Jubilee Year 2025: Pilgrims of Hope

Pope Francis has announced that 2025 will be a year of Jubilee – an event that happens every 25 years. The theme for the upcoming Jubilee is “Pilgrims of Hope”. The 2025 Jubilee will begin on 31st December 2024 and will run until the Feast of the Epiphany in 2026.

More information is available on the Jubilee 2025 website: https://www.iubilaeum2025.va/en.html

What is a Jubilee?

Taking place every 25 years, a Jubilee year is a tradition that is recognised and respected throughout the world as being a significant part of the history of our faith.

Excluding the Extraordinary Year of Mercy in 2016, the last Jubilee year took place in 2000, marking an historic moment as the Church entered into her third millennium. A Jubilee is a special year of grace, in which the Catholic Church offers the faithful the possibility of asking for a plenary indulgence – a remission of sins for themselves or deceased loved ones. The year begins with the well-known custom of the opening of the Holy Door at St Peter’s Basilica, following the other three papal basilicas in Rome. The Pope grants permission for Holy Doors to be situated throughout the world for Catholics everywhere to take part in this most special rite.

We have lots planned for next year. Keep checking back to see what we get up to!  Here's a taster:

• Year 4 will be joining the other Catholic schools in Wandsworth for a special Jubilee Year Mass at St Georges Cathedral in March 2025. This will be celebrated by Canon Victor
• We will be giving the children opportunities to take part in local pilgrimages as part of the call for a spiritual journey of hope.

The Jubilee Prayer

Father in heaven,
may the faith you have given us
in your son, Jesus Christ, our brother,
and the flame of charity enkindled
in our hearts by the Holy Spirit,
reawaken in us the blessed hope
for the coming of your Kingdom.

May your grace transform us
into tireless cultivators of the seeds of the Gospel.
May those seeds transform from within both humanity and the whole cosmos
in the sure expectation
of a new heaven and a new earth,
when, with the powers of Evil vanquished,
your glory will shine eternally.

May the grace of the Jubilee
reawaken in us, Pilgrims of Hope,
a yearning for the treasures of heaven.
May that same grace spread
the joy and peace of our Redeemer
throughout the earth.
To you our God, eternally blessed,
be glory and praise for ever.

Amen