Holy year, 1975; a compilation of documents and messages


HOLY YEAR 1975





HOLY YEAR

1975

A Compilation of Documents

and Messages

1974

Publications Office

UNITED STATES EATHOLIE EDNFERENCE
1312 Massachusetts Avenue, N.W.

Washington, D.E. EQDD5





CONTENTS

Page

INTRODUCTION—What is the Holy Year? by William Ryan ... 1

PAPAL BULL PROCLAIMING THE HOLY YEAR—1975.
Apostolorum Limina. Pope Paul VI. May 23, 1974 5

LETTER TO HIS EMINENCE CARDINAL MAXIMILIAN
DE FURSTENBERG PRESIDENT OF THE CENTRAL
COMMITTEE FOR THE HOLY YEAR ON OPENING
OF THE HOLY YEAR. Pope Paul VI. May 31, 1973 .... 20

THE PASTORAL AIMS OF THE HOLY YEAR. Pastoral
document sent to the Episcopal Conferences and

National Committees for the Holy Year by the

Central Committee for the Holy Year 24

A MESSAGE TO THE CATHOLIC PEOPLE OF THE
UNITED STATES. John Cardinal Krol. President,
National Conference of Catholic Bishops.

Pentecost Sunday, June 10, 1973 37

PASTORAL DOCUMENT ON THE HOLY YEAR AND
THE YOUNG. Central Committee for the Holy Year 40

ADDRESSES OF POPE PAUL VI:

POPE PAUL VI ANNOUNCES HOLY YEAR FOR 1975.
An Occasion for Interior Renewal and Reconcilia-

tion. Address. May 9, 1973 55

RENEWAL AND RECONCILIATION. Address. June 6, 1973 59

TO THE CENTRAL COMMITTEE FOR THE HOLY YEAR.
Address. June 7, 1973 62

PERSONAL, INTERIOR ASPECT OF THE HOLY YEAR
MOVEMENT. Address. June 20, 1973 64



Page

TO RESTORE CHRISTIAN LOVE. Address. October 17,
1973 ' 68

RECONCILIATION WITH GOD: PRIMARY AIM OF THE
HOLY YEAR. Address. October 31, 1973 72

HOLY YEAR INSPIRES PERSONAL RENEWAL,
HEART SEARCHING. Address. November 7, 1973 .... 75

THE HOLY YEAR, A YEAR OF PRAYER. A Commentary
by Jesus Solano, S.J 79

DECREE OF THE SACRED APOSTOLIC PENITENTIARY ON
THE INDULGENCE OF THE HOLY YEAR.
September 24, 1973 87

ACCOMPANYING LETTER OF THE SECRETARY GENERAL
OF THE CENTRAL COMMITTEE TO THE PRESIDENTS
OF THE EPISCOPAL CONFERENCES 89



INTRODUCTION

What is the Holy Year?
by

William Ryan

In pre-Exilic Judaism every 50th year was a Jubilee Year, or

year of remission, in which debts were pardoned and slaves

freed. The medieval popes came to apply such a custom In the
Church, decreeing a Holy Year, a period in which a solemn

plenary indulgence is granted to the faithful under certain con-

ditions and special faculties are given to confessors. The Holy

Year normally begins and ends with special sacred ceremonies

intended to Improve the religious life of the faithful.

The first Holy Year in the Catholic tradition began on Decem-

ber 24, 1300, when large crowds visited St. Peter’s Basilica. At

that time Pope Boniface VIII issued a decree which determined

that every 100 years a universal jubilee should be celebrated.

Subsequent popes progressively shortened the intervals between

Holy Years until finally, in 1470, Pope Paul II reduced the time

to 25 years, a custom which has remained to this day, though

extraordinary Holy Years can be proclaimed at any time. Also

in the 15th century were prescribed the ceremonies that are

observed essentially even today: the Pope opens the Holy Door

of St. Peter's and appoints three cardinals to do the same in the
other basilicas, using assigned rites and prayers. At the end of

the Holy Year, the Porta Santa is again walled up. The last Holy

Year was celebrated by Pope Plus XII in 1950, when unprece-
dented crowds thronged into Rome.

Great pomp and ceremony have accompanied many of the
Holy Year celebrations, but essentially they have been manifesta-

tions of piety. The present Holy Year is concerned in a special

way with the interior life of the spirit and is meant to promote
works of piety, penance and charity as a sign of renewal in faith.

1



Unlike previous Holy Years, which were first celebrated in

Rome and then extended to other communities and dioceses,
the present Holy Year was first proclaimed for ail the local
churches, with activities culminating in Rome in 1975. In this
sense the Holy Year is indeed unique.

Pope Paul set the tone for the new Holy Year in an address on
May 9, 1973. After saying that the theme of the Holy Year is
“reconciliation,” and that the event should bring “spiritual well-

being to every conscience and indirectly to the attitude of

society,” the Pope said:

“According to the centuries-old custom, the Holy Year has its

focal point in Rome. And it will still be so, but with this innova-
tion. The conditions prescribed for acquiring special spiritual

benefits will this time be anticipated and granted to the local

Churches, so that the whole Church spread throughout the world

may immediately be able to profit from this great occasion of
renewal and reconciliation. In this way the whole Church will be
better able to prepare for the climax and conclusions of the Holy

Year, which will be celebrated in Rome in the year 1975, and
which will give to the traditional pilgrimage to the tombs of the
Apostles its traditional meaning for those who are able and wish
to make the pilgrimage.”

“On former occasions, the extension of the Holy Year came
after its celebration in Rome; now this extension will precede the

celebration,” the Pope stated. “Everyone can see how this inno-

vation also includes an intention of honoring with more evident

and effective communion the local Churches which are living
members of the one universal Church of Christ.”

Above all, the Holy Father has said, the Holy Year seeks the

renewal of man and his reconciliation with God. And these are
things which take place “In the depths of the soul, in the interior

sanctuary, where conscience is called upon to bring about con-

version, or ‘metanoia,’ by means of faith and repentance and to
aim at the fullness of charity.”

Pope Paul has established a Central Committee for the Holy

Year whose purpose is to provide a unifying element and assist-

ance to the work of the national committees which have been set

up by episcopal conferences throughout the world. The Central

2



Committee has suggested the following are principal objectives

to be attained in the Holy Year:

—A recommitment to conscience and a personal reflection
upon the human and Christian vocation and upon the demands
arising from worship and faith in God.

—A consideration of the problem of sin, of conversion and of
salvation proposed In terms which are adequate to the mentality,

condition and needs of the present-day world.

—A re-evaluation of penance as an essential component of
the Christian spirit and a restatement of the Sacrament of Pen-

ance as a means to nourish the spirit in forms of administration
which are, at the same time, both practical and faithful to the
genuine traditions of the Church as well as to the psychological

and sociological conditions of modern man.

—A fitting emphasis on the role to be played by penance,
whether as a sacrament or an element in Christian living, in

attaining reconciliation with God and with our fellowmen both in
the Christian community and in the entire human family.

—A constant reminder that Christ is the Savior, from whom
comes every grace, faith, conversion, good works, perseverance

and rededication.

—A strengthening of the union with Christ which should exist
in the individual conscience, in the Interrelationships within the

Church and among the Churches.

—A reaffirmation of the mission and the obligation of Chris-
tians to live in the world and in every sphere of action as true

workers for unity and peace following the Gospel way of brother-
hood and forgiveness, introducing into each area of life and into

each sense of values the Christian spirit of charity.

Various Initiatives have been undertaken at all levels of the

Churches throughout the world in connection with the Holy Year.

At the parish level, some churches have held parish missions,
either In the traditional form or following new patterns, in order
to awaken in the faithful a feeling for the objectives of the Holy
Year.

3



At the diocesan level, many dioceses have encouraged the
participation of Catholic schools and associations, often with the

active assistance of priests and parish councils, in Holy Year

activities.

Many dioceses have also been active in the organization of
pilgrimages to the Cathedral and, eventually, pilgrimages to

Rome.

National episcopal conferences have focused their attention

on the preparation and distribution of catechetical programs and

homilies, on involving communications media in the aims and

purposes of the Holy Year, and on making contacts with the

representatives of the various Christian churches and communi-

ties as well as the non-Christian religions with a view toward

common participation in the ceremonies and programs of the
Holy Year of Reconciliation.

4



BULL OF INDICTION

OF THE

HOLY YEAR 1975

Aposfo/orum Limina

May 23, 1974

PAUL, SERVANT OF THE SERVANTS OF GOD,

TO ALL THE FAITHFUL: HEALTH AND THE

APOSTOLIC BLESSING.

The memorials of the Apostles, the holy places of Rome where
there are worthily preserved and religiously venerated the tombs

of the Apostles Peter and Paul, those “holy fathers" through whom
the city became not only the “disciple of truth" but also the

teacher of truth ^ and the center of Catholic unity, now—as the
universal jubilee to be celebrated there approaches—shine forth
more brightly to the minds of the faithful as the goal of pilgrimage.

Down the centuries, these memorials have always impelled the
Christian people to be fervent in their faith and to testify to ec-

clesial communion. This is so because the Church recognizes her

identity and the cause of her unity in the foundation laid by Jesus

Christ, namely, the Apostles. ^ From as early as the second cen-

tury the faithful came to Rome to see and venerate the “trophies"
of the Apostles Peter and Paul in those very places where they are

preserved;^ and they made pilgrimages to the Church of Rome to
contemplate her “regal dignity." ^ In the fourth century the pil-

grimage to Rome became the principal form in the West of that
kind of religious journey. It was similar to, and had the same

religious purpose as, the pilgrimage which was made in the East
to Jerusalem where the Lord's sepulcher Is found. ^ In the early

5



Middle Ages there came on pilgrimage to Rome from various parts
of Europe and even from the East, especially monks, those who
were “linked to the Chair of Peter" ^ and who wished to make a
profession of their orthodox faith at the tombs of the Apostles."^

The idea of a pilgrimage increased further from the 12th to the
13th century, becoming all the more common by reason of a re-
newal of spirituality and popular piety which spread throughout

Europe at that time. This renewal served to enrich the ancient

notion which the Church received from tradition and which was
equally to be found in other religions, namely, the concept of a

“pilgrimage undertaken for the love of God." ® In this way the
jubilee year originated: it was, as it were, the result of a process

of maturing in the doctrinal, biblical and theological fields.^- It

emerged plainly for the first time in the year 1220, when our
predecessor Honorius III proclaimed a Jubilee Year for the pil-

grimage to the tomb of Saint Thomas a Becket.^^ Later, as is well
known, pilgrims came to Rome to the basilicas of Saint Peter and
Saint Paul, in the great popular and penitential movement of the
year 1300, a movement confirmed by our predecessor Boniface
VIII, and which was marked by a longing to obtain pardon from

God and peace among men. This movement was directed to this
very lofty motive: “The glory of God and the exaltation of the

faith." 12

The Roman Jubilee of 1300 was the beginning and the pattern
of those which have followed (every 25 years from the 15th century

onwards, except when the series was interrupted by extraneous

circumstances). This is an indication of the continuity and vitality

which have always confirmed the relevance of this venerable insti-

tution for every age.

It is correct to say that the jubilees celebrated in recent times

have preserved this outstanding value, whereby the unity and re-

newal of the Church are affirmed in a special way and all men
encouraged to recognize one another as brothers and to walk in

the path of peace. Such a desire manifested itself at the begin-

ning of this century, when our predecessor Leo XIII proclaimed the

Jubilee Year in 1900. The human family was filled with the same
hopes and expectations when, a quarter of a century later, afflicted

by grave dangers and contention, it awaited the Holy Year of 1925.

These were proposed for the special Holy Year of 1933 on the

6



occasion of the 19th centenary of the Redemption. It was the same
noble aspirations for justice and peaceful coexistence among men
that Pius XII put forward in the last jubilee, in the year 1950.

I

It seems to us that in the present Holy Year all the principal and

important motives of the previous jubilees are present and ex-

pressed In summary form in the themes that we ourself laid down
in our discourse of May 9, 1973 when we first announced the Holy
Year: Renewal and Reconciliation. We have offered these themes
for the reflection of the pastors and faithful, particularly during the

anticipated celebration of the jubilee In the local churches, and we
have added to them our exhortations and our catechesis. But the

aspirations that the two themes enunciate and the lofty ideals that

they express will find a more complete realization in Rome, where

the pilgrims to the tombs of the Apostles Peter and Paul and to the

memorials of the other martyrs will come more easily into contact
with the ancient sources of the Church’s faith and life, in order to

be converted by repentance, strengthened in charity and united

more closely with their brethren by the grace of God.

This renewal and reconciliation pertain in the first place to the

interior life, above all because it is in the depths of the heart that

there exists the root of all good and, unfortunately, of all evil. It

is in the depths of the heart therefore that there must take place
conversion or metanoia, that is, a change of direction, of attitude,
of option, of one's way of life.

But also for the Church as a whole, at a distance of 10 years
from the end of the Second Vatican Council we view the Holy Year
as the ending of a period of reflection and reform and the begin-
ning of a new phase of building up in the theological, spiritual and
pastoral spheres, which will develop upon the foundations labori-
ously laid down and consolidated during the past years, in accord-
ance with the principles of new life in Christ and of the communion
of all men in Him, who reconciled us to the Father by His blood.

For the whole world this call to renewal and reconciliation is in
harmony with the most sincere aspirations to liberty, justice, unity
and peace that we see present wherever men become aware of
their most grave problems and suffer from the mishaps produced
by divisions and fratricidal wars. With the message of the Holy

7



Year, therefore, the Church wishes to indicate to all men of good
will the vertical dimension of life that ensures the reference of all

aspirations and experiences to an absolute and truly universal

value, without which it is vain to hope that mankind will find once

more a point of unification and a guarantee of true freedom. Even

though it is characteristic of many sectors of modern society to
assume secular forms, the Church, without interfering in matters
which do not come within her competence, nevertheless wishes to
impress on men the need of being converted to God, who alone is
necessary, and of imbuing all their actions with fear and love of

Him. For faith in God is the most powerful safeguard of the human
conscience and the solid foundation of those relationships of jus-

tice and brotherhood for which the world yearns.

The pilgrimage to Rome by representatives of all the local
churches, both pastors and people, will therefore be a sign of a

new process of conversion and brotherly reconciliation.

As the minister of the word and of the grace of reconciliation,

we respond to this sign of the interior dispositions of the pilgrims

and of the renewed resolve of the Christian people whom they repre-
sent, by imparting the gift of the jubilee indulgence, insofar as we
are able, to all the pilgrims who come to Rome and to all those who,
though prevented from making the journey, accompany them in

spirit.

