On Christmas Eve, Pope Francis inaugurated the Jubilee Year 2025 by opening the Holy Door in the Basilica of St. Peter in Rome. A “Jubilee Year” is a year of forgiveness, mercy, and solidarity that’s meant to reestablish proper relationships with God, each other, and creation. The tradition of the Jubilee Year has biblical origins. It was a time when debts and sins were forgiven, slaves and prisoners were freed, and people returned to their original land and property.
During this Year, we will be able to obtain a Jubilee Indulgence granted by the Holy Father if we undertake a pilgrimage to any sacred Jubilee site: by devoutly participating in Holy Mass or engaging in Eucharistic adoration and meditation, or praying a devotion such as the Marian Rosary, for example, in designated churches in Rome, in the Holy Land, a local Cathedral or other church designated by the local Bishop. We are delighted to announce that our church, Corpus Christi Church, is one of the few churches in our diocese designated to be such a pilgrimage church during the 2025 Jubilee.
A plenary indulgence means that by the merits of Jesus Christ, the Blessed Virgin Mary and all the saints, there is the full remission of the temporal punishment of sins already forgiven in Sacramental Confession. A plenary indulgence cleanses the soul as if the person had just been baptized. Plenary indulgences during the Jubilee Year could be obtained multiple times, even daily, and can be applied to deceased people.
In addition to the pilgrimages to the designated churches, there are other ways to receive an indulgence during the Jubilee Year: abstaining for at least one day a week from “futile distractions”, such as social media or television, fasting, donating “a proportionate sum of money to the poor”, supporting religious or social works, especially in the defense of life in all phases, offering support to migrants, the elderly, the poor, young people in difficulty, helping abandoned children, and volunteering in service to your community.
Indulgences could also be obtained by certain works of mercy and penance, which bear witness to the conversion undertaken by us. We can do this by practicing the Corporal Works of Mercy: to feed the hungry, give drink to the thirsty, clothe the naked, welcome the stranger, heal the sick, visit the imprisoned, bury the dead, and by practicing the Spiritual Works of Mercy: to counsel the doubtful, instruct the ignorant, admonish sinners, comfort the afflicted, forgive offences, bear patiently those who do us ill, pray for the living and the dead. By these actions, we would make a pilgrimage to Christ who is present in them.
To obtain a plenary indulgence during the Jubilee Year, a person also must fulfill special and necessary spiritual requirements:
- Detachment from all sin
- Sacramental confession
- Holy Communion
- Praying for the intentions of the Pope. We can pray in a general way for the intentions designated by the Pope without knowing specifics.
The Vatican asks bishops to “take into account the needs of the faithful as well as the opportunity to reinforce the concept of pilgrimage with all its symbolic significance, so as to manifest the great need for conversion and reconciliation.” In response to that in the Jubilee Year, beginning from February 1, there will be several initiatives that we will undertake to help our parishioners and any visitors to grow in the spirit of conversion and reconciliation. Some of them are:
- Every Sunday at 3 pm there will be a Holy Hour with the praying of the Divine Mercy Chaplet and meditation.
- Every Thursday there will be evening Mass at 6 pm with prayers for the Jubilee Year and the Sacrament of Confession offered at 5:30 pm before Mass. (There will be no 9 am Mass on Thursdays.)
- A replica of the Holy Doors from St. Peter’s Basilica in Rome will be placed in our sanctuary. Our parishioners and visitors can pass through this door as a symbolic manifestation of their conversion, reconciliation and readiness to grow in faith.
Brothers and Sisters,
The Jubilee Year gives all of us an amazing opportunity and privilege to reinvigorate our faith, grow in understanding of our God and share this hope and faith with others. Obtaining a plenary indulgence will require us to live in the state of grace, without a mortal sin, and to take some action, like a pilgrimage to one of these churches or works of mercy, which will seal the amazing gifts offered to us by God. Let’s take advantage of such a great opportunity.
Fr. Mark Jurzyk