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| The Divine Mercy Image |
About the Jubilee of Mercy
In
St. Peter’s Basilica, Pope Francis announced last March 13, 2015, the
celebration of an “extraordinary Holy Year”. This “Jubilee of Mercy” will
commence with the opening of the Holy Door in St. Peter’s on the Solemnity of
the Immaculate Conception, 2015, and will conclude on November 20, 2016 with
the Solemnity of Our Lord Jesus Christ, King of the Universe. At the start of
the New Year, the Holy Father had stated: “This
is the time of mercy. It is important that the lay faithful live it and bring
it into different social environments. Go forth!”
The
Jubilee announcement had been made on the second anniversary of the election of
Pope Francis, during his homily for the penitential liturgy with which the Holy
Father opened the “24 Hours for the Lord”. This initiative, proposed by the
Pontifical Council for the Promotion of the New Evangelization, promotes
throughout the world the opening of churches for an extended period of time for
the purpose of inviting people to the celebration of the Sacrament of
Reconciliation. The theme for this year has been taken from the Letter of St.
Paul to the Ephesians, “God [is] rich in mercy” (Eph 2:4).
The
opening of this next Jubilee will take place on the fiftieth anniversary of the
closing of the Second Vatican Council in 1965. This is of great significance,
for it impels the Church to continue the work begun at Vatican II.
During
the Jubilee, the Sunday readings for Ordinary Time will be taken from the
Gospel of Luke, the one referred to as “the evangelist of mercy”. Dante
Alighieri describes him as “scriba
mansuetudinis Christi”, “narrator of the meekness of Christ”. There are
many well-known parables of mercy presented in the Gospel of Luke: the lost
sheep, the lost coin, the merciful father.
The
official and solemn announcement of the Holy Year will take place with the
public proclamation of the Bolla in front of the Holy Door on Divine Mercy
Sunday, the Feast instituted by Saint John Paul II and celebrated on the Sunday
after Easter.
In
the ancient Hebrew tradition, the Jubilee Year, which was celebrated every 50
years, was meant to restore equality among all of the children of Israel,
offering new possibilities to families which had lost their property and even
their personal freedom. In addition, the Jubilee Year was a reminder to the
rich that a time would come when their Israelite slaves would once again become
their equals and would be able to reclaim their rights. “Justice, according to
the Law of Israel, consisted above all in the protection of the weak” (St. John
Paul II, Tertio millenio adveniente 13).
The
Catholic tradition of the Holy Year began with Pope Boniface VIII in 1300.
Boniface VIII had envisioned a Jubilee every century. From 1475 onwards – in
order to allow each generation to experience at least one Holy Year – the
ordinary Jubilee was to be celebrated every 25 years. However, an extraordinary
Jubilee may be announced on the occasion of an event of particular importance.
Until
present, there have been 26 ordinary Holy Year celebrations, the last of which
was the Jubilee of 2000. The custom of calling extraordinary Jubilees dates
back to the XVI century. The last extraordinary Holy Years, which were
celebrated during the previous century, were those in 1933, proclaimed by Pius
XI to celebrate XIX hundred years of Redemption and in 1983, proclaimed by John
Paul II on the occasion of the 1950 years of Redemption.
The
Catholic Church has given to the Hebrew Jubilee a more spiritual significance.
It consists in a general pardon, an indulgence open to all, and the possibility
to renew one’s relationship with God and neighbor. Thus, the Holy Year is
always an opportunity to deepen one’s faith and to live with a renewed
commitment to Christian witness.
With
the Jubilee of Mercy, Pope Francis focuses attention upon the merciful God who
invites all men and women to return to Him. The encounter with God inspires in
one the virtue of mercy.
The
initial rite of the Jubilee is the opening of the Holy Door. This door is one
which is only opened during the Holy Year and which remains closed during all
other years. Each of the four major basilicas of Rome has a Holy Door: Saint
Peter’s, St. John Lateran, St. Paul Outside the Walls and St. Mary Major. This
rite of the opening of the Holy Door illustrates symbolically the idea that,
during the Jubilee, the faithful are offered an “extraordinary pathway” towards
salvation.
The
Holy Doors of the other Basilicas will be opened after the opening of the Holy
Door of St. Peter’s Basilica.
Mercy
is a theme very dear to Pope Francis, as is expressed in the episcopal motto he
had chosen: “miserando atque eligendo”.
This citation is taken from the homily of Saint Bede the Venerable during which
he commented on the Gospel passage of the calling of Saint Matthew: “Vidit ergo lesus publicanum et quia
miserando atque eligendo vidit, ait illi Sequere me” (Jesus therefore sees
the tax collector, and since he sees by having mercy and by choosing, he says
to him, ‘follow me’). This homily is a tribute to divine mercy. One possible
translation of this motto is “With eyes of mercy”.
During
the first Angelus after his elections, the Holy Father stated: “Feeling mercy,
that this word changes everything. This is the best thing we can feel: it
changes the world. A little mercy makes the world less cold and more just. We
need to understand properly this mercy of God, this merciful Father who is so
patient” (Angelus, March 17, 2013).
In
his Angelus on January 11, 2015, he stated: “There is so much need of mercy
today, and it is important that the lay faithful live it and bring it into
different social environments. Go forth! We are living in the age of mercy,
this is the age of mercy”. Then, in his 2015 Lenten Message, the Holy Father
expressed: “How greatly I desire that all those places where the Church is
present, especially our parishes and our communities, may become islands of
mercy in the midst of the sea of indifference!”
In
the English edition of the Apostolic Exhortation Evangelii gaudium the term mercy appears 32 times.
Pope
Francis has entrusted the Pontifical Council for the Promotion of the New
Evangelization with the organization of the Jubilee of Mercy.
List
of jubilee years and their Popes:
1300:
Boniface VIII
1350:
Clement VI
1390:
proclaimed by Urban VI, presided over by Boniface IX
1400:
Boniface IX
1423:
Martin V
1450:
Nicholas V
1475:
proclaimed by Paul II, presided over by Sixtus IV
1500:
Alexander VI
1525:
Clement VII
1550:
proclaimed by Paul III, presided over by Julius III
1575:
Gregory XIII
1600:
Clement VIII
1625:
Urban VIII
1650:
Innocent X
1675:
Clement X
1700:
opened by Innocent XII, closed by Clement XI
1725:
Benedict XIII
1750:
Benedict XIV
1775:
proclaimed by Clement XIV, presided over by Pius VI
1825:
Leo XII
1875:
Pius IX
1900:
Leo XIII
1925:
Pius XI
1933:
Pius XI
1950:
Pius XII
1975:
Paul VI
1983:
John Paul II
2000:
John Paul II
2015:
Francis
In
the years 1800 and 1850, due to the political circumstances of the times, there
were no jubilees.
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