II

It is well known from the Church's very ancient custom that the

indulgence attached to many penitential practices was granted as
a gift in a special way on the occasion of pilgrimages to the places

sanctified by the life, passion and resurrection of our savior Jesus

Christ and by the confession of the apostles. Today too we asso-

ciate ourself with that venerable tradition, according to the prin-

ciples and norms that we have ourself laid down in the apostolic

constitution Indulgentiarum Doctrina and which we wish at this

point briefly to recall.

Since Christ is our “justice” and, as has been fittingly said, our

“indulgence,” we, as the humble minister of Christ the redeemer,

willingly extend a share in the gift of the indulgence—in accord-
ance with the Church’s tradition—to all the faithful who, through
a profound conversion of the heart to God, through works of

8



penance, piety and brotherly solidarity, sincerely and fervently

attest to their desire to remain united in charity with God and their

brethren and to make progress in that charity. In fact, this shar-

ing comes from the fullness of the treasury of salvation which is

primarily found in Christ the redeemer himself, “in whom subsist
in all their value the satisfactions and merits of his redemption.”

In this fullness In Christ, of which we have all received, there

shines forth “the most ancient dogma of the communion of saints,
whereby, in Christ and through Christ, the lives of the individual

sons of God are linked with the lives of all the other Christian

brethren by a marvelous bond in the supernatural unity of the

Mystical Body of Christ, as In one mystical person.”

For, “by the hidden and benevolent mystery of the divine will,

men are linked together in a supernatural relationship, whereby
just as the sin of one also harms the others, so also the holiness of

one is beneficial to the others.” By means of the indulgence,
the Church, making use of her power as the minister of the redemp-

tion of Christ the Lord, communicates to the faithful a sharing in

this fullness of Christ in the communion of saints, 22 providing them
with the ample means of salvation.

Thus the Church, aiding and embracing them like a mother,
sustains her weak and infirm children, who find a firm support in
the Mystical Body of Christ, which in its entirety works for their

conversion through charity, example and'pi'ayei'- Thus penitencs
find in this singular form of ecclesial charity a powerful aid to help

them to put off the old man and put on the new, and conversion
and renewal consist precisely in this.^^ In fact, the Church's aim

in granting Indulgences is not only that of helping the faithful to

expiate the punishment they have deserved but also that of stimu-

lating them to carry out works of piety, penance and charity, and
in particular works that serve to favor the growth of faith and the

common good.^^

For this reason, interpreting as it were the Church's maternal

sentiments, we impart the gift of the plenary indulgence to all the
faithful who are properly disposed, and who, after confessing
their sins and receiving Holy Communion, pray for the intentions
of the supreme pontiff and the college of bishops:

9



1) If they undertake a sacred pilgrimage to one of the patri-

archal basilicas (the basilica of St. Peter’s in the Vatican, St.

Paul's Outside-the-Walls, the Lateran archbasilica of the Most Holy

Savior, or St. Mary Major’s), or to some other church or place
of the city of Rome designated by the competent authority, and
there devoutly take part In a liturgical celebration, especially the

sacrifice of the Mass, or some exercise of piety (e.g., the Way of
the Cross, the Rosary);

2) If they visit, in a group or individually, one of the four patri-

archal basilicas and there spend some time in devout recollection
concluding with the Our Father, the Profession of Faith in any

approved form and a prayer to the Blessed Virgin Mary;

3) If, being prevented by illness or some other grave reason
from going on a pilgrimage to Rome, they unite themselves

spiritually with this pilgrimage and offer their prayers and suffer-

ings to God;

4) If, being prevented while in Rome by illness or some other
grave reason from taking part in a liturgical celebration or exercise

of piety or visit made by their group (ecclesial, family or social,
as mentioned in 1) and 2) above), they unite themselves spiritu-

ally with the group and offer their prayers and sufferings to God.

During the Holy Year, moreover, there remain in force the

other concessions of indulgences, with the proviso as before that

a plenary indulgence can be gained only once a day”; however,

all indulgences can always be applied to the dead in mundum
suffragii.-^

For the same reasons, namely, in order that the faithful be

provided with every possible aid to salvation, and to help priests,

especially confessors, we lay down that confessors taking part in

the jubilee pilgrimage may use the faculties they have been given
in their own dioceses by the legitimate authority, so that both

on the journey and in Rome they may hear the confessions of the
faithful accompanying them on the pilgrimage, and also the con-

fessions of others who, together with the members of their own

group, may approach them. The right of the penitentiaries of the
patriarchal basilicas regarding the confessionals reserved to

them is maintained,-® and special faculties will be granted by the

Sacred Apostolic Penitentiary to the penitentiaries.

10



IV

We have stated above that the following two principal purposes
have been laid down for the Holy Year: spiritual renewal in Christ

and reconciliation with God, and we have said that these aims con-

cern not only the Interior life of each individual but the whole

Church, and also in a certain sense the whole of human society.
For this reason we earnestly exhort all concerned to consider these

proposals, to undertake initiatives and to coordinate programs so

that during the Holy Year real progress may be made in the re-
newal of the Church and also in the pursuit of certain goals which

we have especially at heart, in accordance with the farsighted

spirit of the Second Vatican Ecumenical Council. Repentance, the

purification of the heart and conversion to God must consequently

bring about an increase in the apostolic activities of the Church.

During the Holy Year therefore generous efforts must be made
to further evangelization, which Is certainly the first of all the

activities to be promoted. For the pilgrim Church “has been

divinely sent to all nations that she might be ‘the universal sacra-

ment of salvation’ ” and she “is by her very nature mission-

ary,’’ and in her historical course Is renewed to the extent that

she shows herself ready to accept and to deepen through faith

the Gospel of Jesus Christ the son of God, and to proclaim His

saving message to men by word and the witness of her life.

The coming assembly of the Synod of Bishops does not have a

merely extrinsic and fortuitous connection with the Holy Year. On
the contrary, as we have already stated, “a zealous effort must be
made to coordinate and link closely together both these ecclesial
events.’’ |n this regard the Synod will propose directives and

suggestions for the reflection of the pastors, gathered about the

supreme pontiff, so that they may carefully consider in the light
of faith “the evangelization of the modern world,’’ taking into
account, in the light of the charity of Christ, the wishes of the

whole Church and the more urgent needs of our time.

Therefore devout attention to the word of God together with
catechetical instruction given to the faithful of every state and of

all ages must lead Christians to a purifying of their way of living
and to a higher knowledge of faith; it must dispel doubts, and
stimulate the negligent to activate joyfully in their lives the Gospel

message; it must impel everyone towards a conscious and fruitful

11



sharing in the sacraments; it must encourage communities and
individuals to give witness to the faith by the uprightness and

strength of their lives, so that the world may see the reason for
the hope that is in us.^^

Now that ten years have passed since the Second Vatican Council
began the great and salutary work of renewal in the fields of the
pastoral ministry, the practice of penance and the sacred liturgy,

we consider it altogether fitting that this work should be re-
viewed and carried further. If what the Church has clearly ap-

proved is kept in mind, it will be possible to recognize the valid

and legitimate elements to be found in the many and varied ex-
periments that have been carried out everywhere. Similarly,

these same elements can, by a more earnest effort, be put into
practice in accordance with the norms and principles suggested by

pastoral prudence and a sense of true piety.

The presence of large numbers of pilgrims, both pastors and

people, from Christian communities throughout the world, brought

together in Rome by a fraternal desire to gain the true benefits
of the grace and love of Christ, will undoubtedly afford excellent

opportunities for putting forward, comparing and evaluating

studies and viewpoints of various kinds. This will most certainly

be the case if congresses and meetings are held at different levels

in the ecclesial community and by varied groups of experts, and

provided that prayer and a ready willingness to carry out the

apostolate are joined together.

At this point we wish to draw particular attention to the need

to find a just and proper balance between the different demands
of the pastoral ministry today, a balance similar to that which

has been admirably achieved in the sacred liturgy. We refer to the
balance between tradition and renewal, between the necessarily

religious nature of the Christian apostolate and its effectiveness

as a force in all fields of social living, between free and spon-

taneous activity—which some are accustomed to call charis-
matic—in this apostolate and fidelity to laws based on the com-
mands of Christ and of the pastors of the Church. For these laws,

laid down by the Church and continually brought up to date, make

allowance for individual experiments within the Christian com-

munity, in such a way that they are a help to the building up the

body of Christ; which is the Church, and not a hindrance.

12



We wish likewise to draw attention to the ever increasing need
to promote the kind of apostolate which, without damaging the

Church’s necessary and traditional institutions, namely dioceses

and parishes, takes special account of particular local circum-

stances and categories of people. Such an apostolate must ensure

that the leaven of the Gospel permeates those forms of modern

social living which often differ from traditional forms of ecclesial

life and seem foreign to the communities in which the faithful

gather together and are linked in prayer, faith and charity. The

forms we are thinking of are principally those of workers, mem-
bers of the academic world and young people.

It will also be necessary to examine with care methods of teach-

ing religion and of preaching the sacred word of God, to insure

that they meet the needs of our time. This must be done with the

aim of finding effective methods. Special care must be taken to

insure that the media of social communications promote the

human and Christian progress both of individuals and of com-
munities.

These are questions of the greatest seriousness and importance.

We must face up to them, and with humble prayer seek the grace
of the Holy Year in order to solve them.

V

As is well known, in recent years one of the Church’s most press-

ing concerns has been to disseminate everywhere a message of

charity, of social awareness and of peace, and to promote, as

far as she can, works of justice and of solidarity in favor of all

those in need, of those on the margins of society, of exiles and of

the oppressed—In favor of all men. In fact, whether individuals,
social groups or peoples. We earnestly desire, therefore, that
the Holy Year, through the works of charity which it suggests to

the faithful and which it asks of them, should be an opportune

time for strengthening and supporting the moral consciousness of

all the faithful and of that wider community of all men which the
message of the Church can reach If an earnest effort is made.

The ancient origins of the jubilee as seen in the laws and in-

stitutions of Israel clearly show that this social dimension is part
of its very nature. In fact, as we read in the book of Leviticus,
the jubilee year, precisely because it was dedicated in a special

13



way to God, involved a new ordering of all things that were recog-
nized as belonging to God; the land, which was allowed to lie
fallow and was given back to its former owners, economic goods,
insofar as debts were remitted, and, above all, man, whose dignity

and freedom were reaffirmed in a special way by the manumission
of slaves. The year of God, then, was also the year of man, the

year of the earth, the year of the poor, and upon this view of the

whole of human reality there shone a new light which emanated
from the clear recognition of the supreme dominion of God over

the whole of creation.

In today’s world also the problems which most disturb and tor-

ment mankind—economic and social questions, the question of
ecology and sources of energy, and above all that of the liberation

of the oppressed and the uplifting of all men to a new dignity of
life—can have light cast on them by the message of the Holy Year.
We wish, however, to invite all the sons and daughters of the

Church, and especially the pilgrims coming to Rome, to undertake

certain definite tasks which, as successor of Peter and head of

that Church “which presides over the universal gathering of

charity,’’ we now publicly propose and commend to all. We
refer to the carrying out of works of faith and charity for the bene-

fit of our needy brethren in Rome and in other churches of the
world. These works will not necessarily be grandiose ones, al-

though such are in no way to be excluded. In many cases what
are today called “micro-realizations’’ will be sufficient, correspond-

ing as they do to the Gospel spirit of charity. In this field the Church,

in view of the modest resources at her disposal, will perhaps have

to limit herself more and more to giving men nothing more than
the widow’s mite.'"^^ But she knows and teaches that the good

which counts most is that which, in humble and very often un-

known ways, manages to give help where there is a little need and

to heal small wounds—things which often find no place in large
projects of social reform.

Nevertheless, the Church feels that it is necessary to give en-

couragement also to these larger programs for promoting justice

and the progress of peoples. She renews her call to all those who

have the power and the duty to build up In the world a more perfect

order of social and human relations, that they should not give up

because of the difficulties of the present times, and that they

14



should not be won over by selfish interests. Once more we make a

particularly strong appeal on behalf of developing countries, and

of peoples still afflicted by hunger and by war. Let special atten-

tion be given to the many needs which oppress man today, to the
finding of employment by which men can provide for the needs of
life, to housing which so many lack, to schools which need much
assistance, to social and medical aid, and to the development and

safeguarding of decent public moral standards.

We should like also to express the humble and sincere desire
that in this present Holy Year too, in accordance with the tradition

of previous jubilees, the proper authorities of the different nations

should consider the possibility of wisely granting an amnesty to

prisoners, as a witness to clemency and equity, especially to those

who have given sufficient proof of moral and civic rehabilitation,
or who may have been caught up in political and social upheavals
too immense for them to be held fully responsible.

We express in anticipation our gratitude and invoke the Lord’s
abundant blessings on all those who will strive to ensure that this
message of charity, of social awareness and of freedom, which the

Church addresses to all men in the lively hope that she may be
understood and listened to, is accepted and translated into reality

in the political and social order. In expressing this hope we are
conscious of following a wonderful tradition which began with the

law of Israel and found its fullest expression in Our Lord Jesus

Christ, who from the very beginning of His ministry presented
Himself as the fulfillment of the ancient promises and figures con-

nected with the jubilee year: ‘The spirit of the Lord is upon me,

because He has anointed me to preach good news to the poor.
He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives and recovering
of sight to the blind, to set at liberty those who are oppressed to
proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord.”

VI

If there is one spiritual advantage which we especially desire
will come about from the celebration of the Holy Year, it is an
increase in the number of those who devote their lives to serving
the Church, especially priests and religious. For in order that the
paths of grace and the means of salvation which the Holy Year
Indicates and offers to all the faithful may be properly explained

15



and made available, there will always be a need of those sacred
ministers and witnesses of Christ's Gospel who by completely
following the Lord show their fellowmen, namely the men of this
and subsequent ages, the way of penance and of holiness.

Thus, the voice of God must be listened to diligently. He never
ceases to stir up and invite chosen individuals to dedicate them-

selves generously to the service of the Church and of the whole

human race by the exercise of the priestly ministry and by the
faithful witness of the religious life. Some will be called by God
to offer themselves to Him through obedience and sacred celibacy
and as priests of Christ to teach and sanctify and lead the faithful

wherever they may be. Others, men and women of various ages
and conditions, will be attracted to the religious life, so that by

fulfilling their baptismal promises through a higher way of life
they may fully live in the spirit and truly benefit the Church and
society. We desire strongly that the multitude of these especially
dear members of the Church may Increase and flourish more and
more, so that through their priesthood and the activity of their

religious life they may bear the joyful message of Christ to the
ends of the earth and all give glory to the heavenly Father.

