Pope Francis Announces Holy Year of Mercy.
Surprise comes on 2nd anniversary of his pontificate.
VATICAN CITY — On the second anniversary of his election, Pope Francis today announced the celebration of an extraordinary Holy Year of Mercy, beginning on December 8, the Solemnity of the Immaculate Conception and the 50th anniversary of the closing of Vatican II.
The surprise announcement came at a penitential liturgy celebrated in St. Peter’s Basilica Friday evening, as Pope Francis opened the Lenten prayer initiative “24 Hours for the Lord”. The Holy Father said the celebration of this “Jubilee of Mercy”, also called an “extraordinary Holy Year”, will commence with the opening of the Holy Door of the basilica and “will conclude on November 20, 2016, the Sunday of Our Lord Jesus Christ, King of the Universe and living Face of the Father’s mercy.”
Addressing the faithful, the Pope said: “Dear brothers and sisters, I have often thought about how the Church might render more evident her mission to be a witness to mercy. “It is a journey that begins with spiritual conversion,” he said. “That is why I have decided to announce an extraordinary Jubilee centered on God’s mercy. It will be a Holy Year of Mercy. We want to live in the light of the Lord’s word: ‘Be merciful as your heavenly Father is merciful’ (cf. Lk 6:36).” The Pope then added: “this is especially true for confessors.”
In Christian tradition, a year of Jubilee is a time of joy, remission or universal pardon. The Vatican points out that the opening of this “Jubilee of Mercy” will take place on the 50th anniversary of the closing of the Second Vatican Council in 1965. Pope Francis has entrusted the organization of the Holy Year to the Pontifical Council for the Promotion of the New Evangelization.
The last “ordinary Jubilee” year was in 2000, when Pope St. John Paul II held the “Great Jubilee” which was likewise a celebration of the mercy of God and forgiveness of sins. The most recent extraordinary Holy Years were those in 1933, proclaimed by Pius XI to celebrate 1,900 years of Redemption, and in 1983, proclaimed by John Paul II on the occasion of 1,950 years of Redemption.
In a statement released on Friday, the Vatican explained that, during the Jubilee Year, the Sunday readings for Ordinary Time will be taken from the Gospel of Luke, who is referred to as “the evangelist of mercy”. St. Luke’s Gospel contains many well-known parables of mercy: the lost sheep, the lost coin, the merciful father.
The Vatican added: “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 the Sunday after Easter.”
As the Old Testament reveals, in the ancient Hebrew tradition, a Jubilee Year was celebrated every 50 years. It 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.
The Vatican explained that a Jubilee Year was also 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 who 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.
An extraordinary Jubilee may be announced on the occasion of an event of particular importance. There have been 26 ordinary Holy Year celebrations while the custom of calling extraordinary Jubilees dates back to the 16th century.
The Catholic Church has invested the Hebrew Jubilee with a deeper 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. The Holy Year is therefore “always an opportunity to deepen one’s faith and to live with a renewed commitment to Christian witness,” the Vatican said.
With the Jubilee of Mercy, it added, 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.”
Pope Francis concluded his announcement of the “Jubilee of Mercy” at Friday’s penitential liturgy by entrusting the Holy Year to the maternal intercession of the Blessed Virgin, saying: “I am convinced that the whole Church will be able to find in this Jubilee the joy of rediscovering and making fruitful the mercy of God, through which we have all been called to give consolation to every man and women of our time. From this moment on, let us entrust it to the Mother of Mercy, that she may turn her gaze upon us and watch over our journey.”
Diane Montagna
Aleteia, March 13, 2015
Pope Francis:
homily with announcement of Year of Mercy.
(Vatican Radio) Pope Francis presided over a penance service in St. Peter’s Basilica on Friday afternoon, during which he announced an extraordinary Jubilee dedicated to Divine Mercy. Below, please find Vatican Radio’s English translation of the Holy Father’s homily, in which he made the announcement.
This year as last, as we head into of the Fourth Sunday of Lent, we are gathered to celebrate the penitential liturgy. We are united with so many Christians, who, in every part of the world, have accepted the invitation to live this moment as a sign of the goodness of the Lord. The Sacrament of Reconciliation, in fact, allows us with confidence to draw near to the Father, in order to be certain of His pardon. He really is “rich in mercy” and extends His mercy with abundance over those who turn to Him with a sincere heart.
