Jubilee 2025 - Pilgrims of Hope

Visit the Vatican Jubilee 2025 Website: Iubilaeum 2025
Also check out the USCCB web page for the Jubilee of Young People.

As the Universal Church looks toward the Jubilee Year 2025, the 2,025th anniversary of the Incarnation of Our Lord, the Archdiocese is preparing for what Pope Francis calls an “event of great spiritual, ecclesial and social significance in the life of the Church.”

In the Archdiocese of Galveston-Houston, on Sunday, Dec. 29, the Feast of the Holy Family, Daniel Cardinal DiNardo celebrated a “Jubilee of Hope” Opening Mass at the Co-Cathedral of the Sacred Heart in Houston. Also on Dec. 29, Auxiliary Bishop Italo Dell’Oro, CRS, celebrated a “Jubilee of Hope” Opening Mass at St. Mary Cathedral Basilica in Galveston later that day.

Pope Francis stated in his February 2022 letter announcing the Jubilee 2025: "We must fan the flame of hope that has been given us and help everyone to gain new strength and certainty by looking to the future with an open spirit, a trusting heart and far-sighted vision. The forthcoming Jubilee can contribute greatly to restoring a climate of hope and trust as a prelude to the renewal and rebirth that we so urgently desire."

The Jubilee Year offers the faithful opportunities to participate in various jubilee events at the Vatican and in the Archdiocese.

The great tradition of opening the Holy Door began when Pope Francis opened the Holy Door of St. Peter’s Basilica on Dec. 24. Other holy doors were opened at the Rome basilicas of St. John Lateran, St. Mary Major and St. Paul Outside the Walls.

Learn about the Young Adult Pilgrimage to Rome for the Jubilee of Young People

Archdiocesan Pilgrim Sites

For those who cannot travel to Rome, there are two pilgrim sites for the Jubilee Year for Catholics in and visiting the Archdiocese as special places of prayer for local pilgrims, offering Holy Year opportunities for reconciliation, indulgences and other events intended to strengthen and revive faith.

St. Mary Cathedral Basilica
2011 Church St., Galveston
409-762-9646 - Website

Co-Cathedral of the Sacred Heart
1111 St. Joseph Pkwy., Houston
713-659-1561 - Website

Unlike the practice in the Year of Mercy, diocesan cathedrals are not designated with their own holy doors during the Jubilee.

Jubilee Plenary Indulgence

Pope Francis has announced an indulgence is available to the faithful during the jubilee year. The indulgence, he explained, would be “a way of discovering the unlimited nature of God’s mercy.” A plenary indulgence is a grace granted by the Catholic Church through the merits of Jesus Christ to remove the temporal punishment due to sin.

The conditions necessary for a Jubilee indulgence include:
- Being in a state of grace and disposed to receive the indulgence
- Having confessed one’s sins sacramentally
- Receiving Holy Communion
- Offering prayers for the Holy Father and his intentions
- If able, make a pilgrimage to a designated Jubilee pilgrim site, such as Houston’s Co-Cathedral of the Sacred Heart or St. Mary Cathedral Basilica in Galveston
Learn more about the norms for indulgences during the Jubilee Year, which include pilgrimage, penance and service

News and Updates

What is a Jubilee?

"Jubilee" is the name given to a particular year. A time to re-establish a proper relationship with God, with one another, and with all of Creation. To learn more, click here.

Resource Downloads for the Jubilee Year

Jubilees Throughout History

In the Catholic Church, the concept of Jubilee or 'Holy Year' was used to declare special years for forgiveness and reconciliation. The first Jubilee was declared by Pope Boniface VII on Feb. 22, 1300 (Feast of the Chair of St. Peter), to mark the beginning of that century. He later recommended it occurring every 100 years. Learn more here.

The Jubilee Logo

To learn about the meaning of the logo for the 2025 Jubilee, click here.

Jubilee 2025 Calendar

This 2025 calendar of events includes a one-page overview of the Holy Year moments followed by several pages of anticipated detailed schedules for each Jubilee celebration in Rome, which can be replicated or adapted at the discretion of each local community.

Spes Non Confundit - Bull of Indiction

On Thursday, May 9, the Solemnity of the Ascension of the Lord, Pope Francis officially proclaimed the Ordinary Jubilee of 2025 with the public reading and delivery of Spes Non Confundit, the Bull of Indiction for the Holy Year, in St. Peter's Basilica at the Vatican.

Click here for a newsletter with some helpful information on the Bull.

Jubilee Prayer

Father in heaven, may the faith you have gifted us in your son Jesus Christ, our brother,

and the flame of charity kindled in our hearts by the Holy Spirit, reawaken in us, the blessed hope

for the coming of your Kingdom. View entire prayer

Official Jubilee Hymn

Mass for the Year

On May 13, 2024, the Holy See's Dicastery for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments confirmed the text of the "Mass for the Holy Year" in multiple languages. The USCCB provides them in English, Spanish, and Latin. These may be used during the Jubilee Year 2025, from December 24, 2024 to January 6, 2026.

Mass for the Holy Year (English) - Misa para el Año Santo (Spanish) - Missa pro Anno Sancto (Latin)

Hymn for the Year

There is a hymn written to be used throughout the year, especially when the Mass Propers are used. The Original text is by Pierangelo Sequeri.

Oftentimes, while walking along, a song will come to mind which really seems to express how we are feeling. This is also true for the life of faith, which is a pilgrimage toward the light of the Risen Lord. The Sacred Scriptures are steeped in song, and the Psalms are a striking example: the prayers of the people of Israel were written to be sung, and it was in song that the most human events were presented before the Lord. The tradition of the Church has continued this, making music and song one of the lungs of its liturgy. The Jubilee, which in itself is expressed as an event of people on pilgrimage to the Holy Door, also uses song as one of the ways of expressing its motto, “Pilgrims of Hope”.

Many themes of the Holy Year are woven into the text written by Pierangelo Sequeri and set to music by Francesco Meneghello. First of all, the motto, “Pilgrims of Hope”, is best echoed biblically in some pages from the prophet Isaiah (Isaiah 9 and Isaiah 60). The themes of creation, fraternity, God's tenderness and hope in our destination resonate in a language, which although not "technically" theological, is in substance and in the allusions, so that it rings eloquently in the ears of our time.

With each step of their daily pilgrimage believers trustingly rely on the source of Life. The song that arises spontaneously during the journey (cf. Augustine, Discourses, 256) is directed to God. It is a song charged with the hope of being freed and supported. It is a song imbued with the hope that it will reach the ears of the One from whom all things flow. It is God who as an ever-living flame keeps hope burning and energizes the steps of the people as they journey.

The prophet Isaiah repeatedly sees the family of men and women, sons and daughters, returning from their scattered ways, gathered in the light of God's Word: “The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light” (Is 9:2). The light is that of the Son who became Man, Jesus, who by His own Word gathers every people and nation. It is the living flame of Jesus that stirs the step: “Arise, shine; for your light has come, and the glory of the Lord has risen upon you” (Is 60:1).

Christian hope is dynamic and enlightens the pilgrimage of life, revealing the faces of brothers and sisters, companions on the journey. It is not a roaming of lone wolves, but a journey of people, confident and joyful, moving toward a New destination. The breath of the Spirit of life does not fail to brighten the dawn of the future that is about to arise. The heavenly Father patiently and tenderly watches over the pilgrimage of his children and opens wide the Way for them, pointing to Jesus, his Son, who becomes a pathway for everyone.

English

Sheet Music - Text

Recording: Recording performed by the Choir of the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception, Washington, DC - Peter Latona, Director

Spanish