VII

Finally, we wish to proclaim and preach that the reconciliation
of Christians Is one of the principal aims of the Holy Year. How-

ever, before all men can be brought together and restored to the
grace of God our Father, communion must be reestablished be-
tween those who by faith have acknowledged and accepted Jesus
Christ as the Lord of mercy who sets men free and unites them in
the spirit of love and truth. For this reason the Jubilee Year, which

the Catholic Church has accepted as part of her own custom and

tradition, can serve as a most opportune period for spiritual re-

newal and for the promotion of Christian unity.

We would moreover point out that the Second Vatican Council
has taught that every effort and undertaking directed toward the

reconciliation of Christians and all true ecumenism must neces-

sarily start from an inner conversion of the heart, since the desire

for Christian communion springs and grows from spiritual renewal,

self-denial, the full exercise of charity and fidelity to revealed

truth.

16



It is here that there is to be found the full and proper realization

of the whole ecumenical movement, to which the Catholic Church

adheres as far as she is able, and through which churches and

communities not yet fully In communion with the Apostolic See

seek and desire the perfect unity willed by Christ. It is in fact the

task and duty of the whole Church to reestablish this unity in full

ecclesial communion. The year of grace, in this sense, provides

an opportunity for doing special penance for the divisions which

exist among Christians; it offers an occasion for renewal in the
sense of a heightened experience of holiness of life in Christ; it

allows progress toward that hoped-for reconciliation by intensified

dialogue and concrete Christian collaboration for the salvation of

the world: “that they also may be one in us, so that the world may
believe.”

We have expressed once more our intentions and our desires
concerning the celebration of the Holy Year in this city of Rome.

We now invite our brothers in the episcopate and all the pastors
and faithful of the churches throughout the world, of those

churches also which are not in full communion with the Roman
Church, and indeed all who believe In God, to participate at least
spiritually in this feast of grace and redemption, in which Christ

offers Himself as the teacher of life. Together with the pastors

and faithful on pilgrimage to the tombs of the Apostles and the

early martyrs, we desire to profess faith in God the almighty and
merciful Father and in Jesus Christ our redeemer.

For our part we would hope that all who come to Rome to see
Peter may through us experience in the Holy Year the truth of
the words of St. Leo the Great: “for in the whole Church Peter

repeats each day, ‘you are Christ the Son of the Living God,’ and

every tongue which confesses the Lord is inspired by the teaching

of this voice.”

We would wish also that through our ministry and that of our
brother priests a huge multitude of faithful may come to the
sources of salvation. May the holy door which we shall open on
the night of Christmas Eve be a sure sign of this new approach to

Christ, who alone is the way and the door.^^ It will be a sure
sign too of the paternal affection with which, filled with love and

desiring peace, we open our heart to all.

17



We implore the Blessed Virgin Mary, the holy mother of the
Redeemer and of the Church, mother of grace and of mercy, col-
laborator of reconciliation and shining example of the new life, to
ask her Son to grant to all our brethren and sons and daughters

the grace of this Holy Year, to renew and preserve them. To her
hands and to her maternal heart we commend the beginning, the
development and the conclusion of this most important matter.

We wish this our letter to take full and immediate effect, in
such a manner that whatsoever has been laid down and decreed

in it be religiously observed by all concerned, and come into force,
all things to the contrary notwithstanding. If anyone knowingly or

unknowingly shall act other than in accordance with what we have
laid down, we order that such action be considered altogether null
and void.

Given in Rome, at St. Peter’s, on the 23th day of May, the

solemnity of the Ascension of the Lord, in the year 1974, the 11th

of our pontificate.

I Paul,

Bishop of the Catholic Church

1 Cf. St. Leo the Great, Sermo LXXXII, 1: PL 54, 422.
2 Cf. Rev. 21:14.
3 Cf. The testimony of Gains, an ecclesiastic of the time of Pope Zephry-

nus, in Eusebius, Historia Ecclesiastica, II, 25, 7.
4 Cf. The inscription of Abercius, bishop of Hierapolis in Phrygia at the end

of the second century; text and translation in M. Guarducci, L'iscrizione di

Abercio, “Ancient Society” 2 (1971), pp. 176-177.
5 Cf. St. Maximus of Turin, Homilia 72: PL 57, 405 b.
6 The expression is found in a letter of St. Columban to Pope Boniface IV

in 613: Sancti Columbani Opera, ed. G. S. M. Walker, Dublin 1957, p. 48.
7 Concerning this custom Cf. F. M. Mignanti, Istoria della Sacrosanta

Basilica Vaticana . . ., Rome-Turin 1867, p. 180.
8 Cf. in general B. Kotting, Peregrinatio Religiosa, Wallfahrten in Der

Antike und das Pilgerwesen in der Alten Kirche, Regensburg 1950.
9 R. Foreville, L'Idee de Jubile chez les Theologiens et les Canonistes

(XII-XIII S.) avant I'lnstitution du Jubile Remain (1300): "Revue d'Histoire
Ecclesiastique” LVI (1961), pp. 401-423.

p. Pressuti, Regesta Honorii III, Roma 1888-95, 1840; text in R. Fore-
ville, Le Jubile de Saint Thomas Becket du XIII au XV siecle (1220-1470).
Etudes et Documents, Paris 1958, pp. 163-164.

18



Bull Antiquorum Habet Fida Relation, dated 22 February 1300: Ex-
travagantes Comm. V, IX, 1.

12 Cf. The glossa of Cardinal Giovanni Monaco on the same bull.
13 Cf. Paul VI, Allocutio qua Christifidelibus in Basilica Vaticana coram

admissis nuntiat. Se Universalem lubilaeum in Annum MCMLXXV Indictum,
d. 9 M. Maii A. 1973: AAS 65 (1973), pp. 322-325.

14 Cf. 2 Cor. 5:18-20; Rom. 5:10.
15 Cf. Lk. 10:42; Mt. 6:33.
16 Apostolic Constitution Indulgentiarum Doctrina, AAS 59 (1967), pp.

5-24.

17 Cf. Paul VI, Epist. ad e. mum p.d. Maximilianum S.R.E. Cardinalem de
Furstenberg ob indictum universale maximumque jubilaeum in annum
MCMLXXV, iniziandosi ufficialmente, d. 31 M. Maii A. 1973: AAS 65 (1973),
pp. 357-360.

13 Apost. Const. Indulgentiarum Doctrina, 5: AAS 59 (1967), p. 11.
19 Cf. Jn 1:16.
20 Apost. Const. Indulgentiarum Doctrina, 5: AAS 59 (1967), pp. 10-11;

Cf. St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae, III, qu. 48, A. 2 ad 1 and q. 49,
a. 1.

21 Apost. Const. Indulgentiarum Doctrina, 4: AAS 59 (1967), p. 9.
22 Cf. Apost. Const. Indulgentiarum Doctrina, 8: AAS 59 (1967), p. 16.
23 Cf. Paul VI, Epist. ad Rev. P. Constantinum Koser, Ordinis Fratrum

Minorum Vicarium Generalem, septingentesimo quinquagesimo anno vol-
vente as "Indulgentia Portiunculae” per honorium pp. III Sancto Francisco
Concessa, Sacrosancta Portiunculae Ecclesia, d. 14 m. iulii a. 1966: AAS
58 (1966), pp. 631-634.

24 Cf. Apost. Const. Indulgentiarum Doctrina, 8: AAS 59 (1967), p. 17.
25 Cf. Enchiridion Indulgentiarum, norma 24, para. 1.
26 Ibid., norma 4.
27 Cf. Paul VI, Motu Proprio Pastorale Munus, 1, 14: AAS 56 (1964), p. 8.
28 Cf. First Synod of Rome, 1960, art. 63.
29 Second Vatican Ecumenical Council, Decree on the Missionary Activity

of the Church, Ad Gentes Divinitus, 1, AAS 58 (1966), p. 947.
30 Ibid., 2: AAS 58 (1966), p. 948.
31 Discourse to the general secretariat of the Synod of Bishops: L'Osser-

vatore Romano of 6 April 1974, p. 4.
32 Cf. 1 Peter 3:15.
33 Cf. Rom. 15:2; 1 Cor. 14:3; Eph. 4:12.
34 Lev. 25:8ff.
35 Cf. St. Ignatius of Antioch, Epist. ad Romanos, inscr.: Funk 1, 252.
36 Cf. Lk. 21:2; Mk. 12:42.
37 Lk. 4:18:19.
38 Cf. Decree on Ecumenism, Unitatis Redintegratio, 7: AAS 57 (1965),

p. 97.
39 Cf. Ibid, 5: AAS 57 (1965), p. 96.
40 Jn. 17:21.
41 Cf. Gal. 1:18.

42Sermo III: PL 54, 146.
43 Cf. Is. 12:3.
44 Cf. Jn. 14:6.
45 Cf. Jn. 10:7, 9.

19



Pope Paul’s letter on the opening
of the Holy Year

To His Eminence

Cardinal Maximilian de Furstenberg

President of the Central Committee

for the Holy Year

Lord Cardinal,

As the official beginning of that vast movement of spiritual
renewal, which will have its climax in Rome, in 1975, is on

Sunday June 10, the solemnity of Pentecost, we wish to set forth

briefly to you. Lord Cardinal, that we have placed before the Cen-
tral Committee for the Holy Year what are the aims we have in

mind with this initiative, what spirit we would like to see prevail

in those who respond to our invitation, and what fruits we hope

can be gathered with the grace of the Holy Spirit, in whose name
and in whose light we are now setting out.

As we declared from our very first announcement, on May 9
last, with the Jubilee we propose the renewal of man and his recon-
ciliation with God, which take place above all in depth, in the

interior sanctuary, where conscience is called to bring about its

conversion, or “metanoia,” by means of faith and repentance (cf.

Mk. 1, 15), and to aim at the fullness of charity.

God himself, infinitely merciful, after redeeming the world by

means of Jesus Christ his Son, calls all men, none excluded, to

participate in the fruits of redemption (cf. 1 Tim. 2, 4) and inter-

venes with his Holy Spirit to operate salvation in them (cf. Rom.

8, 10 ff.).

To strengthen the bonds

The Church is convinced that only from this interior operation

can be derived also reconciliation between men, as the social

dimension embraces all sectors and levels of life, in relations be-

tween individuals, families, groups, categories, nations; to become.

20



as far as is possible for man’s frailty and the imperfection of

earthly institutions, a ferment of peace and universal unity.

She undertakes, therefore, to bring it about that the force of the

redemption wrought by Christ should strengthen in the faithful, in

dioceses, in parishes, in religious communities and in other centers

of Christian life and apostolate, as well as in the Churches sepa-

rated from us up to now, the bonds of faith and charity in the Blood

of Christ (cf. Col. 1, 20). The Pentecost of grace will thus be able

to become also the Pentecost of the new brotherhood. This is the

spirit we hope to see flourish in the whole celebration of the Holy
Year.

Therefore we trust that the value of penitential practices will be
rediscovered, as a sign and way of grace, as a commitment for the

deep renewal which receives its full efficacy in the Sacrament of

Penance, to be used and administered according to the provisions

of the Church, for resumption by the individual and the community

of progress along the way of salvation (cf. Acts 16, 17).

It seems to us that the expression, the occasion and, as it were,

the synthesis of these practices, which will have their completion

In the celebration of the Holy Eucharist, can be the Pilgrimage,

which in the authentic tradition of Christian ascetism, has always

been carried out for reasons of piety and expiation. Today, too, it

can be inspired by these motives, both when it takes place in forms
more similar to those of the ancient pilgrims to Rome, and when it
uses the modern means of communication.

Need for charity

It is necessary, however, that the Pilgrimage should be accom-

panied not only by prayer and penance but also by the exercise of

brotherly charity, which is a clear demonstration of love of God
(cf. 1 Jn. 4, 20, 21; 3, 14), and must be expressed, by the individ-
ual faithful, their associations, and ecclesial communities and

institutions, in spiritual and corporal works of mercy, in favor of

needier brothers. Thus the Holy Year will really widen the scope of
the Church's charity, and will portend a renewal and reconciliation

of universal dimensions.

For these aims to be achieved more easily, let us express the
wish that the practice of the Pilgrimage will be carried out in all

the local Churches, in cathedrals and sanctuaries, diocesan and

21



national, as intermediate stages converging at last, in 1975, in
Rome, the visible center of the universal Church. Here the repre-
sentatives of the local Churches will conclude the way of renewal
and reconciliation, venerate the tombs of the Apostles, renew their
adhesion to the Church of Peter, and we, God willing, will have the
joy of receiving them with open arms and together with them we
will bear witness to the unity of the Church in faith and charity.

It is our ardent desire that in this march towards the “source of

salvation” (cf. Is. 12, 3) our sons fully united to the Church of

Peter will be joined, in the forms possible for them, also by the

other followers of Christ and all those who, along different and

apparently distant ways, are seeking the one God with upright

conscience and goodwill (cf. Acts 17, 27).

The concrete programs of the Pilgrimage and other practices,

aimed at fostering renewal and reconciliation, will certainly be

indicated by the Episcopal Conferences for the local Churches, tak-

ing into account both the outlook and customs of the places, and

the real purposes of the Holy Year, which we have just outlined.

On our side we ask pilgrims, after having prayed according to

our intentions and to those of the whole Episcopal College, to take

part, locally, in a solemn community function, or to make a stop to
reflect before the Lord, ending it with the recitation or singing of

the Pater and the Creed, and with an invocation to the Blessed

Virgin.

Gift of Indulgence

As if in response to these simple and sincere manifestations by

means of which the faithful, in the local Churches, will carry out a

real conversion and profess that they wish to remain and become

stronger in charity towards God and towards brothers, we, as the

humble minister of Christ the Redeemer, will grant, in the due

forms, the gift of the Indulgence. Also those sons of ours who, not

being able to take part in the Pilgrimage because they are pre-

vented by illness or some other serious cause, join in it spiritually

with the offering of their prayers and their suffering, will benefit

from this gift.

With the Holy Year, the Church, exercising the “ministry of rec-

onciliation” (cf. 2 Cor. 5, 18), offers privileged opportunities.

22



special appeals so that all those reached by her word and, even

more, as is our wish and our most ardent prayer, by the inner and

ineffable touch of grace, may participate in Christian joy, the fruit
of the salvific virtues of the Redeemer.

To refine spirits

We conclude this letter with the expression of the hopes we place
In the celebration of the coming Holy Year. They are, we repeat,
renewal and reconciliation as interior facts and as implementations

of unity, brotherhood and peace, expanding from spirits renewed

and reconciled in Christ, throughout the whole Church, and towards

the whole human society, on the ways of charity, the fruit of which
is justice, goodness, mutual forgiveness, the gift of oneself and of

one’s property for one’s brothers. In a word we hope and trust that
a renewed Christian sense of life will refine spirits and spread

abundantly in the world, for common salvation.

