The Jubilee 2025 opens tomorrow December 24, 2024 at 7.00 pm with a full program of events and celebrations. Also known as Holy Yearthe Jubilee is an event organized by the Catholic Church in Rome every 25 years. Those who go on pilgrimage to the capital and cross the Holy door, specially opened in St. Peter’s Basilica and other basilicas, obtains theplenary indulgence: all the sins he has committed are forgiven and the soul returns to being pure. Every Jubilee lasts about a yearduring which a large number of pilgrims flock to Rome.
The Jubilee has been established in the year 1300 by Pope Boniface VIII and since 1450 it has taken place every twenty-five years. The pope can also call extraordinary jubilees.
What is the Jubilee
The Universal Jubilee of the Catholic Church it is a celebration lasting about a year during which the Pope “condones” all the sins of the faithful who go on a pilgrimage to Rome and cross the Holy Door open to St. Peter’s Basilica and at other Churches, including the three papal basilicas of the capital: San Giovanni in Laterano, San Paolo Fuori le Mura, Santa Maria Maggiore.
The idea on which the celebration is based is the claim that the Pope has the power to “absolve” the faithful and condone their sins, making their souls pure and free to enter Heaven. The Jubilee is divided into one plurality of celebrationsmany of which are reserved for specific categories of people.
The Jubilee lasts just over a year: from Christmas Eve of one year to the Epiphany of the second following year. Therefore it is also known as the Holy Year. It is ordinarily held every twenty-five years, but the popes can decide to establish it extraordinary jubilees on certain occasions. The first extraordinary Jubilee was announced in 1423 by Martin V to celebrate the return of the papacy to Rome after the Avignon “captivity”; the last one took place between 2015 and 2016 on the initiative of Francis.
The beginning of the Jubilee is marked by the opening of the Holy Door of St. Peter’s Basilicacarried out by the pontiff, followed in the following days by the opening of the holy doors of the other basilicas. The doors remain open for the entire duration of the Holy Year (however, they are closed at night) and are then walled up awaiting the next Jubilee.
The origins and history of the Jubilee
The Jubilee was born in the Middle Ages, but has its origins in an ancient tradition of the Jewish people. In ancient times, in fact, every fifty years the Jews left the land to rest, freed the slaves and returned the confiscated lands. The start of the event was announced with a ram’s hornin Hebrew called jobelfrom which the word jubilee derives.
In the Christian context, a ceremony for the remission of sins every one hundred years perhaps already existed in the thirteenth century, but there are no contemporary sources. We know with certainty that the Jubilee was established by the Pope Boniface VIII in the year 1300 with the bull Antiquorum habet trust relatio. The bull offered plenary indulgence (i.e. the remission of all sins) to the inhabitants of Rome who visited the basilicas of St. Peter and St. Paul at least thirty times during the Holy Year; for those who did not live in Rome, it was sufficient to visit the two basilicas fifteen times. The event caused a huge influx of pilgrimsalso mentioned by Dante in the Divine Comedy, to the point that the papal authorities had to establish the direction of travel on the Sant’Angelo bridge, located not far from St. Peter’s.
The bull of Boniface VIII also established that the Jubilee would have place every hundred yearsbut already in 1350 Clement VI changed the legislation, lowering the interval between one Holy Year and the next to fifty years. Since 1450 the Jubilee has taken place every twenty-five years. It was not celebrated on only three occasions1800, 1850 and 1875, due to the political upheavals in which the Papal State was involved.
The Jubilee of 2025
The next jubilee begins on December 24, 2024with the opening, by Francis, of the Holy Door of St. Peter’s Basilica. It will therefore be the second Jubilee celebrated by the current pontiff after the extraordinary one of 2015/16. The opening of the door of St. Peter will be followed by the opening of the doors saints of the other papal basilicas of Rome in the following days, but the doors of other churches used in some past jubilees will not be opened.
During the Holy Year, they will be organized in the Vatican special days dedicated to specific categories of people. The first will be those of the Jubilee of the world of communication, from 24 to 26 January 2025, followed by the Jubilee of the armed and police forces on 8 and 9 February. Among the other jubilees, the one for young people will be held in June, from which a large influx of people is expected, and the following month the one dedicated to “digital missionaries and Catholic influencers”. The last one will be the prisoners’ jubilee, scheduled for December 14, 2025. The closing of the holy doorwhich will take place on January 6, 2026, will mark the end of the celebrations.
