2025 Will be a Jubilee Year……here’s what to expect
It’s been announced that the year 2025 will be a Jubilee Year (also known as a “holy year,”). An ordinary Jubilee Year is a special year in the life of the church that is only celebrated every 25 years.
Jubilee years have been held on regular intervals in the Catholic church since 1300, but they trace their roots back to the Jewish tradition of marking a jubilee year every 50 years.
According to the Vatican website for the jubilee, these years in Jewish history were “intended to be marked as a time to re-establish a proper relationship with God, with one another, and with all of creation, and involved the forgiveness of debts, the return of misappropriated land, and a fallow period for the fields.”
The most recent ordinary jubilee was in 2000; however, Pope Francis called for an Extraordinary Jubilee Year of Mercy in 2015-2016.
The theme of the Holy Year is “Pilgrims of Hope.” The papal bull, issued May 9, 2024 that introduced the coming Jubilee Year is titled “Spes Non Confundit,” or “Hope does not disappoint,” drawn from Romans 5:5. “Everyone knows what it is to hope,” Pope Francis wrote. “In the heart of each person, hope dwells as the desire and expectation of good things to come, despite our not knowing what the future may bring.we expect that Italy will be high on everyone’s list of destinations.
Jubilee 2025 opened Christmas Eve, December 24, 2024 at 7 p.m. with the rite of the opening of the Holy Door at Saint Peter’s Basilica in the Vatican immediately before Pope Francis celebrated midnight Mass.
Holy Doors will also be opened at Rome’s three other major basilicas:
Saint John Lateran on December 29
Saint Mary Major on January 1
Saint Paul’s Outside the Walls on January 5.
A Holy Door was also opened December 26 at Rebibbia Prison, a Roman prison Pope Francis has visited twice before to celebrate Mass …… and wash inmates’ feet on Holy Thursday.
The doors represent the passage to salvation Jesus opened to humanity. In 1423, Pope Martin V opened the Holy Door in the Basilica of St. John Lateran — the Diocese of Rome’s cathedral — for the first time for a jubilee. For the Holy Year of 1500, Pope Alexander VI opened Holy Doors at Rome’s four main basilicas. At the end of a holy year, the Holy Doors are formally closed and then bricked over.
We expect even larger crowds than normally, but don’t let that deter you. If you are considering going to Italy for the Holy Year 2025, as we are, there are some things that will help prepare you for the experience and make your trip enjoyable. Whether traveling individually or with a group, planning ahead can make any trip more enjoyable.
To help you prepare for the Jubilee Year 2025 we recommend this article: (courtesy Select International Tours)
You can earn a plenary indulgence by traveling to one of these churches in Rome….or even in your own country.
And here is an article from Alateia that will help in your planning.