To be here in order to experience His love, however, is first of all the fruit of His grace. As the Apostle Paul reminds us, God never ceases to show the richness of His mercy throughout the ages. The transformation of the heart that leads us to confess our sins is “God’s gift”, it is “His work” (cf. Eph 2:8-10). To be touched with tenderness by His hand and shaped by His grace allows us, therefore, to approach the priest without fear for our sins, but with the certainty of being welcomed by him in the name of God, and understood notwithstanding our miseries. Coming out of the confessional, we will feel God’s strength, which restores life and returns the enthusiasm of faith.
The Gospel we have heard (cf. Lk 7:36-50) opens for us a path of hope and comfort. It is good that we should feel that same compassionate gaze of Jesus upon us, as when he perceived the sinful woman in the house of the Pharisee. In this passage two words return before us with great insistence: love and judgment.
There is the love of the sinful woman, who humbles herself before the Lord; but first there is the merciful love of Jesus for her, which pushes her to approach. Her cry of repentance and joy washes the feet of the Master, and her hair dries them with gratitude; her kisses are pure expression of her affection; and the fragrant ointment poured out with abundance attests how precious He is to her eyes. This woman’s every gesture speaks of love and expresses her desire to have an unshakeable certainty in her life: that of being forgiven. And Jesus gives this assurance: welcoming her, He demonstrates God’s love for her, just for her! Love and forgiveness are simultaneous: God forgives her much, everything, because “she loved much” (Luke 7:47); and she adores Jesus because she feels that in Him there is mercy and not condemnation. Thanks to Jesus, God casts her many sins away behind Him, He remembers them no more (cf. Is 43:25). For her, a new season now begins; she is reborn in love, to a new life.
This woman has really met the Lord. In silence, she opened her heart to Him; in pain, she showed repentance for her sins; with her tears, she appealed to the goodness of God for forgiveness. For her, there will be no judgment except that which comes from God, and this is the judgment of mercy. The protagonist of this meeting is certainly the love that goes beyond justice.
Simon the Pharisee, on the contrary, cannot find the path of love. He stands firm upon the threshold of formality. He is not capable of taking the next step to go meet Jesus, who brings him salvation. Simon limited himself to inviting Jesus to dinner, but did not really welcome Him. In his thoughts, he invokes only justice, and in so doing, he errs. His judgment on the woman distances him from the truth and does not allow him even to understand who guest is. He stopped at the surface, he was not able to look to the heart. Before Jesus’ parable and the question of which a servant would love his master most, the Pharisee answered correctly, “The one, to whom the master forgave most.” And Jesus does not fail to make him observe: “Thou hast judged rightly. (Lk 7:43)” Only when the judgment of Simon is turned toward love: then is he in the right.
The call of Jesus pushes each of us never to stop at the surface of things, especially when we are dealing with a person. We are called to look beyond, to focus on the heart to see how much generosity everyone is capable. No one can be excluded from the mercy of God; everyone knows the way to access it and the Church is the house that welcomes all and refuses no one. Its doors remain wide open, so that those who are touched by grace can find the certainty of forgiveness. The greater the sin, so much the greater must be the love that the Church expresses toward those who convert.
Dear brothers and sisters, I have often thought about how the Church might make clear its mission of being a witness to mercy. It is journey that begins with a spiritual conversion. For this reason, I have decided to call an extraordinary Jubilee that is to have the mercy of God at its center. It shall be a Holy Year of Mercy. We want to live this Year in the light of the Lord’s words: “Be merciful, just as your Father is merciful. (cf. Lk 6:36)”
This Holy Year will begin on this coming Solemnity of the Immaculate Conception and will end on November 20, 2016, the Sunday dedicated to Our Lord Jesus Christ, King of the Universe – and living face of the Father’s mercy. I entrust the organization of this Jubilee to the Pontifical Council for Promotion of the New Evangelization, that [the dicastery] might animate it as a new stage in the journey of the Church on its mission to bring to every person the Gospel of mercy.
I am convinced that the whole Church will find in this Jubilee the joy needed to rediscover and make fruitful the mercy of God, with which all of us are called to give consolation to every man and woman of our time. From this moment, we entrust this Holy Year to the Mother of Mercy, that she might turn her gaze upon us and watch over our journey.
(from Vatican Radio)
