About the Jubilee Year
According to the 700-year tradition of the Catholic Church, there will be a Jubilee in 2025 – a special year during which the Roman Bishop grants the faithful full absolution, subject to certain conditions. The Pope has dedicated this Jubilee year of 2025 to the virtue of hope, which, according to the Apostle Paul, “will not put to shame” (Romans 5:5).
The celebration of a year of jubilee is rooted in the Old Testament Law, according to which slaves could be set free (cf. Leviticus 25:39-43) and the land that was pledged could be returned to its former owners (cf. Leviticus 25:10). Hence the semantics of the word “jubilee” – from the Hebrew “יוֹבֵל” [yo-bale’], which is similar to the word for the sound of an animal horn that announced the beginning of this holy time.
The Catholic Church has been celebrating the jubilee year since 1300, on the initiative of Pope Boniface VIII. Initially, it was supposed to be celebrated once every 100 years, but later the tradition of celebrating the jubilee was reduced to 50, 33, until Pope Paul II approved 25 years in 1457. This chronology of celebration has been preserved to this day (except for “extraordinary” anniversary years, such as 2016).