This, Lord Cardinal, is what we wished to let you know on this
eve of an important period of the history of the Church in our days,

which will be symbolized when the time comes, by the opening of
the Holy Door. We beg you to communicate it to our Brothers in
the Episcopate, while we bless you and all those whom our appeal
reaches with the most ample outpouring of our heart, the heart of a
father and of the humble servant of the servants of God.

From the Vatican Apostolic Palace, May 31, 1973, Feast of the
Ascension of Our Lord, the tenth year of our Pontificate.

Paulus PP. VI

23



The Pastoral aims of the Holy Year
In January, 1973, the secretariat of the Central Committee for

the Holy Year sent the Episcopal Conferences and National Com-
mittees for the Holy Year the following Pastoral Document to draw
their attention to some points duly fixed by the Central Committee
itself, and partly made known already, but now confirmed by the
news and testimonies coming from the local Churches about the

first results of the Jubilee events and the preparation of the
Pilgrimage to Rome.

Principal aims

The principal aims to keep in mind during the whole course of

the Holy Year in the local Churches in preparation for its culmina-

tion in Rome, are the following:

1. awareness and personal reflection on the human and Chris-
tian vocation and on the commitments of worship and faith in God;

2. awakening to the problem of conversion, salvation, liberation

from evil, proposed in terms adapted to the mentality, conditions

and needs of the world today (also taking into account, where nec-

essary, the psychological and sociological aspects of the problem);

3. a revaluation of repentance as the essential element of the

Christian spirit and a fresh awareness of the Sacrament of Penance

as a means of nourishing this spirit, in the practical forms of ad-
ministration responding to the genuine tradition of the Church and

to the psychological and social conditions of men today, fixed by
the Holy See in a document soon to be published;

4. suitable stress on the significance of repentance as reconcil-

iation with God and at the same time with brothers, the Christian

community and the whole of mankind (taken as a community

guided by a moral order corresponding to the divine plans), both

in the Sacrament of Penance and in Christian practice, and there-

fore on its efficacy in bringing about unity and peace;

5. continual reference to Christ as the one Saviour, from whom
comes all grace, also that of faith, conversion, good works, perse-

24



verance, continual renewal, and in whose name the Church carries

out her whole ministry and offers her services to all men;

6. strengthening of communion in Christ at the level of per-

sonal conscience; of ecclesial and inter-denominational relations,

of groups and institutions of the Church as a fact already existing

thanks to Christ and to which it is necessary always to refer and

return to put right the ruptures that occur in this communion owing

to personal and social failures In the past.

7. a reminder of the mission and of the duty of Christians to be

operators of unity and peace in the world—in all fields of action:
family, professional, social, political, cultural, etc.—adopting the
evangelical method of brotherhood and forgiveness and expressing

the Christian spirit of charity in facts, values and institutions.

Practical initiatives

The initiatives suggested by the Central Committee which are

being carried out in many local Churches to attain the aims of the
Holy Year better, are the following:

1 . At the parish level:

a) holy missions—in old and new forms—to awaken in the
faithful the spirit of repentance, reconciliation and unity, according

to the requirements and aims mentioned above;

b) catechetical courses, sermons, study groups, discussions,

etc., about these points and their practical applications;

c) revision of the whole situation of parishes from the aspects

of religious practice, faith, works of charity, pious unions and

apostolic associations, etc.. In order to give them new impetus, with
methods adapted to the psychological, sociological and religious

conditions. (For this purpose it will be useful to establish agree-

ments and programs in deaneries or groups of parishes, with

the participation of the religious men and women in charge of the
various associations and works);

d) arousing the interest of pupils of the catechetical schools and

of young people of every category in the aims and working groups,

researches, discussions, competitions, etc.

25



2. At the diocesan level:

a) promoting and coordinating the initiatives of parishes and

other pastoral centers, in the attempt to keep them along lines that

will make it possible to reach the alms proposed better;

b) stimulating the participation of Catholic schools and insti-

tutes, various associations, religious orders, etc. in the initiatives;

c) preparing and carrying out the diocesan pilgrimage to the

cathedral church and to other holy places, particularly shrines,

determined by the bishops, with the following purposes:

—community celebration of a rite of spiritual and social recon-
ciliation for the whole local Church;

—manifestation of ecclesial unity and commitment to express
it in actual works before the local population, even before non-

believers;

—spiritual preparation of the pilgrimage of the local Church to
Rome, representing the whole diocese in the meeting with the

Roman Church and with the Pope. (For this purpose it will be
useful for the bishops to Interest in this work the pastoral offices,

the Priests’ and Pastoral Council, the religious, the leaders of the

various associations and institutions of the diocese).

3. At the national (or regional) level:

a) agreeing on common forms and ways for the diocesan cele-
bration of the Holy Year in the various dioceses of the nation (or

region);

b) drawing up and distributing the plans of catechetics and

homilies, liturgical and paraliturgical texts, calendars, etc. for the

Holy Year In the various dioceses and in the pilgrimage to Rome,

according to the model-schema prepared by the special Central

Liturgical Commission and already sent to the' Episcopal Confer-

ences (in the “Ordo Jubilaei” and In n. 4 of the Holy Year Bulletin);

c) interesting the various organs of public opinion and of social

communication in the subjects and aims of the Holy Year;

d) making any necessary agreements with the public authorities

as regards freedom in the celebrations;

26



e) getting into touch and reaching agreements with the repre-

sentatives of the various Christian churches and communions and

perhaps other religions, for joint participation in the rites and other

initiatives of the Holy Year of Reconciliation;

f) informing the Central Committee about everything. (The

Episcopal Conferences should act in agreement with the Unions of

Religious Superiors and with the leaders of the various associations

and institutions).

Pastoral problems

Let us mention again some pastoral problems with regard to
which it is suggested that initiatives should be taken on the plane

of study, revision and programming, for example at meetings or

congresses at the national and international level, according to the

spirit and the basic points fixed for the Holy Year:

1) faith and religion in labor conditions;

2) faith and religion in the world of the young;

3) faith and religion in the world of culture and science;

4) faith and religion in the development of the business and

consumer society;

5) faith and religion in the world of social communication and

entertainment;

6) faith and religion in the use of one’s leisure;

7) the problem of priestly and religious vocations in a new com-
munity awareness of the Church;

8) the missionary reawakening of the whole Church.

The Agencies, Associations, Movements, etc., engaged in study
and the Apostolate in the fields mentioned, are urged to take initia-
tives at the various levels in order to promote a general revival of
conscience, in the first place, but also of commitment of the Cath-
olic groups and the Christian people as a whole, for an effective
work of renewal according to the spirit and directives of the
Council.

27



The '‘Week of Reconciliation"

The climax of the Holy Year celebrations in the local Churches

will be, however, the “Week of Reconciliation.” The liturgical rite
and the catechetical illustration of this “Week” are to be found in
the “Ordo Jubilaei celebrandi” published by the Sacred Congrega-

tion for Divine Worship on behalf of the Central Committee, and

already sent to the Episcopal Conferences.

Stress should be laid on the importance of Lent and Easter for

this “Week” which will deal with the following subjects: I. The hope
of the world and the kingdom of God. II. The Word become flesh.
III. “Repent and believe.” IV. “Through death to life.” V. Cele-

bration of Reconciliation. VI. The Church gathered in the Holy
Spirit. VII. The mystery of unity.

The texts for this “Week” can be used, however, in celebrations
on other occasions (days, weeks, various liturgical times) through-

out the span of the Holy Year.

The “Ordo” also contains the texts for “Easter in the Holy Year.”

It is obvious, however, that the basis of all the celebrations indi-

cated by the “Ordo” or outlined and fixed by the Episcopal Confer-

ences in the various countries, is constituted by the principal aims

of the Holy Year, which are expressed in the pastoral commitment

of repentance, to be spread as the spirit and fundamental practice

of Christian life in close connection with the faith.

Making this program come to life calls for a preparation,
about which we take the liberty of offering some suggestions.

Spiritual preparation

The Central Committee offers the groups interested in the prep-

aration and course of the Holy Year some suggestions, also taken
from the reports of various Episcopal Conferences, in confirma-

tion of what the Committee itself had already drawn up and made
known.

1. The “Holy Year Prayer” has been duly issued. It would be a

good thing to recite it in the community and in all the churches,

also among the “Prayers of the faithful,” and spread it in families,
institutes, religious communities and among the sick. It may serve

28



a great deal to drive home the aims and the spirit of the Holy Year

to the faithful of the whole world.

2. Presenting it to the faithful, it would be useful to set it in a

framework of catechetics on the value of ecclesial prayer, on the

Mystical Body and on the Communion of Saints.

3. The sick and other suffering and needy persons should be

asked to offer up—always united to the mystery of the communion
of the Saints—their afflictions and sorrows in union with Christ for
the renewal and reconciliation of people in the Holy Year. A con-
tinuous work of enlightenment, consolation and exhortation with

regard to the Holy Year should be carried out particularly among
these united faithful.

4. Family and group meetings should be imbued with prayer

and the ideals of the Holy Year in order to leaven all environments

with the spirit of renewal and reconciliation which are to be the

outstanding characteristics of the Jubilee celebration.

5. The affirmation of this spirit will be the best way to avoid even

the most remote appearance of mere show and triumphalism in

the Jubilee celebrations. What is most important is to promote

works, acts, interventions which reflect the one “glory” that is

really beyond all question: the glory of the Risen Christ.

6. The stress on spiritual and charismatic subjects will also
serve to make the intentions of the Church and the Holy See better
known and appreciated. These intentions are all geared to recon-
ciliation and not to partisan worldly interests.

7. For the movement to have really popular repercussions, it is
necessary to find persons who bear witness to Christ In an out-
standingly sincere way and get them to speak on all the channels
available to interest public opinion in Rome and in the various
countries. The problem is to choose persons—priests and laymen
—of a real Christian spirit, if not actually saints.
Pastoral preparation

We wish to recall the great subjects of the Holy Year that have
been proposed for study and discussion in Catholic schools and
reviews, regarding living problems on the spiritual, ecclesial and
social plane, from the biblical, dogmatic, moral, ascetic, liturgico-
pastoral standpoint, etc., in terms of spiritual life. They can also

29



supply the material for a catechetics of the Holy Year adapted to

the various conditions of places and persons.

1. Faith and repentance as the essence of the Christian mes-

sage; Conversion to God and brotherly communion; Sin and its
weight in human life and history; Reconciliation with God by means
of Christ’s blood and cross; Redemption and liberation; The mis-

sion of the Church as the minister of redemption and promoter of

human liberation; The Church “sancta” and “poenitens”; Metanoia
not so much in the structures as in man; Interior and complete con-
version of the human person.

2. The ministry of forgiveness and the gift of remission; Per-

sonal value and ecclesial solidarity in conversion and repentance;

Essence, ways and present-day problems of the sacrament of Pen-

ance; The relationship between Penance and indulgences as the

expression and application of solidarity in Christ and in the Church;

The right way to present indulgences today.

3. Human renewal as the fruit of reconciliation; Christian re-
pentance and human values; Christian faith and the religious sense
of life in the context of secular society; Christian hope and the

commitment for development and social pacification; The viewpoint
of eternal life and the temporal dimensions of Christian action for

peace; The commitment of Christians at the various levels and in
the various sectors of social action.

4. The great moments of reconciliation in the human heart, in
human relations, in the Church and among the Churches, among
all believers, among peoples and States.

5. The unity of the Church in prayer, charity, repentance; Broth-

erly charity in the world today; The actual methods to build peace

in ecclesial and social relations.

6. The theological and pastoral meaning of the Roman Jubilee;
The Pilgrimage as a penitential practice; The “wish to see the suc-

cessor of St. Peter” and the jubilee; and to see the provisional and

ministerial function of Rome in the perspective of our pilgrimage to
eternity.

Practical plans for action

1. The fundamental theological and catechetical subjects con-

nected with the Holy Year, should be dealt with and developed in

30



the framework of today’s ecclesiology and in relation to the spirit-

ual demands revealed by the mentality of the men of today, with
an approach faithful to the true Christian doctrine and open to all

the rightful aspirations of the contemporary spirit.

2. It would be necessary to interest scholars in the various

branches of theology so that they will elaborate the afore-said sub-

jects at the scientific level, and pastoral experts so that they will

adapt them to the necessities of the ministry.

3. In the development of the subjects of the Holy Year it should

be kept in mind that the primacy of the material and of social struc-

ture asserted in many movements of modern culture cannot be
effectively contested by merely reaffirming the primacy of the

transcendent and of the life of the Spirit. It must be shown that in

the perspective of the Holy Year the importance of the material and

of structure is not only not ignored but is even given greater value,

just on account of what really has the primacy, that- is, the values

of faith and prayer.

4. The theologico-pastoral subjects proposed must be dealt with

in such a way as to attract the present interest In a particular type

of spiritual message, which corresponds to the essence of Christian

spirituality. The elements of the latter, which arouse very favorable

echoes even in the laity, are bound up with the sanctifying potential

of the Christian’s historical commitment. This potential presup-

poses: a) the goodness of the natural order; b) the welding of

nature and grace; c) the supernatural value of time; d) the catholic

dimensions of the Incarnation; e) the perspective of history in the

light of eternity.

These possibilities must then be connected with self-denial and

the Cross.

5. The explanation of the value of the pilgrimage to Rome as a
“sign,” is of particular importance. The same can be said of Rome
itself, as a bridge and center of service with regard to a spiritual

reality of individuals and of humanity, which is far more lofty and
eternal.

6. The pilgrimage should be presented above all as the quest
for a new meeting with God In the experience of contact with the
Tombs or “Confessions” of the Apostles Peter and Paul (who sum

31



up also the memories of the other Apostles), whose bodies rest in

their basilicas, but whose faith lives in Rome and in the universal
Church even in our own day.

7. In the local churches the Pilgrimage must be to the Cathe-

drals, where the heart of the diocese and the presence of the
bishop will be rediscovered; to the Sanctuaries of the Blessed

Virgin (local or regional): to the Churches where the Saints who
founded them are buried. It is necessary to draw up in good time
for these pilgrimages plans of liturgical celebrations and popular

devotion with reference to the Holy Year.

8. Among the practices, in addition to the liturgical celebra-
tions, mention should be made of the Rosary and the V/a Crucis,
with ideas suited for the Holy Year, according to the various litur-

gical times.

