By Deacon Scott Pearhill
ICR Editor
2025 is a Jubilee year for the Catholic Church. Jubilees, or Holy Years, are celebrated every 25 years and highlight a spiritual theme. This year’s focus is “Pilgrims of Hope.”
Pope Francis encouraged the worldwide Church to “fan the flame of hope” in his letter announcing the Holy Year. The Pope said he wants “everyone to gain new strength and certainty by looking to the future with an open spirit, a trusting heart and far-sighted vision.”
The Jubilee will officially begin on Dec. 24 when Pope Francis opens a Holy Door at St. Peter’s Basilica in Rome.
Bishop Peter F. Christensen will celebrate the opening rite for the 2025 Jubilee Year on Sunday, Dec. 29, at the Cathedral of St. John the Evangelist in Boise. The rite will begin at 2:30 p.m. at the top of the steps in front of the Cathedral doors.
Selections from sacred scripture and the papal bull inaugurating the Holy Year will be proclaimed. The assembly will then have an opportunity to venerate the special Jubilee Cross before the procession into the Cathedral.
The Jubilee Cross will lead the entrance procession and remain in the Cathedral for the duration of the Holy Year so pilgrims can visit and venerate this sign of Christ’s paschal sacrifice, a sign of hope for Christians. After the special opening rites, the 2:30 p.m. Mass on Dec. 29 will celebrate the Feast of the Holy Family.
Bishop Peter asks Idaho parishes to use existing liturgies and regional celebrations throughout the year to celebrate the Jubilee. For example, the annual Idaho Catholic Youth Conference (ICYC), Mar. 7-9, will be themed “Pilgrims of Hope” and will include catechesis highlighting the importance of hope.
In his papal bull inaugurating the Jubilee, Spes non confundit (Hope does not disappoint), Pope Francis wrote, “In the course of the year, every effort should be made to enable the People of God to participate fully in its proclamation of hope in God’s grace and in the signs that attest to their efficacy.” Parishioners, families, students and all the Idaho faithful are encouraged to participate in local events and liturgies that celebrate the Year of Hope.
On the same day the Diocese of Boise kicks off its Jubilee observance (Sunday, Dec. 29), Pope Francis will open another Holy Door, this one at the Archbasilica of St. John Lateran, the cathedral of the Diocese of Rome. “In Catholic tradition, the Holy Door represents the passage to salvation—the path to a new and eternal life, which was opened to humanity by Jesus,” Pope Francis wrote in Spes non confundit.
Similarly, Pope St. John Paul II described the meaning of a Holy Door in his Bull of Indiction for the Jubilee in 2000: “To pass through that door means to confess that Jesus Christ is Lord; it is to strengthen faith in Him in order to live the new life which He has given us. It is a decision that presumes freedom to choose and the courage to leave something behind, in the knowledge that what is gained is divine life.”
For the 2025 Jubilee, Vatican instructions specify that Holy Doors be opened only in Rome. Therefore, a special Jubilee Cross will be included in our local celebration of the opening rites at the Cathedral in Boise.
Jubilee years have been common in the Church since 1300 when Pope Boniface VIII established the regular practice of Holy Years. At first, they were celebrated every century, then every half-century and finally every 25 years, allowing each generation to experience the graces of the year-long celebration.
Regularly scheduled Holy Year celebrations are called "ordinary Jubilees," but there are also "extraordinary Jubilees." In 1933, Pope Pius XI chose to commemorate the 1,900th anniversary of our redemption through Christ's Paschal mystery. There will likely be another extraordinary Jubilee in 2033, celebrating the 2,000th anniversary of our redemption. Pope Francis proclaimed an extraordinary Holy Year in 2015: the Year of Mercy.
More information about the 2025 Jubilee can be found on the Vatican website iubilaeum2025.va and the U.S. Bishops’ website: usccb.org/jubilee2025.
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