole world. In South Africa, as we celebrate 30 years of democracy, we too are invited to enter into a new springtime of hope. As a nation which has passed through many struggles, we are witnesses of “hoping against hope”.
Jubilee of Hope: In the midst of numerous global crises, Pope Francis has chosen hope as the central message of the upcoming Jubilee. The Bull of Indiction, “Spes non Confundit”, given in Rome on the Solemnity of the Ascension in May this year, begins with a quotation from St Paul: “hope does not disappoint” (Rom 5:5). This Christian hope is full of expectation of the good things to come, despite the challenges we face every day or the uncertainty we have about the future. The virtue of hope is intimately connected with the virtues of faith and love, for these are built on what we hope for, and “in hope we are saved” (Rom 8:24).
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| Pope Francis greets pilgrims after officially announcing the Jubilee Year |
Advent hope: The Season of Advent, a season of hope, begins on Sunday 1 December this year. Over the next four weeks, following an old custom, many Catholic Communities will light the four candles around the Advent wreathe. It will not only count down the weeks to Christmas, but also serve as the immediate preparation for the Jubilee Year. Week after week the liturgy will recall the hope of salvation in the hearts of the Chosen People, the prophets, St John the Baptist and Our Lady, and the hope of the pilgrim People of God, who now joyfully await the coming of Our Saviour. As we prayerfully anticipate Christmas amidst the doom and gloom of our times, hope grows ever stronger in the hearts of the faithful.
How about spending this Season of Advent with the Gospel of Luke, which we will read throughout the next Liturgical Year? Some have suggested reading a chapter of the Gospel every day of December, so that by Christmas Day, one would have read Luke’s account of the life and ministry of Jesus. I’d suggest reading it backwards, starting with the events of the Passion (begin with chapters 19-24), then the public ministry of Jesus (found mostly between chapters 4-21) and ending with the Infancy Narrative (chapters 1-3). This would provide solid spiritual preparation for the Nativity of Our Lord and the Holy Year. It could even give one a new sense of hope!
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| The Candle of Hope |
Live the Jubilee: Now, while everyone may not be able to travel to Rome during the Holy Year, we could all live the Jubilee, as pilgrims of hope, which is the motto for 2025. The most obvious way to participate in the Jubilee is to return to the Sacraments, especially the Eucharist and Penance, sources of God’s grace. Pope Francis has asked that, in dioceses around the world, “special care should be taken to prepare priests and the faithful to celebrate the sacrament of Confession and to make it readily available in its individual form”. There will also be opportunities throughout the Holy Year to obtain the Special Jubilee Indulgence, for yourself and the holy souls in purgatory.
Everyone can thus participate in the Jubilee, for “all the baptized, with their respective charisms and ministries, are co-responsible for ensuring that manifold signs of hope bear witness to God’s presence in the world”. The Jubilee should not simply make Catholics marvel at the beauty of the Church’s patrimony, but remind us of the hope that all Christians will be one in Christ (Jn 14:7).
In the words of Pope Francis: “For everyone, may the Jubilee be a moment of genuine, personal encounter with the Lord Jesus, the ‘door’ (cf. Jn 10:7.9) of our salvation, whom the Church is charged to proclaim always, everywhere and to all as ‘our hope’ (1 Tim 1:1)”. As the Holy Door of St Peter’s Basilica is opened on Christmas Eve, may our hearts be opened to the hope of all our days, Jesus Christ, Emmanuel, God-with-us (cf. Mt 1:23).
Join me as we continue our journey together as pilgrims of hope and explore different aspects of the Jubilee Year in my succesive blog entries!
The Pilgrim
Fr Runaine James Radine
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| Official Logo of the Jubilee 2025 |
Holy Year Timeline:
24 December 2024: Pope Francis opens the Holy Door of the Basilica
of Saint Peter in the Vatican, inaugurating the Ordinary Jubilee 2025.
26 December 2024: Pope Francis opens a Holy Door at Rome’s Rebibbia
Prison.
29 December 2024: Opening of the Holy Door at the
Archbasilica of Saint John Lateran, the Cathedral of Rome. On the same day, in
every cathedral and co-cathedral, diocesan bishops are invited to celebrate
Holy Mass for the solemn opening of the Jubilee Year [note, this may vary
according the pastoral situation in the particular churches].
1 January 2025: Opening of the Holy Door of the Papal
Basilica of Saint Mary Major.
5 January 2025: Opening of the Holy Door of the Papal
Basilica of Saint Paul Outside the Walls.
28 December 2025: Closing of the last three Holy Doors and
conclusion of the Holy Year in dioceses.
6 January 2026: Conclusion of the Ordinary Jubilee with
the closing of the Holy Door of the Basilica of Saint Peter.
Useful Links:
The Bull of Indiction can be accessed in the following link:
Read more about the Jubilee Indulgence here:
For the full itinerary of the Holy Year, visit:
www.iubilaeum2025.va/en/pellegrinaggio/calendario-giubileo.html