Practical suggestions for catechetics

For good catechetics for the Holy Year, it would be useful:

1) to promote courses of lectures on the subjects of the Holy

Year in the various dioceses and parishes, and in particular to

stress the importance of the Sacraments, centered upon Penance,

the Eucharist and the sanctification of feast-days;

2) to take the opportunity to dispel errors and confusions that

are widespread among the people today, with regard to the Church,
priests, religious life, indulgences, etc.;

3) to supply priests with short, concise themes on the subjects

of the Holy Year, with biblical, liturgical and conciliar texts, and

rapid explanations, as has been done by various Episcopal Confer-

ences and in various dioceses;

4) to find really “inspiring” preachers and lecturers and launch

them (distributing them over large areas) for the Holy Year; and in

any case to look for and send suitably trained preachers and lec-

turers, in agreement on the same schema of subjects;

5) the subject of Reconciliation should be developed in all

instructions and celebrations. Also the readings for liturgical or

paraliturgical celebrations should be chosen on this subject: for

example the ones indicated in the “Ordo lectionum” under the

32



heading “Concord." But the best rule is that of the “Ordo Jubilaei

celebrandi."

The Holy Year and non-Catholics

1. The Episcopal Conferences and the National Committees are

exhorted to study opportunities and ways to invite to the Holy Year

celebrations Christians not united with Peter’s Chair and non-Chris-

tians, and to interest also non-believers.

2. The general line to follow is to obtain the communion of souls
around the fundamental values: conversion, prayer, charity; with

the intention of opening up ways, giving opportunities, in order that

divine grace may bring about the blooming of a closer unity in faith
and in adherence to the Church.

3. It will be very important to study and show how the subjects
of the Holy Year coincide with certain fundamental motives of the

mentality, culture and religion of the various peoples: for example

the followers of Confucius, Buddha, Mohammed.

4. Commissions or mixed study groups should be set up to

study the possibility and ways of a joint participation in the Holy

Year in Rome and to present suggestions and requests, if any, to
the Central Committee.

The Holy Year and charity

1. In the celebrations of the Holy Year a large place should

always be given to individual and collective works of charity, under-

• stood in all its forms, reaching out as far as possible.

2. Particular care should be given to the poor, those living in

shanty towns, the homeless, the aged, those suffering from loneli-

ness.

3. Among the practices required for the Indulgence, stress
should be laid on the necessity of carrying out works of charity,

though the latter are freely chosen.

4. Among the works of charity recommended are payment of
the fares of poor pilgrims and the provision of board and lodging

for them, free of charge. For this purpose it will be a good thing

to make warm appeals to private persons, families, parishes,
agencies and religious institutes.

33



5. Interdiocesan forms of aid should be promoted: in the sense

of help from the richer to the poorer dioceses, and particularly to

dioceses in mission lands. This aid should pass through the Cen-

tral Committee, which has set up a special Commission for soli-
darity among pilgrims. Some churches have already committed
themselves to this work of exquisite Christian and ecclesial brother-

hood.

6. It is part of the tasks of this Commission to collect funds
both to cover travelling expenses and assistance for poor pilgrims

and for works of individual aid (for example medical treatment, vic-

tims of accidents or crimes); all churches, agencies, and institutes

of the various countries should contribute to this fund.

7. Many charitable initiatives, celebrations of "days,” collection
of offerings, etc., which are now traditional, should take on a
special character in the Holy Year with regard to the spirit and

aim of the Jubilee.

The Holy Year and the Young

Particular attention must be paid to the young so that they may
receive and appreciate the message of the Holy Year.

A special Commission, presided over by Mons. Patrick Carrol
Abbing, the founder and president of Boys’ Town, is at work to

study and give concrete form to the initiatives to be taken for the

Holy Year of the Young in Rome. But here we offer some features
of a "Holy Year Teaching” which may be of help also for specific
initiatives in the local Churches:

1. the first principle will be to use a language adapted to the

young, and to propose to them a message responding to their

aspirations. This message must:

a) be humanizing and promote solidarity of works, in favor

of the whole of mankind;

b) be respectful of the essential values inherent in man and
be charitable to all;

c) invite the Christian to be, in this context, the best witness

of Jesus Christ, the perfect man.

34



2. The message must take its place in a theology of the Church

explained in a language that aims at discovering, through the Holy

Year, the dimension of the Church. Basic points;

a) not so much a Church above or opposite, but immersed in

the world, like yeast in the human dough; not of the world, but in

the world;

b) mankind has already been saved by Christ, present and

visible in the Church;

c) men of goodwill are in union with Christ's Church;

d) a Christian is one who has chosen Christ, undertaking to

renew himself and to renew all other men in him;

e) he who is most capable of operating, suffering and dying

to serve others, is most in conformity with Christ;

f) the communion of the faithful is called forth, guided and
symbolized by the Bishops and the Pope, in accordance with

Christ's will.

3. It will be necessary to respect the many different forms, to
insert the yeast of the Holy Year in the youth movement The
following facts should be kept in mind:

a) every nation or ecclesial region expresses a youth with

different problems, culture, sensibility and customs:

b) the demand of the young starts in the first place from the
deep recesses of conscience and Christ's proposal reaches the

individual first of all, then the group, then the local Church, and

finally the whole Church;

c) it is useful to give new meaning and value, in the light of
the “Holy Year," to many youth initiatives that have already won
recognition at the international and local level (for example meet-

ings, marches, the plight of refugees, etc.) and respect and use

their appeal, due to their spontaneous origin.

4. A choice and a proposal of valid contents will perhaps be
opportune, passing over the traditional forms, if necessary, and
using a new language. Thus for example:

35



The Holy Year

—a year of solidarity, fellowship, hopes, justice, liberation, love,
trust, reconciliation, making all things new.

Pilgrimage

—a moment of truth or quest for it, passed together;
—a sense of common poverty to understand one another and

plan a new path for humanity;

—meetings to share experiences with one another, to talk to one
another, to express the joy of being together: together with one

another, with the Bishop, or with the Pope, signs of unity.

Repentance

—checking and revision of the path of mankind, and of the con-
tribution of the young to its progress;

—awareness of the human weakness, the inconstancy and incon-
sistency of youthful sincerity at times;

—the sense of general guilt, of mutual manipulation, of slavery
to fashions and lack of authenticity in the group;

—reconversion towards the persons of the poor, the aged, edu-
cators, authority, recognizing their social role and always loving

their persons;

—conversion from the idea of a God who frightens and is of
utility only, to the three living persons of the Father who loves us,
Christ who saves us, and the Holy Spirit who is living love in us.

Indulgences

—spiritual solidarity among people, united by the one Savior;
—confidence in others, opening to the Church which makes us

capable of turning to men and to God;

—accepting the love of others which saves us by means of the
communication of the merits by which Christians cooperate in

redemption;

-—recognizing that this exchange of spiritual gifts was entrusted
by Christ to Peter, who makes real their communication.

36



A Message to the Catholic People
of the United States

JOHN CARDINAL KROL

Pentecost Sunday, June 10, 1973

Dear Friends:

Last month our Holy Father, Pope Paul, announced that the

Church throughout the world will observe 1975 as a Holy Year. He

asked that the presidents of bishops’ conferences everywhere ex-

plain the meaning of the Holy Year to the Catholic people of their

countries and encourage their wholehearted participation. Pope

Paul's announcement raises the questions: What is a Holy Year?

What meaning does it have for us? What are we to do about it?

The tradition of the Holy Year has its origin in Old Testament

times, when the Jewish people observed a Jubilee Year every seven

years. This was a period in which debts were forgiven, slaves were

freed, and neighbor was reconciled with neighbor. The tradition

was revived by the Church in the Middle Ages. The first Holy Year

was observed in 1300. Pilgrims flocked to Rome to do penance,
visit the shrines there, and receive the spiritual benefits of partici-

pation in the observance. In modern times Holy Years have been

observed every quarter-century. The last was held in 1950. The

1975 observance will be the 26th general Holy Year.

Although the Holy Year has its roots in ancient tradition, it is

profoundly relevant for us today. For the heart of the Holy Year is

its spiritual significance. As Pope Paul has explained, it aims at

nothing less than “the interior renewal of man." And, in keeping
with the tradition that began in Old Testament times, the special

theme of the 1975 Holy Year is “Reconciliation.” Through prayer,
through penance, through good works we are encouraged to re-
move the barriers that separate us from God and from one another
—to rekindle the first of our love for God and our fellows. As St.
Paul tells us, “Now in Christ Jesus you who once were far off have
been brought near through the blood of Christ. It is he who is our
peace, and who made the two of us one by breaking down the
barrier of hostility that kept us apart.” (Eph. 2:13-14)

37



The Holy Year is important for us, as individuals, and as a com-

munity—a community of Christians seeking to build community
in our troubled times. Spiritual renewal will enable us to combat

more effectively the forces of hatred, violence and oppression

which divide man from man today. It will help us to resist and
reverse the process of demoralization which affects so many seg-
ments of our society. All true morality is founded on the divine

law of God. The Holy Year will help us appreciate this fact more

clearly and give it meaning in the troubled society in which we live.

For whom is the Holy Year intended? The obvious answer is,
“everybody.” Pope Paul has made this clear. Unlike some past
Holy Years in which activity was centered in Rome, the 1975 Holy

Year will emphasize efforts at spiritual renewal carried out in the

local churches throughout the world. The special graces and spirit-

ual benefits associated with the Holy Year will be available to all.

The worldwide observance will indeed converge ultimately on

Rome, and as in the past the Holy City will be thronged with pil-

grims. But this Holy Year will be a truly universal event, an experi-

ence of faith In which all Catholics, and indeed all men of good will
everywhere—are encouraged to take part in their own communi-
ties.

The Pope has described three kinds of persons for whom the
spiritual renewal of the Holy Year is intended in particular: the per-

son who, in the confusion of current ideas and ideologies, has “lost

the certainty of truth”; the person who has become so absorbed in
events outside himself that he “no longer possesses communica-

tion with himself”; and the person so caught up in a compulsive

quest for pleasure that he finds himself at length “bored and dis-

illusioned” by his way of life. In describing these three categories

the Holy Father has indeed sketched a portrait of modern man.

As we begin our preparation for the Holy Year, it is helpful to
bear in mind two other important events, one of which will precede

it and the other of which will follow it. On the eve of Holy Year, in

1974, an international Synod of Bishops will take place in Rome.

Its theme will be “The Evangelization of the Modern World.”

Bishops from many nations will study and recommend to the Holy
Father ways in which the Church can more effectively bring the

good News of Jesus Christ to the men and women of our times. The
Holy Year, its emphasis on spiritual renewal and reconciliation, will

38



inevitably deepen and carry forward the Synod’s effort to achieve

greater understanding of the meaning of “evangelization” today.

The second event, in our own country, will be the observance

of the U.S. Bicentennial In 1976. The Bicentennial challenges

Americans—so sorely divided in recent years—to achieve new
unity among themselves; a unity based on shared commitment to
common moral and spiritual values. Again, the Holy Year’s em-
phasis on renewal and reconciliation will help point us in the direc-

tion we must go to bring this about.

It is also significant that the Holy Year will mark the 10th anni-

versary of the close of the Second Vatican Council. The theme of

the Council was renewal. The first and indispensable requisite of

conciliar renewal is personal, spiritual, interior renewal. The Holy

Year will be an occasion for us to review how far we have come In a
decade and to re-commit ourselves to the work that remains in

order to achieve the vast and inspiring purposes of the Council.

Today, Pentecost Sunday, is an appropriate time to begin our

preparation for the Holy Year. We commemorate today the gift of
the Holy Spirit to the Church—that Spirit who makes us one in
Christ and Inspires us, as he did the Apostles, to carry Christ’s

message far and wide into the world around us. Let us pray to the
Spirit that the Holy Year will be for all of us a time of renewal and

reconciliation, and that we will find in the Holy Year the grace and
strength to continue in our own day the work begun on the first
Pentecost.

God bless you all.

John Cardinal Krol

President,

National Conference of Catholic Bishops

39



PASTORAL DOCUMENT ON THE

HOLY YEAR AND THE YOUNG

Central Committee for the

HOLY YEAR

To the Episcopal Conferences, National

Committees, Directors and Assistants of

Youth Movements.

address myself most hopefully to the young, to whom I express
my feelings of deep warmth and my paternal affection. In spite of
some rather contradictory attitudes of theirs; some exhibitionism
and positions of protest, I have faith in them. It is to them, to the

young, to those who are searching for new ways of personal

involvement, that I would like to address the disturbing words of

the Gospel: Why do you stand here all day idle?’ Their thirst
for the absolute can not be sated by false ideologies or empty

experiments. No, the young have within themselves the capability,

the imagination, the force, the spirit of dedication and self-

sacrifice to enable them to make their contribution to the salvation
of their brothers: ‘Go you also into the vineyard.' " ^

Paul VI

PRELIMINARY REMARKS

The call of the Holy Year to a greater authenticity of life, na-
turally takes for granted that those who have the responsibility
for proclaiming it to others will have already initiated their own
personal process of self-examination and conversion. “The need

40



for consistency," says Paul VI, "compels us to emerge from our

own mediocrity, from our lukewarmness, from trying to reconcile

the full adherence to the Gospel, to which we are pledged, with

the hedonistic permissiveness that is in vogue today, both in

theory and in practice, and which leads us to betray the Cross." ^

The young ask us for positive signs of this conversion; a

greater simplicity of life, in the spirit of Francis of Assisi, who

by stripping himself, also pledged himself in the eyes of the

community to a life of greater closeness to Jesus in his poverty,

ridiculed as he was by men. The young want the Church to be a

"sign."

The Holy Year also makes it impellent for those who must ex-

plain it to others to adopt the proper pastoral approach. "The

conditions of the society in which we live oblige us to revise our

methods, to study all possible means of bringing to the people the
Christian message in which modern man can find the answer to
his dilemmas and the strength to carry out his own personal duty

of human solidarity." ^ In the case of the young, one must
naturally use the right method of approach and the type of

language that they can understand.

The majority of young people today are not prepared to accept

the message of the Holy Year. It is only right, therefore, that in

bringing it to their attention, this be done step by step. This does

not imply, however, that it should be emptied of any of its full

spiritual significance, and be presented as one more movement
for social reform, or that its message, which is a demanding one

on the personal level, should be watered down to make it more
acceptable to the masses. The great purpose of the Holy Year is

this: "to give authentic expression to the Christian life, coherent,

interior, all-embracing, capable of 'renewing the face of the earth,'

in the spirit of Christ." To reach this goal of total renewal "each
one of us is invited to examine closely his own mode of thinking,
of feeling, of acting as compared to the ideal of a follower of
Christ." ^

The Holy Year offers all those who are in close contact with
young people a happy occasion for showing them the personality
and the words of Christ as a model and a rule of life. They need

Christ, the real Christ, who leads them to the Father, who proposes

41



ideals that are capable of arousing their enthusiasm; who frees
them from the temptation to run from their responsibilities; who
involves them in an authentic program of love for their brethren;

who urges them to discover His likeness in all the disinherited
creatures of the earth.

