The Year of Prayer 2024 and The Jubilee Year 2025
Introducing the Jubilee Year
Pope Francis has declared that 2025 will be a Jubilee Year. A Jubilee year is a holy year. As we read in Leviticus (25:12) ‘For it is a Jubilee; it shall be holy to you.’ The year will run from the opening of the Holy Door in Rome on 24 December 2024 until the Feast of Epiphany 2026. The Holy Father has invited the whole Church to prepare for the Jubilee through 2024, which he has called a Year of Prayer.
Jubilee Motto
The motto for the upcoming Jubilee Year is ‘Pilgrims of Hope’. The motto aims to give a concise sense of the meaning of the jubilee journey. The 2025 jubilee will be a year of hope and trust in a world suffering the impacts of war, the ongoing impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic and the increased threats to the climate.
Jubilee Logo
The logo shows four stylized figures, representing all of humanity, coming together from the four corners of the earth on pilgrimage. They embrace each other to indicate the solidarity and fraternity which should unite all peoples. The figure at the front is holding onto the cross. It is not only the sign of the faith which this lead figure embraces, but also of hope, which can never be abandoned, because we are always in need of hope, especially in our moments of greatest need.
The Year of Prayer
The Holy Father has asked that 2024 be a ‘Year of Prayer’, as a preparatory year for the Jubilee, particularly focussed on the Lord’s Prayer. Pope Francis announced its launch on Sunday 21 January 2024. ‘We Dare to Say’ is now available as booklet (distributed in parishes across the diocese) or for download from the Jubilee Pages of the Diocesan Website. It is a resource for small group faith-sharing and for individual meditation, featuring five sessions each based on a line from the Lord’s Prayer. Each session includes scripture, prayers and a reflection with questions. Please consider joining with others this Lent to use ‘We Dare to Say’, exploring together the prayer our Saviour gave us.
Adoremus at Oscott in September 2024
A National Eucharistic Congress is planned for Saturday 14 September 2024 at Oscott, Birmingham. Oscott is significant as it was the place where the first Eucharistic procession took place after the restoration of the Church in Britain. There will also be a youth event on the Sunday which will be concentrating on vocations. St Marie’s Cathedral will have Eucharistic Adoration over that same weekend, and parishes may also offer a holy hour with exposition of the Blessed Sacrament.
Pilgrimage
Prayer takes us on a pilgrim journey, on the path to God. While pilgrimage should be an integral part of the Jubilee not everyone can visit Rome. However, we can plan to undertake a spiritual or walking pilgrimage in 2025 as ‘Pilgrims of Hope.’ We have many shrines, sanctuaries, and other places filled with spiritual significance in our diocese. For example, we have the Padley Martyrs Chapel at Grindleford, the Shrine of Our Lady of Doncaster, the Carmelite Monastery of the Holy Spirit at Kirk Edge, Roche Abbey in Maltby, the Monk Bretton Priory in Barnsley and of course St Marie’s Cathedral in Sheffield. We can plan to visit one or more of these places in 2025, as our pilgrimage of hope.
