Get Ready for Jubilee Year 2025

As we prepare for the Jubilee Year 2025, which begins on Christmas Eve, Pope Francis has called us to prepare with a Year of Prayer. Fr Runaine Radine explains what that means.

On an evening in March 2013, the new pontiff stood on the central balcony of St Peter’s basilica, surveying the multitudes that had gathered in the big square below. He asked the people to bless him, and in turn blessed them. Then he asked them: “Please, do not forget to pray for me.”

Pope Francis has constantly requested prayers for himself, so much so that it has become the Holy Father’s signing-out mantra after every Sunday Angelus address. As the Catholic faithful, we have a duty to pray, and to pray for and with the pope.

Since the start of his Petrine ministry, the first Jesuit to occupy the Chair of Peter has invited the faithful to pray, listen and discern, in typical Ignatian fashion.

On January 21, the Sunday of the Word of God, after reciting the same Angelus from the window of the Apostolic Palace, Pope Francis officially announced a ‘Year of Prayer’ in preparation for the Jubilee Year 2025.

“The coming months will lead us to the opening of the Holy Door, with which we will begin the Jubilee. I ask you to intensify your prayer to prepare us to live well this event of grace, and to experience the strength of God’s hope. Therefore, today we begin the Year of Prayer; that is, a year dedicated to rediscovering the great value and absolute need for prayer in personal life, in the life of the Church, and in the world”. The Holy Father added that resources would be made available by the Dicastery for Evangelisation to assist the faithful in this regard.

In a subsequent press conference, the dicastery underlined the spiritual dimension of this initiative. While no specific events have been planned for this year of preparation, it is a time to rediscover the necessity of prayer in the life of the Church so as to become “sign of hope in the world”.

The virtue of hope is a central aspect of the upcoming Jubilee. Indeed, its official theme is “Pilgrims of Hope”. Christian hope is born from a prayerful expectation and longing for the coming of Christ. As people of faith, this orients our journey together as the pilgrim Church on Earth, as we carry out deeds of love in the world.

The grand feature of every Holy Year, for which we are preparing in all earnestness now, is the opening of the Holy Door, first in St Peter’s basilica in the Vatican, set to take place on Christmas Eve, and then in the other major basilicas of Rome: St John Lateran, St Mary Major and St Paul Outside the Walls. Rome, in the words of Pope Francis, must become “a city of hope” during the Jubilee Year.

A Holy Year traditionally occurs every 25 years. You may recall the Great Jubilee Year at the turn of the new millennium in the year 2000, presided over by Pope John Paul II. The last time the Holy Door was opened, though, was at the start of the Extraordinary Jubilee of Mercy 2015-16. Such extraordinary celebrations happen from time to time. John Paul II, for instance, declared the Holy Year of Redemption in 1983. The next Holy Year might be in 2033, which will mark 2000 years since the death of Jesus on the Cross and his resurrection in the tomb — the anniversary of our Redemption in Christ.

A Year of Favour from the Lord

This alone gives us a sense of the real meaning of Jubilee Years. Taking its inspiration from the Scriptures, it is, essentially, “a year of favour from the Lord” (cf Isaiah 61:2, Luke 4:19). If you visit the four major basilicas outside a Jubilee Year, you will notice that the Holy Doors are sealed behind concrete walls. These walls are literally broken open, so that peace may enter anew.

Dioceses around the world usually designate cathedrals or other parish churches so that the faithful may pass through a Holy Door, in union with the celebrations in Rome, since pilgrimages are among the main events of Holy Years. It is a deeply spiritual time, when we practise the pillars of the Christian life with greater intensity, that of prayer, penance and works of mercy.

The Year of Prayer offers an opportunity for all the faithful to prepare for the Jubilee Year 2025 so that it becomes a moment of renewal in the prayer-life of communities, families and individuals. We can do so by rediscovering the rich tradition of prayer in our Catholic faith, from the common prayers like the Our Father and the Hail Mary to the highest form of prayer in the Eucharistic liturgy, which is the privileged place to hear the Word of God. We can also do so through devotions that are dear to us, like the rosary, and by learning from Our Lady and the saints and the great teachers of prayer.

Many avenues for a renewed commitment to prayer can be found by simply following the rhythm of the liturgical year  — the Church at prayer — daily and across the whole world.

Great jubilees in 2025

This must be an exciting time in the life of the Church — prayer alone should excite and challenge us — but it is also exciting owing to the fact that there will be some major anniversaries commemorated during the Jubilee 2025, for which we give thanks to God in prayer. The year will mark 1700 years since the Council of Nicaea as well as the dedication of the basilica of St John Lateran, and the 60th anniversary of the conclusion of the Second Vatican Council.

Unlike previous ones, perhaps the upcoming Holy Year is the first “social-media friendly Jubilee”. Technology has its drawbacks, of course, but the Jubilee 2025 website as well as an app geared towards pilgrims are now live, which will hopefully spark interest among young people and encourage many others to get involved, not only online but, more importantly, also in-person.

Archbishop Rino Fisichella, one of the pro-prefects for the Dicastery of Evangelisation, explained at the aforementioned press conference that the Year of Prayer, and indeed the Jubilee, is “a time to discover how to pray, and above all how to educate the people of today in prayer, in this age of digital culture, so that prayer can be effective and fruitful. We cannot deny the fact that our time manifests a profound need for spirituality. The louder the cry of technology that seems to correspond to all our desires, the deeper we discern the search for a true spirituality that brings each person back to encounter themselves in the truth of their existence and therefore in a coherent relationship with God”.

The aim of this time of grace in the Church is a “spiritual Jubilee”, reminding us that holiness is the vocation of all the baptised. Thus all the faithful can and should participate in this Year of Prayer in preparation for the Jubilee Year, as “Pilgrims of Hope” in the broken world of today.

Fr Runaine Radine is a priest of the diocese of Port Elizabeth currently based in Rome. The Jubilee 2025 website is at www.iubilaeum2025.va/en.html and the “Iubilaeum25” app can be downloaded from Play Store for Android or App Store for iOS.

Published in the June 2024 issue of The Southern Cross magazine