Pope Francis on Tuesday opens the 2025 Holy Year, kicking off a celebration of the Catholic Church that is predicted to attract some 32 million pilgrims to Rome and test the pope’s stamina and the flexibility of the Eternal City to welcome them.
At the beginning of Christmas Eve Mass, Francis pushes open the nice Holy Door at the doorway of St. Peter’s Basilica. The ceremony inaugurates the once-every-25-year tradition of a Jubilee, during which the Catholic faithful make pilgrimages to Rome.
Francis has dedicated the 2025 Jubilee to the theme of hope, and he’ll underscore that message when he opens a Holy Door on Thursday at Rome’s Rebibbia prison in a bid to offer inmates hope for a greater future. Francis has long incorporated prison ministry into his priestly vocation, and has made several visits to Rebibbia and other prisons during his travels.
Security across the Vatican was at its highest levels following the Christmas market attack last week in Germany, the inside ministry said.
Italian authorities were using extra police patrols and camera surveillance around Rome, while pilgrims faced metal detectors and other security checks to access St. Peter’s Square via a reinforced police barricade passage.
Francis, who turned 88 last week, went into the Christmas week and Jubilee launch with a chilly that forced him to deliver his weekly Sunday blessing from indoors. His health and stamina, already compromised due to his tendency to get bronchitis, are a priority given the rigorous calendar of events through the Holy Year.
One of the highlights will likely be the canonization of the teenage web whiz Carlo Acutis, considered the primary millennial and digital-era saint, through the Jubilee dedicated to adolescents in April.
This week, Francis celebrates Christmas Eve Mass on Tuesday evening after which delivers his annual “Urbi et Orbi” (to the town and the world) speech on Christmas Day from the loggia of St. Peter’s Basilica. In addition to the outing at Rebibbia, he’ll rejoice New Year’s Eve vespers and a New Year’s Day Mass.
The city of Rome goes into the Jubilee with some trepidation. It has undergone two years of traffic-clogging public works upgrades of transportation, hospital emergency rooms and other vital services, testing residents’ patience.
But only a couple of third of the 323 projects have been accomplished, and the town is already groaning under the load of overtourism. Visitors have returned to Italy in droves following COVID-19, and the explosion of short-term vacation rentals has exacerbated a housing crisis.
Some of Rome’s prized monuments have reopened recently, including the Trevi Fountain. And the fundamental Jubilee project was finished just in time: A pedestrian piazza linking Castel St. Angelo to the Via della Conciliazione, the fundamental boulevard resulting in St. Peter’s Square, was unveiled Monday.
Vatican officials insist that Rome has a practice of welcoming pilgrims and point to how past Jubilees have left their mark on the Eternal City’s urban and spiritual landscape. The Sistine Chapel was commissioned by Pope Sixtus IV for the Jubilee of 1475, and the large Vatican garage was built for the 2000 Jubilee under St. John Paul II.
Pope Boniface VII called the primary Holy Year in 1300, and in recent times they’re generally celebrated every 25 to 50 years. Pilgrims who participate can obtain “indulgences” — the related to the forgiveness of sins that roughly amounts to a “get out of Purgatory free” card.
Francis declared a special Jubilee in 2015-2016 dedicated to mercy and the subsequent one is planned for 2033 to commemorate the anniversary of the crucifixion of Christ.
The last regular Jubilee was in 2000, when St. John Paul II ushered within the church’s third millennium. The one before that, in 1975, was notable because Pope Paul VI was nearly hit by falling plaster when he opened the Holy Door. The door was still behind a fake wall and Paul had used a ceremonial hammer to bang on it thrice to open it. The fake wall now could be removed well upfront.
___
Associated Press religion coverage receives support through the AP’s collaboration with The Conversation US, with funding from Lilly Endowment Inc. The AP is solely chargeable for this content.