The Church does not indulge in wishful thinking, imagining that

the majority of young people will answer the call of the Holy

Year. The obstacles are enormous. They stem from the young

people themselves and from the present condition of society. But

the Church also knows that grace can operate its own miracles
even in the most obdurate heart and see to it that even the

deafest ear hear the words that contain eternal life. The task is

not easy but it is filled with hope for the future. God's timing

and that of the human soul do not always coincide with man’s
natural impatience to see results. But the very difficulty of the

undertaking should spur one on to greater trust in God, to ask

Him for the gift of His grace; it should teach one, with new
urgency, the need for prayer, and the need to lead others, the

young, to pray.

I.—YOUNG PEOPLE AND THE OBJECTIVES OF THE HOLY YEAR

What are the aims of the Holy Year and how are they looked

on by the young people of today?

The first question which one must be prepared to answer is:

“What is a Holy Year?" Then; “Why a Holy Year in this day and
age?"

The Holy Year, from the very beginning, has been a special

period devoted to renewal and reconciliation. Perhaps this ex-

plains why a Holy Year fits in today: at few moments in history
has there been such a pressing need for human renewal and
reconciliation.

“The Holy Year/’ the Pope says, has as its first aim “the inner

renewal of man: of the man who thinks and whose very thinking
has made him lose his certitude of the Truth; of the working man,
who has become so involved on the outside that he has lost his

capacity for reflection; of the man who indulges in pleasure and
has so many exciting means of amusement that he soon becomes
bored and deluded. Man must renew himself from the inside.’’ ^

42



This is one of the more “youthful” passages in the Pope’s talks

on the Holy Year. It is so much to the point that it can be trans-
mitted to them directly. Young people have become more and

more alienated, more and more “emptied” by a type of civilization

that does not integrate them and does not give them a sense of

their own worth; more and more deluded by the mirages offered

by a consumer society; more and more bored by a life without

real ideals and without goals that are personally rewarding. Con-

version would signify for them a return to their real authenticity,

a repossession of their proper spiritual dimensions, an accept-

ance of the values brought by the risen Christ into the life of

man and into society.

“We also need—Paul VI goes on to name the second great
objective of the Holy Year, reconciliation

—

to establish an authen-

tic, a living and happy relationship with God, to be reconciled

with Him, in loving humility, so that, from this primary and con-

stitutional harmony, the whole world of our human experience may
express the need for and acquire a new potency to reach a recon-

ciliation in charity and justice with all men, recognizing them all

as our brothers. This reconciliation extends into other vast and

very realistic fields: the Church itself, human society, politics, the
ecumenical movement, peace." ®

It is not always easy to speak of reconciliation to young people,

inclined as they are to accentuate tensions and conflicts. And

yet, today, growing numbers of them are submitting themselves

to a severe cross-examination on the violence that is plaguing

society, on its lack of meaning, on the real values of love and of

peace that are seen more and more as the only way for mankind
to save itself from the whirlpool of violence.

On this level the biblical meaning of reconciliation, conceived
as a refusal of violence and of human exploitation, and as a
reaffirmation of the value of love, could open a breach for the

young and lead them to a search for the only true fount of life
and of love, which Is God and to realize the fundamental Im-
portance for the validity of their own lives of establishing an
intimate personal relationship with Him. The Holy Year offers a
special occasion for everyone to get closer to God and to follow
the only guide towards Him, the only true intermediary for our

reconciliation with Him: the Risen Christ.

43



''A real religious, doctrinal and sacramental contact with Christ
holds the first place in the revival of our Christian life, through the

grace of the Holy Spirit."

Conversion and reconciliation: the two charges capable of

making the positive qualities of youth, to which Paul V! alludes,

explode into action:

"Is it not true, perhaps, that in this new generation of young
people a positive attitude towards the truth, towards justice and

towards love, is being born? Towards prayer and the faith;

towards the innocent search for a Church which is humble and

good, capable of giving a new meaning and a new value to life,
and to plan for a vigorous and active peace of universal import?

We sense these new pulsations in the soul of the young: we listen
to them with respect and with approval; and we trust that the

sincerity that can renew all things may exercise its mysterious
and truth-revealing influence upon them." ^

II.—THE PRESENTATION OF THE HOLY YEAR

a) One language—one message
Who are the young people about whom we are speaking?

Today everyone speaks of "the youth” as though it were a

single socio-psychological grouping. On the contrary, young
people are divided and subdivided into innumerable different

categories.

As far as the Holy Year itself is concerned and its presentation

to the young one must take into account their different situations

today in relationship to the faith.

Without calculating a minority who are spiritually well prepared

and actively engaged, or another group declaredly atheistic, one

can make a conventional grouping of the rest in the following

way:

—young people who by and large practice their faith but go
through periods of crisis and are searching for a more meaningful

life;

—those who are religious by affiliation but not practicing,
except occasionally, and yet might not be insensible to a sum-

44



mons to a more authentic faith, if it were presented to them in

a convincing way;

—those who are indifferent, either through ignorance or be-
cause of a definite rejection of religion, and, who, today, are the

great majority.

In spite of their diversities, young people today do not like to be

classified and labelled, nor do they like the discriminations that an

adult mentality is often inclined to make. Hence the need, in

presenting the Holy Year to the young, to address them with one

language, as Christ did: rather than an abstractly theological

language, which would be considered dry and anachronistic, the

language of the Gospels should be used, which is what many

young people today are asking for, attracted as they are by Its

extreme simplicity, by its universality, by its profound human
contents.

Using this language, the message to be delivered should also

be profoundly human; for a “new” society, more just and more

fraternal, to be built through the goodwill of all. A message that

calls for the solidarity of each individual and of every group in a

concrete commitment on behalf of every human being and, in the
first place, on behalf of the poor, of those who are shut out, the

oppressed, those who live on the fringes of society. A message

which takes Into account the existing commitments of those who

are asked to participate and of the different conditions in which

they live In the various localities.

“The joys and the hopes"—they are the words of Gaudium
et Spes

—
“the sorrows and the anguish of men today, of the poor

above all and of all those who suffer, are also the joys and the
hopes, the sorrows and the anguish of the disciples of Christ, and

there is nothing genuinely human that does not find an echo in
their heart."

It is a question of putting into action the “new hurnanism" of
which Paul VI speaks.^ One must teach the young to love God,
so that they may love their fellowman, and to love their fellow-
man, so that they may learn to love God. In fact, the Apostle says:
“he who loves God should love his brother also," and “how can
he who does not love his brother whom he sees, love God, whom
he does not see?"^^ The love of God is the source of love for

45



mankind, and love for mankind is the sign and the expression of

an authentic love for God. Where there is love, there is God and
where God is, there is His Kingdom. But the Kingdom of God

must be prepared. His Kingdom is being prepared when young

people are trying to free themselves from evil, to obey their con-

science and to emerge from their mediocrity and their egoism;

above all, when they begin to assume their responsibilities toward

each other.

In this gradual approach to the full message of the Holy Year,

the specific responsibility of the Christian emerges with all its

irreplaceable force: he is “the witness” to the risen Christ, from

whom he derives a very special commitment towards his fellow-
men and towards their salvation. It is from the validity of this
testimony that the young may begin to understand the importance
for themselves of a more direct acquaintanceship with Him who
said of Himself: “/ am the Way, and the Truth, and the Life.’' They
need so much to know that Christ is the brother who makes sense
of their work, of their sufferings, of their aspirations and efforts

on behalf of their brothers.

“Do we want to be authentic followers of Christ—asks the
Holy Father—do we want to expand ourselves, through the
solidarity of our love, towards all our brothers far and near, or do

we prefer to close the circle of our social consciousness within
the limits of our own narrow interests, walled in by the bitterness
of our individual and collective egoism?.’’

b) The Church: the announcer of the message

The message of the Holy Year, expressed in a language which

is intelligible to the young, is proclaimed by the Church. She, in

her turn, must present them with her credentials. If the Church

repeated the question today asked by Christ of His Apostles, and

referred it to herself: “Who do you say I am?’’ what might their
answer be? The reply of the majority would be: “We don’t know
and we don’t care.” For many, the Church represents a problem,
an obstacle, even though their attitude often reflects their general

attitude towards every institution. Hence the need to show them

the real countenance of the Church, in a step by step presentation,

beginning with the Church open to the world not above nor facing

the world, but immersed in the world, in an attitude, not of

46



suspicion, but of esteem and love. A Church taking part in a

dialogue with all the people and all the organizations that are

sincerely concerned with the building of a society that is more

just and more respectful of the dignity and the liberty of man. A
Church actively engaged, together with all men of good-will, in a
continuous effort for the full recognition of the inalienable rights

of every person, without distinction, in every sector of human
activity.

The great social encyclicals, the journeys of Paul VI to the

United Nations, to New York and Geneva, to India, to the Holy
Land, to Australia, to Hong Kong, to the Philippines, to Colombia,
to Africa . . . are so many steps taken by the Church “expert in
humanity” towards the enlightenment and the transformation of

the world.

“The Church in the world is not an end in itself: it is at the

service of all the peoples ... it is the messenger of love, the
worker of peace": so Paul VI expressed himself during the Second

Vatican Council.

But the Church is not a mere social force leavening the mass;

she is the mystery of man’s communion in Christ with the Father;
it is in this essential quality of hers that she finds the force to

expand and leaven all that is human. This communion comes to
fruition in the local Churches, gathered in the Universal Church.

Seen in this light one can see the full dimensions of the mission

of the Bishops and of the Pope, called by Christ to serve their

brethren, and to be the symbol and the guardians of unity among
the faithful. The pilgrimage also acquires its full significance,

first to the cathedrals, where the Bishop is, and then, to Rome,

to the tomb of the Apostle Peter, where the Pope is: the pilgrim-
age, the culmination of the Holy Year.

This is the Church that the young must finally get to know, so

that the fruits of God’s grace may come to full maturity.

c) A presentation that takes into account a variety of different
situations

If the message of the Holy Year is one and the language used in

speaking to the youth should be the same one, nevertheless, in
presenting it, the diverse attitudes and varying needs of the young

47



people in the different nations and regions should be taken into

full account. One can speak today, in general, of a youth culture;
this is affected, however, by innumerable historical, geographical

and environmental circumstances. Every nation and every region

can be said to have a youth that is different, subdivided into

different social and cultural categories that, in their turn, affect

their perception of certain problems and their reaction to them.

In speaking of the Holy Year and in launching the projects

connected with it, attention must be paid to the plurality of these

situations and to the gradualness with which youth groups tend

to develop. The availability of young people, in relationship to

the call of Christ, varies from one individual to another and from

one group to another.

Being attentive to the different local situations also means
paying attention to the various youth movements that already

exist on the international and the local level, many of which
manifest the tendency of the young to overcome every kind of

discrimination. Before starting new enterprises, one should give

careful consideration to the existing ones, many of which have
great originality, precisely, because of the spontaneous way in

which they came into being. If the movements are valid ones, they

could be involved in the great program of the Holy Year.

'The Holy Year—said the Pope

—

is not intended to suspend,

or suffocate or upset the variety and richness of the authentic

movements already operating within the Church. The Holy Year

should rather infuse new energy into them, and include them, if
possible, in some way into its own general program. This involves,
in this case, their acceptance of a new and profound source of

inspiration, rather than their having to fit themselves into a

particular mould." i-

d) Encourage the enterprise of the young in planning their

Holy Year

Among the characteristic attitudes of the young today are their
rejection of authority viewed as an imposition, their urgent request

for responsibility, their just wish to participate in making the

decisions that concern them directly, their desire for recognition

and for an autonomous role in society. Whoever wishes to obtain

their cooperation in any project, must take into account their

48



mentality. It would prove negative to try and give them lists of

instructions and programs already worked out. They should be

encouraged to express themselves in their own way and to invent

their own programs, in harmony with the final objectives.

In this same spirit, every encouragement should be given to the
young people in the formulation of projects that are in keeping

with the purposes of the Holy Year. Special attention should be

given to group activity: it is here that the young have their best

chance to accomplish something worthwhile, as well as developing

a more Christian way of doing things together. This would be a

partial answer to their request for concrete responsibilities. It is

also in full accord with sound Christian pedagogy making them

more accustomed to reflection, to reasoning things out and to

accepting the “risks” of making decisions. Lastly, it would enrich

them with new experiences of life within the Church and it would

enrich the Church itself. All of which is in harmony with the

purpose of the Holy Year.

III.—THE CONSTITUENT ELEMENTS OF THE HOLY YEAR EX-
PRESSED IN YOUTHFUL TERMS

The risk of an undertaking of such remote historical roots as

the Holy Year is that of making it appear detached from the

realities of the present, anchored to the past and therefore in-

capable of any real impact on society today.

Hence the need to explain the constituent elements of the Holy
Year, using terms and expressions that do not cloud their real

significance. Some examples of how these traditional terms
might be translated into a “younger” language:

Holy Year might also be presented as a year of solidarity, of

communion, of hope, of justice, of liberation, of love, of trust, of
reconciliation, being careful, naturally, not to empty these ex-
pressions of their full Christian meaning.

Pilgrimage might be a joining together in a spirit of humility

and of poverty, in an attitude of humble searching. “A pilgrim-
age” would be meeting together to exchange experiences, to en-

gage in a dialogue, to understand each other, to express the joy

of walking along together, among themselves, with the Bishop,
with the Pope. “A pilgrimage” would be working together on a

49



common project and planning new ways for humanity. The jump
from this to the pilgrimages properly so-called would not be a

long one; these would become a search for closer communion

with the faithful of yesterday and a “march of faith” towards the

future.

Penance, so well illustrated in the parables of the prodigal son

and of the unfaithful servant, is renunciation, it is true, but it is,

above all, the sign of one’s conversion to God and to one’s

fellowman, of a “getting out” of oneself. In a gradual presentation,

penance would be a close examination of the march of mankind

and of the contribution that youth is making towards its progress;

a consciousness of human limitations, of the weaknesses, the
inconstancy and the lack of consistency of young people as well;

a recognition, on the part of each individual, of his fundamental

egoism, of the poverty of his personal contribution and of his

great responsibilities towards his brethren; the refusal of any

factious spirit in the group and of any intolerance. It would be a

turning towards the poor, the aged, the outcast, not in mere words,

but also in deeds and at the cost of personal sacrifice. It would be

an acceptance of authority, recognizing the role that authority

plays in society, and showing love and respect for those who exer-
cise it. It would be a complete availability on the part of each

individual to accept without reservations the message of Christ

and to apply it in its entirety to his own way of life. It would be

a change-over from the idea of a God far removed from the human
drama, to that of the biblical God, who places Himself at the head
of our march of liberation, of God the Father who loves us as His
sons, of Christ who saves us, of the Spirit who is love and com-
munion.

