After reciting a formal prayer before opening the prison’s Holy Door Dec. 26, the pope took the microphone back to explain that he had inaugurated the Holy Year 2025 by opening the Holy Door of St. Peter’s Basilica.

“I wanted the second Holy Door to be the one here, at a prison,” he said. “I wanted all of us, inside or out, to have an opportunity to throw open the doors of our hearts and understand that hope does not disappoint.”

Members of the penitentiary police band played the official hymn of the Holy Year 2025 when the pope arrived, while about 300 people waited inside the church; they included just over 100 women and men serving time at Rebibbia, some of their family members, volunteers, prison staff, Rome Mayor Roberto Gualtieri and officials of the Italian justice department.

The door of the prison’s Church of Our Father was decorated with a pine garland with white roses and silver-tinted pinecones. Inside the church, a manger with the baby Jesus sat in front of the altar. The inmates, with the help of volunteers, provided the music while a prisoner and a female guard did the readings.

The prayers of the faithful included a petition for governments to focus on rehabilitating and assisting all people, especially those who have made mistakes.

Seated in his wheelchair in front of the church door, Pope Francis had prayed: “In the joy of Christmas, let us welcome the call of the Lord Jesus to follow him. He is the door of life, the hope that does not disappoint, the good news that saves.”

“May the opening of this Holy Door be for all of us a call to look to the future with hope,” he said. “Let us open our hearts to the mercy of God so as to celebrate with the whole church his unending love.”

The Vatican press office had distributed the text of the homily the pope prepared for the Mass, but the pope did not use it.

Instead, Pope Francis spoke directly to the inmates. He told them that all Christians need to remind themselves that “hope does not disappoint, it never disappoints. I need to think about this, too, because in life’s difficult moments one thinks that everything is over, that nothing can be resolved. But hope never disappoints.”

“I like to think of hope being like an anchor on the shore, and we, holding the rope, are there, safe because our hope is like an anchor” hooked into the earth. “This is the message I want to give all of us, including myself: Don’t lose hope.”

At the end of Mass, before greeting and shaking hands with each of the 300 people present inside the church, Pope Francis repeated his message. He told inmates, “Now, don’t forget the two things we need to do with our hands: First, hang on to the rope of hope, hang on to the anchor by its rope, never let go; second, throw open your hearts, have an open heart.”

By Cindy Wooden, Catholic News Service

[Vatican City – CNS] – In the quiet of Christmas Eve, Pope Francis opened the Holy Door of St. Peter’s Basilica, launching what he called a “Jubilee of Hope.”

As the doors opened, the bells of the basilica began to peal.

After the reading of a brief passage from the Gospel of John in which Jesus describes himself as “the door,” Pope Francis briefly left the atrium of the basilica, creating some confusion. But when the cardinals in the front row sat down, the others did likewise.

Three minutes later, the pope returned. He was pushed in his wheelchair up the ramp to the Holy Door. In silence, he raised himself from the chair to knock five times, and aides inside slowly opened the door, which had been framed in a garland of green pine branches, decorated with red roses and gold pinecones.

Opening the Holy Door of St. Peter’s Basilica has been a fixture of the Catholic Church’s celebration of jubilee years since the Holy Year 1450, the Vatican said.

Pope Francis chose “Pilgrims of Hope” as the theme for the Holy Year 2025, which began Dec. 24 and will run through Jan. 6, 2026.

The rite of opening the decorated bronze door began inside the basilica with the reading in different languages of biblical passages prophesying the birth of the savior “who brings his kingdom of peace into our world,” as the lector explained.

Then, to emphasize how the birth of Jesus “proclaims the dawn of hope in our world,” the Gospel of St. Matthew’s account of the birth of Jesus was proclaimed.

Introduced with a blare of trumpets, the choir sang, “Let us go rejoicing to the house of the Lord.”

“The steps we now take are the steps of the whole church, a pilgrim in the world and a witness of peace,” the pope told the assembled cardinals, bishops, ecumenical guests and lay faithful in the atrium of the basilica.

“Holding fast to Christ, the rock of our salvation, enlightened by his word and renewed by his grace,” the pope continued, “may we cross the threshold of this holy temple and so enter into a season of mercy and forgiveness in which every man and woman may encounter and embrace the path of hope, which does not disappoint.”

Echoing the biblical jubilee themes of reconciliation and forgiveness, Pope Francis prayed that the Holy Spirit would soften hardened hearts so that “enemies may speak to each other again, adversaries may join hands and people seek to meet together.”

“Grant that the church may bear faithful witness to your love and may shine forth as a vital sign of the blessed hope of your kingdom,” he prayed.

Normally the Holy Door, to the right of the basilica’s centre doors, remains sealed with bricks, a symbolic reminder of the barrier of sin between people and God. The 16 panels on the bronze doors illustrate key moments in salvation history, including the fall of Adam and Eve, the annunciation of Jesus’ birth, Christ presented as the shepherd rescuing a lost sheep, the crucifixion and the risen Jesus appearing to the disciples.

Ten children from 10 different countries, holding hands with their parents, crossed the threshold after the pope and the altar servers, but before the cardinals and bishops. Then 54 people from 27 nations — including the United States and Canada, Australia, Tanzania and Togo, Venezuela and Vietnam — passed through. Many of them wore the traditional dress of their nations or ethnic groups.

Also among the first to cross the threshold were representatives of other Christian churches. The Dicastery for Promoting Christian Unity said in an explanatory note, “Entering through the Holy Door expresses the willingness to follow and be guided by the only begotten Son of God.”

Especially during the year that will see the celebration of the 1,700th anniversary of the Council of Nicaea, which solemnly defined the basics of Christian faith, the ritual “is a manifestation of the faith that all Christians share in Jesus, the Eternal Word made man,” the note said.

However, it added, the ecumenical guests’ participation “must not be interpreted as an attempt to associate them with elements of the jubilee, such as the jubilee indulgence, which are not in line with the practices of their respective communities.”

In fact, the “selling” of indulgences helped spark the Protestant Reformation; the practice was later banned by the Council of Trent.

The Catholic Church believes that Christ and the saints have accumulated a treasure of merits, which other believers — who are prayerful and repentant — can draw upon to reduce or erase the punishment they are due because of sins they have committed. Making a pilgrimage, going to confession, receiving Communion and offering prayers to receive an indulgence is a key part of the Holy Year.

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© OSV News / Our Sunday Visitor, Inc. 2024 – from CNS Vatican bureau, used with permission

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