Indulgences, is one of the terms that are least attractive to

youth and that can easily be misunderstood, also because of

certain past simplifications. They might be presented, in a con-

tinuous crescendo, as a sense of comparticipation in the riches

of the community which are open to all, without exception; as the

acceptance of the love which others have for us and which saves

us from our own poverty and inadequacy; as spiritual solidarity

among men, united in one Saviour; as a willingness to enter into
the great circulation of values promoted by all those who have
lived their Christianity with greater authenticity; as a saving

insertion into the universe of Christ and of our brothers who

50



prolong the mystery of salvation; up to the recognition of the

fact that this vital interchange was entrusted by Christ to Peter

who through this communication promotes greater solidarity in
the whole Church.

IV.—HOLY YEAR: AN APPEAL FOR CONSISTENCY

The Holy Year, as presented by the Pope, presupposes that in

the hearts of men there is a desire for peace and for a greater
closeness to their brothers. The invitation to make a personal
examination of conscience, and to measure one's own availa-

bility for a program of renewal and of reconciliation, is its logical

consequence and may be accepted by any person of goodwill.

The Holy Father believes that two classes of people should take

a particular interest in what he calls the “catholic realism’’ of the

Holy Year: ''those who have chosen Christ, in one way or another,
as their Master of life,’’ and the young: "they are the first to speak

to us of authenticity."

"How can one announce Christ our Lord—^the Pope asks him-
self

—

to the young, who are the most likely to understand him and
to follow him, who are tired and almost nauseated by the
formulae that modern life, so overburdened, so rich, so opulent,

has poured out on them? ... In this vision filled with protest
they can find the stimulus to live in poverty and to search for the

truth. The young people today want to be authentic; they want

to be what they are and what they should be."

If the young demand coherency. If they rightly condemn
Pharisaism and hypocrisy, if they esteem people who are con-
sistent, the Holy Year, In its turn, can rightly ask them to show
coherency and sincerity of purpose. For those who claim to be
Christians, this call for coherency will naturally have even more
peremptory tones.

"The time has come—says the Pope

—

to measure our fidelity
to Christ, in the conflict which it endures, with our acceptance

of a way of thinking and of acting that ignores his Gospel and his
way of salvation ... Do we really want to be authentic followers
of Christ, or merely names on the list of those who have been
baptized and therefore easily Pharasaical and accused by the very

51



principles and by the obligations that we ourselves claim to
recognize?’'

There have been many youth movements in recent times that
have borne the name of Christ. Young people have been deeply
attracted for many reasons, some authentic and others less so,
to the figure of Christ. On the occasion of the Holy Year, one
must be ready to give an answer to the many burning questions
that the young people will ask. One answer is also the proposal
of an ideal: the imitation of Christ, without any reservations.

One must show Christ as living among the people of today,
freeing them from falsehood so that they may live in authenticity
of purpose; freeing them from egoism, so that they may give them-
selves more completely to all mankind, while still preferring those

for whom Christ himself showed a special preference: the poor;
freeing them from loneliness, by calling them near Mary to the
warmth of a community; freeing them from fear, by giving back

to each one his true human dignity.

‘’When my thoughts reach this conclusion—they are the words
of Paul VI

—

there come to my mind, I do not know by what asso-
ciation of ideas, the words of Christ in the Gospel, so simple and

so powerful, when he calls on his disciples to follow him: ‘Come
after me!’, and Peter in particular: ‘Follow me!’, and when he

calls on all the miserable ones of the earth: ‘Come to me, all you

who labor and are burdened’. The call of Christ resounds in the
depths of the soul, with all its sweetness and all its vehemence, at

the very moment when our present position, static, perhaps, and
lazy, is faced with the mysterious and fascinating ocean of the

contemporary world; it resounds as an alternative, at one and the

same time free and imperious, between the Gospel and the con-
fused culture that is at our disposal, between Christ and the

world; chose, come!.”

These words are addressed to everyone, but they have a special

significance for the young: it is they, more than the rest, who

must face “the mysterious and fascinating ocean of the con-

temporary world”; it is they who feel deep within them an an-

guished fear of the future.

"... come to me, Christ invites us, not so as to leave and dis-
qualify the world—the Pope continues

—

but to give the world its

52



true value, recognizing that it is indeed splendid but also equivocal

and, in the end, disappointing; come to me, Christ says to us, to
serve and save the world, to love it as I, Christ, loved it giving my
life for its salvation."

The young feel the need, perhaps unconsciously, for a guide.

This is revealed by their search for authentic “models." It is the

responsibility of those who must present the Holy Year to the
young, to facilitate their encounter with Christ, so that they, too,

may be able to say: "We have met him, we have listened to him;
we have felt the fascination of his teaching, we have accepted the
gift of his mysterious words, we have lifted ourselves up so as to

be united with him and to be able to say with St. Paul: 'It is now
no longer I that live, but Christ lives in me’."

Maximilian Card, de Furstenberg

President

Mgr. Antonio Mazza

Secretary

1 Discourse of Paul VI: June 22, 1973.
2 Discourse of Paul VI: July 11, 1973.
3 Discourse of Paul VI: June 22, 1973.
4 Discourse of Paul VI: June 20, 1973.
5 Discourse of Paul VI: May 9, 1973.
6 Ibid.

7 Discourse of Paul VI: July 4, 1973.
8 Discourse of Paul VI: July 11, 1973.
9 Populorum Progressio: 20.
10

I Ep. John: 4, 20-21.
11 Discourse of Paul VI: May 16, 1973.
12 Discourse of Paul VI: June 20, 1973.
13 Discourse of Paul VI: July 11, 1973.
14 Discourse of Paul VI: Nov. 10, 1973.
15 Discourse of Paul VI: May 16, 1973.
16 Discourse of Paul VI: July 11, 1973.
17 Ibid.
18 Discourse of Paul VI: Nov. 10, 1973.

53



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IV i|



Paul VI Announces Holy Year
for 1975

AN OCCASION FOR INTERIOR
RENEWAL AND RECONCILIATION

General Audience, May 9, 1973

Today there is something we would like to tell you, something

which we believe is important for the spiritual life of the Church.

It Is this: after having prayed and meditated, we have decided to

celebrate in 1975 a Holy Year, when the Interval of twenty-five

years fixed by our predecessor Paul II in the Papal Bull Ineffabilis

Providentia of April 17, 1470 will have expired. The Holy Year,

which in canonical language is known as the “Jubilee," meant in

the biblical tradition of the Old Testament a year of special public

observance, with abstention from normal work, a return to the orig-

inal distribution of land, the cancellation of existing debts and the

freeing of Hebrew slaves (cf. Lev. 25:8 ff.). In the history of the

Church, as you know, the Jubilee was instituted by Boniface VIII

in the year 1300, for a purely spiritual purpose. It consisted in

making a penitential pilgrimage to the tombs of the Apostles Peter
and Paul. Dante was among those who took part in it and he gives
a description of the crowds thronging the city of Rome (cf. Inferno
18, 28-23). Later, in 1500, there was added to the Jubilee the
opening of the Holy Doors of the Basilicas which were to be visited.

This was intended not only to facilitate the influx of penitents but
also to symbolize easier access to divine mercy through the gaining
of the jubilee indulgence.

In line with the Council

We have asked ourself if such a tradition should be continued in
our times, which are so different from times gone by and so con-
ditioned both by the style of religion given to ecclesial life by the

recent Council and by the practical lack of interest of many parts of
the modern world in the ritual expression of other centuries. We

55



have immediately however been convinced that the celebration of

the Holy Year not only can be consistently fitted in with the spiritual

line adopted by the Council itself—which it is our responsibility to
develop faithfully—but also can very well be harmonized with and
contribute to the tireless and loving efforts being made by the
Church to meet the moral needs of our time, to interpret its deepest

aspirations and to accept honestly certain forms of its preferred

external manifestations.

Essential concept of Holy Year

in view of the variety of purposes it is necessary to stress what is

the essential concept of the Holy Year. It is the interior renewal of

man: of the man who thinks and who in his thought has lost the
certainty of truth; of the man who works and who in his work has
realized that he is so extroverted that he no longer fully possesses

communication with himself; of the man who enjoys life and who so
assumes himself and has so many exciting ways to gain pleasurable
experience that he soon feels bored and disillusioned. Man must
be renewed from within. This is what the Gospel calls conversion,

penance and a change of heart. It is the process of selfrebirth. It

is simple, like a clear and courageous act of conscience and at the

same time complex, like a long, instructive and reforming appren-
ticeship. It is also a moment of grace, and one usually does not
obtain grace without bowing one’s head. And we do not think we
err in detecting in modern man profound dissatisfaction, satiety
coupled with insufficiency, unhappiness produced by false formulas

for happiness, with which he is intoxicated, and dismay at not

knowing how to enjoy the thousand and one pleasures that civiliza-

tion offers him in abundance. In other words, man needs an inte-
rior renewal such as that hoped for by the Council.

Now the Holy Year is oriented precisely to this personal and inte-
rior renewal, which under certain aspects is also exterior. It is an

easy and at the same time extraordinary therapy which should
bring spiritual well-being to every conscience and indirectly, at

least to some extent, to the attitude of society. This is the general
theme of the next Holy Year, which is also centered upon another

special theme that is oriented to practical living: reconciliation.

56



Reconciliation

The term “reconciliation” evokes the opposite concept of a

break. What break would we have to mend in order to reach that

reconciliation which is the condition for the desired renewal of the

jubilee? What break? But it is not perhaps enough to use this word

reconciliation, which involves a whole program, to realize that

our life is disturbed by too many breaks, too much disharmony, too
much disorder to be able to enjoy the gifts of personal and collec-
tive life according to their ideal finality? We need above all to
reestablish a genuine, vital and happy relationship with God, to be

reconciled with him in humility and love, so that from this first

basic harmony the whole world of our experience may express a
need and acquire a virtue of reconciliation in charity and justice

with men, to whom we immediately give the new title of “brothers.”
Moreover, reconciliation takes place in other vast and very real

areas: within the ecclesial community itself, in society, in the rela-

tions among nations, in ecumenism, in the sphere of peace and so
forth. If God permits us to celebrate the Holy Year, it will have

many things to tell us in this regard.

Local churches first

Let us now limit ourselves to pointing out an important aspect
of the structure of the next Holy Year. According to the centuries-

old custom, the Holy Year has its focal point in Rome. And it will

still be so, but with this innovation. The conditions prescribed for

acquiring special spiritual benefits will this time be anticipated and

granted to the local Churches, so that the whole Church spread

throughout the world may immediately be able to profit from this
great occasion of renewal and reconciliation. In this way the whole
Church will be better able to prepare for the climax and conclusion

of the Holy Year, which will be celebrated In Rome in the year 1975,
and which will give to the traditional pilgrimage to the tombs of the
Apostles its traditional meaning for those who are able and wish to
make the pilgrimage. And this important and salutary spiritual
and penitential movement, which involves the entire Church and
which will be accompanied by the granting of special indulgences,
will begin on the coming feast of Pentecost, June 10. On former
occasions, the extension of the Holy Year came after its celebration

57



II

in Rome; now this extension will precede the celebration. Everyone
can see how this innovation also includes an intention of honoring
with more evident and effective communion the local Churches
which are living members of the one universal Church of Christ.

This will suffice for the present. But by the grace of God we shall
have many other things to say on this matter. May our Apostolic
Blessing be with all of you.

58



Renewal and reconciliation

Paul VI stresses significance of Pentecost

as opening of Holy Year in local churches

General audience, June 6, 1973

As you know, Sunday next, June 10, is the feast of Pentecost, the

feast that commemorates and aims at renewing the descent of the

Holy Spirit, the animator, sanctifier, unifier of the Church, the

Mystical Body of Christ. And as you likewise know, this forthcom-

ing solemnity will mark the beginning, in the local churches, that

is, in the ecclesial communities each presided over by its own Bishop,

of that religious event, or rather that spiritual movement which we

call “Holy Year,” followed by the celebration proper in the third

quarter of our century, in 1975. You will hear more about it again,

a great deal, everywhere. Prepare to understand it, to live it; and

specifically in its general purpose. They are a renewal of Christian

life, such as is demanded and must be possible in the deep and
stormy process of the metamorphosis of our times, and a recon-

ciliation of minds and things, at which we think we must aim if we
wish to reconstitute in us and outside us that superior order, that

“kingdom of God,” on which the present and future destinies of

humanity depend. Renewal and reconciliation: it seems to us that

these must be the logical and general consequences, in the history

of the Church and of mankind, of the Council, springing like a river

of salvation and civilization from its generating source.

Why from Pentecost?

Why does this fact start from Pentecost? Not only because this
beautiful feast, which we can define as the historical birth of the
Church, offers a propitious, inspiring occasion, but above all be-

cause we hope, we beseech that the Holy Spirit, whose mysterious
and sensible mission we celebrate at Pentecost, will be the princ-
cipal Operator of the fruits desired from the Holy Year. This, too,

will be one of the most important and fruitful themes of spirituality
proper to the Holy Year: the Christology and particularly the Eccle-

59



siology of the Council must be succeeded by a new study and a new

cult of the Holy Spirit, precisely as the indispensable complement

of the teaching of the Council. Let us hope that the Lord will help

us to be disciples and teachers of this successive school of his:

Jesus, leaving the visible scene of this world, left two factors to

carry out his work of salvation in the world; his Apostles and his

Spirit (cf. Congar, Esquisses du mystere de I’Eglise, p. 129, ff.).

We do not wish to enter this magnificent theological field now.
For the elementary purposes of this brief preparatory sermon it is

enough for us to point out, in the first place, that the action of the

Spirit, in the ordinary economy of the divine plan, is carried out in

our spirits in respect for our freedom, in fact, with our very cooper-

ation, if only as the condition of divine action in us. We must at
least open the window to the entrance of the breath and the light of

the Spirit.

Let us say a word about this opening, this availability of ours to

the mysterious action of the Spirit. Let us ask ourselves what the

psychological and moral states of our souls must be, in order that

they may receive the “dulcis Hospes animae.” This would be
enough to weave interminable treatises of spiritual, ascetic and mys-

tical life. Let us now reduce these states to two only, at least for

the sake of being easily remembered, making them correspond to

the field preferred by the action of the Paraclete, that is, the Holy

Spirit who becomes our assistant, consoler, advocate.

Man’s consent required

The first field is man's “heart.” It is true that the action of

grace may leave out of consideration the subjective correspondence
of the one who receives it (a child, for example, a sick person, a
dying man), but normally man's conscience must be in a state of

consent, at least immediately after the impulse of the supernatural

action of grace. The Holy Spirit has his favorite cell in the human
being, the heart (cf. Rom. 5, 5). It would take too long to explain

what the word “heart” means in biblical language. Let us be con-
tent now to describe the heart as the intimate center, free, deep,

personal, of our spiritual life. Anyone who does not have a spiritual
life of his own lacks the ordinary capacity to receive the Holy Spirit,

to listen to his soft, sweet voice, to experience his inspirations, to

enjoy his charisms. The diagnosis of modern man leads us to see

60



in him an extroverted being, who lives a great deal outside himself

and little in himself, like an instrument that is more receptive to the

language of the senses, and less to that of thought and conscience.

The practical conclusion at once exhorts us to praise of silence, not

of unconscious, idle and mute silence, but the silence that subdues

noises and exterior clamor and which is able to listen; to listen in

depth to the voices, the sincere voices, of conscience and to those

springing up in the concentration of prayer, to the ineffable voices

of contemplation. This is the first field of action of the Holy Spirit.

It will be well for us to remember it.

Flight from true communion of ecclesial charity

And what is the other? The other is “communio," that is, the

society of brothers united by faith and charity in one divine-human

organism, the mystical Body of Christ. It is the Church. It is ad-

herence to that mystical Body, animated by the Holy Spirit, who
has, in the community of the faithful, hierarchically united, authen-

tically assembled in the name and the authority of the Apostles, his
Pentecostal upper room. So we might well consider whether certain
ways of seeking the Spirit, which prefer to isolate themselves in

order to escape both from the directive ministry of the Church and

from the impersonal crowd of unknown brethren, are on the right
path. What Spirit could a selfish communion meet, one that
arises from a flight from the true communion of ecclesial charity?
What experiences, what charisms could make up for the absence of
unity, the supreme encounter with God?

And so the program of the Holy Year, inaugurated on the feast
of the Holy Spirit, is at once placed on the way of spiritual life,
where He, the Gift of Love, inhabits and awakens and forms and

sanctifies our individual personality; and the way of the society of
the “saints,'’ that is, the Church of the faithful, where salvation is

a continual rejoicing, for everyone.

May our Apostolic Blessing, Sons and Brothers, direct you and
follow you along the right way.

61



Address of Paul VI to the
Central Committee for the

Holy Year

On June 7, 1973, the Holy Father received the members of the
Central Committee for the Holy Year. His Holiness delivered the

following address.

We extend our cordial and respectful greeting to you—Lord
Cardinal, Venerable Brothers and beloved Sons—who make up the
Central Committee for the Holy Year. We ourself recently set it up,
calling you to be part of it, on the same day on which we made to
the Church and to the world the happy announcement of the Jubilee

that will be celebrated in Rome in 1975, as the crowning part of a
whole vast movement of spiritual renewal which will begin in the
local Churches next Sunday, the feast of Pentecost.

This desired and welcome meeting, which coincides with your
first plenary meeting, is of great comfort to us since we see in you

—coming from various countries, belonging to numerous nations,
and representatives of all the sectors of the People of God—

a

promise and a guarantee of success for the important initiative that

is so close to our heart.

Spiritual purposes

Faithful to the fundamental lines and to the orientations that we

have already had the opportunity to set forth and give in not a few

circumstances, and to which, God willing, we will return; animated

by a spirit of Initiative to put these indications duly into practice

and promote their enlightened and welcome reception everywhere,

in an attitude of generous, complete availability and brotherly serv-

ice to the local Churches and to the respective Committees for the

Holy Year, news of the constitution of which is reaching us, to our

consolation; far-sighted and industrious in taking care in a worthy

way of the many and complex organizational aspects, particularly
with a view to the pious pilgrimages that will bring innumerable

62



faithful to Rome, you are called to carry out a necessary and irre-

placeable function, in keeping with the very nature of the Church

which is also a visible and organic society and therefore requires

adequate instruments.

But, like all Church organisms, your Committee also is in the

service of higher aims. Therefore allow us to stress the exclusively

spiritual purposes of the Holy Year and of the whole movement

connected with it and which is now starting; its unmistakable char-

acter as a spiritual, penitential, religious, socio-charitable event

connected with worship; as an extraordinary occasion of grace, re-

newal of morals, reconciliation with God and with our brothers, in a

word, of holiness, as the very name Holy Year emphasizes.

Pressing needs

These are exciting ideals, pressing urgencies: a great and noble

cause, which urges and encourages you to work with commitment

and a spirit of faith, and which induces you to sustain and give

efficacy to your responsibility with prayer. From 1300 every Holy

Year has always been a highly significant moment, a particularly

important stage in the history of the Church, of her spirituality, her

beneficial influence on civil society itself. The validity of the

one we are preparing to celebrate is proved by centuries-old experi-
ence and at the same time revived and strengthened by the salu-
tary aggiornamento promoted by Vatican II. You can easily find the

mark of this aggiornamento in the fresh approach we have given to
the unfolding of this extraordinary new moment of grace for the
whole Church.

Continue, therefore, with Christian serenity and trus.t, with the

fulfillment of the ecclesial mission that has been entrusted to you;

and let the Apostolic Blessing which we paternally impart to you,
invoking all divine assistance on your persons and your work,

accompany you, with our gratitude.

63



Personal, interior aspect of the
Holy Year Movement
General audience, June 20, 1973

Let us speak again of the Holy Year, which began in the local

Churches on the feast of Pentecost. We will speak of it again be-
cause we would like to see, round this “Holy Year” formula, as we

have already said, not only the fulfillment, but the development of a

historic moment in the spiritual life of the Church, not just an
event, but a religious movement. This conception seems to us, in

the first place, in conformity with the motive of this celebration:

renewal and reconciliation, aimed at stamping a permanent and

general renewal on the religious and moral conscience of our times,

inside and, if possible, outside the Catholic Church.

In the second place, this view of the Holy Year, it seems to us,
intends to reflect in the reality of thought and morals the great plan

of the Council, and prevent its salutary teaching from being rele-

gated to the archives as voices of the past, but rather that they

should operate in a masterly way in the actual life of the present

and the future generation. It must be a school that becomes life.

Call for new inspiration

In the third place, we wish to give importance and extension to
this extraordinary religious expression, which we call the Holy Year,
because the historical and social circumstances of our times are so

heavy and overpowering with regard to our faith and its consequent

existential logic that a necessity of seriousness, incisiveness and

strength must, it seems to us, sustain the “movement” of the Holy
Year right from the beginning. Either it will win recognition as a

general, serious and united effort, and therefore a really renewing

one, or it will at once be extinguished and exhausted as a sterile

attempt, good and meritorious perhaps, but in practice shortlived

and ineffective.

At this point some preliminary observations arise, which it is
well to keep in mind right now. The doubt, or rather the fear, may

64



arise in some people that the Holy Year movement will oppose so
many other spiritual and pastoral movements, the programs of
which are already tested by long and clear experience, or already

approved by the authority of the Church, or recognized as legiti-

mate and free expressions of the vitality of the People of God. No,

we answer: the Holy Year does not Intend to suspend, choke and

sweep away the variety and riches of the authentic manifestations

already going on in the ecclesial world. The Holy Year would rather

imbue them with new energy, and at the most, if possible, connect

them in some way with its own general program, which calls in
this case rather for the acceptance of a deep, new inspiration than

for a specific and concrete adherence to precise particular frame-

works.

Not triumphalism

Others may think that it is desired to celebrate the Holy Year in
a triumphalistic style, with trumpetings and overwhelming exterior

events, giving the exterior aspect of the movement derived from it
an importance greater than other aspects of religious and Catholic

life, for which, however, it is necessary to claim an importance that

cannot be renounced, perhaps even a superior importance. On this
point, which can constitute a strong objection to the celebration of

the Holy Year, we wish to invite the good to a twofold reflection.
It is, indeed possible, please God, that the Holy Year will have the

support of the people, flocking crowds, the spectacular appearance

of multitudes. It is an ecclesial, universal fact; that some moments
it reflects the catholic character of vocation to the Gospel. It is

humanity, in its immense extension, that we make the object of our
invitation and our interest; also and above all on this occasion we
wish to give to the heart of the Church the dimensions of the world!

Should we protest, then, if the phenomenon takes on exceptional
quantitative forms and proportions? Is it not the mystery of the

unity of the multiplicity of her univocal and expanded riches? We
will all enjoy it, if the Lord bestows on us the grace of seeing “the

spaces of charity” so widened (cf. St. Augustine, Sermo 69; PL. 38,
440-441).

But, in the second place, let us say at once that this spectacular,

and perhaps touristic result, is not specifically the aim of the Holy
Year. If a purpose of universal communion cannot but exist in the
intentions of an affirmation that concerns the whole Church in her

65



essential properties of unity and catholicity, it is not, however, the

primary one as effect in time, nor as a value in itself, because it

presupposes and demands the attainment of another prior aim: the
conversion of hearts, the interior renewal of spirits, the personal

adherence of consciences. First the individual, conscious and

aware, then the crowd.

Interior conversion

We would like this first purpose of the Holy Year to be given
supreme importance. We must aim first and foremost at an interior
renewal, a conversion of personal sentiments, liberation from con-

ventional imitation of others, revision of our outlook, deploring,

more than anything else, our shortcomings before God, and to-

wards the society of men our brothers, and with regard to the con-
cept that everyone must have of himself, as a son of God, as a

Christian, as a member of the Church. It is a new philosophy of
life, if we may say so, that must be formed in every member of the
Mystical Body of Christ; everyone of us is invited to rectify his way

of thinking, feeling and acting with regard to the ideal model of the

follower of Christ, while being a loyal and hard-working citizen of

contemporary civil society.

This great conception of the Holy Year: to give Christian life an

authentic expression, consistent, interior, full, capable of “renew-

ing the face of the earth” in the Spirit of Christ, must be clearly

present in our minds, with one very important immediate conse-

quence: the accomplishment of this project begins at once, and

takes place in the personal conscience of each of us. We would
like this personal and interior aspect of the great spiritual enter-

prise, now begun, to head all programs. Each one of us must feel

called upon to work out on himself, in himself, the religious,

psychological, moral and operative renewal which the Holy Year

aims at achieving.

Personal examination

With this first practical consequence: we must all verify, or carry
out the introspective examination about the main line of our life,

that is, about the free and responsible choice of our own vocation,
our own mission, our own definition, as a man and as a Christian.
A vital examination!

66



And a second consequence, far easier, but far more insistent:

it is necessary to resume the practice of good, of honesty, seeking

what is better in little things, that is, in the sequence of our ordi-

nary actions, where our defects lie in wait for us at every moment,

sometimes disastrously; and where, on the contrary, integrity of

action can be easily perfected, if we remember the teaching of the
Lord Jesus: “He who is faithful in a very little is faithful
also in much" (Lk. 16, 10). This is something to begin with imme-
diately, for everyone, with our Apostolic Blessing.

67



To Restore Christian Love

General audience, October 17, 1973

Beloved sons and daugthers,

As we have already said many times, we are now preparing for
the Holy Year and in that preparation there are two theme-words

which we repeat continually: renewal and reconciliation. In the

first word, renewal we can see, as it were, all the effort, all the
spiritual, moral and social fruit which each one individually and the

Church as a whole hope to obtain for themselves subjectively; in the

second, reconciliation, there seems to be the foreshadowing of a
more objective action or rather of a relationship which goes beyond
the personal or collective boundaries of our own interior life and
refer to the exterior conditions in which we live and by which we are
surrounded. The terms are, in any case, clear to all: we must renew
ourselves within and outside we must bring peace. Within and
without. This division is simplistic and must be integrated into

real life.

Let us see on this occasion, for example, what we mean by the
second theme-word, reconciliation. What is its significance? To
whom and to what does it refer?

Becoming aware

Let us note at once that it presupposes a breaking away which

we must remedy and repair. It presupposes disorder, contrast,
enmity, separation, loneliness, a break in the harmony of a design

which requires integrity and perfection and which corrects and

overcomes our selfish isolation and restores in and around us the

circulation of love. Are we aware of the need for such a reconcilia-
tion? This is most important. It represents something quite new in

the field of human awareness. Firstly, in man’s awareness of him-
self; is he not more fully and truly man if, in his own awareness of
himself he perceives, together with his own tyrannical selfishness,
also his own narrow existence, his own selfcenteredness, his own

68



isolation, his inadequacy. Secondly, in the realm of social aware-

ness: the need for others is engraved in our very being. No man is
sufficient unto himself. How then is each one to integrate himself
in his relationship with others? Is this relationship to be one of

conflict or is it to be orderly?

Lastly, and most important, is the field of religious awareness.

Here we have the apex of our consciousness of our own position in

the world of Being and of the destiny in store for each one of us.

Let us reflect carefully then and let us realize that we need recon-
ciliation on these three fronts, the solipsistic, the social and the

religious. We ourselves are not surrounded by perfect order. From
all sides we receive the sting of deficiency, of reproach, of remorse,
of danger. A psychological analysis would bring us too far afield.

Let us, for the moment, be content to dwell briefly on the three

aspects (the three fronts, as we said before) already mentioned of

our awareness of the need for reconciliation.

The law of love

The first, then, is our inner restlessness which arises from our

awareness that although we are living we are inadequate, insuffi-
cient in ourselves, full of energies and deficiencies, tormented by

our own insatiable selfishness. And yet this very selfishness is, at

one and the same time, a proof of our right to life and of our sub-
jective poverty. Where and how can we find peace, integration,
balance, the fullness of our personality? The answer is at hand.

Our inner peace is to be found in love. Thus the further question

arises: which love? We will not answer this question immediately.
We will say only that in order to be happy it is necessary to learn
“the art of loving.” It Is an art in which nature herself will be our

teacher if only we listen to her and interpret her according to the
sovereign law of love as taught by Christ and apply it with all the

detail and vigor which is implied by such a law; love God, love your

neighbor.

If we were to learn really how to love as we ought would not our
own personal and collective lives be transformed to peace and
happiness? The Holy Year will also have to include in its program
this fundamental aim: love, to restore love; real, pure, strong,

Christian love.

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The painful reality of war

And what are we to say about social reconciliation? 0 what a
chapter that would be! At least a thousand pages! Let us say

merely that reconciliation, that is, peace, becomes daily a more

pressing need, an increasing need. Did not all of us hope that after

the last World War a lasting peace would finally be achieved? Did
not the whole world make truly gigantic efforts to give peace in the
development of civilization? Thus peoples would feel secure and

nations would practice brotherhood among themselves. The terri-
ble and fearsome experience of recent years, however, makes us

realize one dreadful fact: war is still possible, it is always possible.

The production and sale of armaments shows us that it is even

easier and more disastrous than ever. Even today we are experi-

encing a painful event of war, and it is not the only one. We feel
humiliated and frightened. Is it possible that this is an incurable

disease of humanity?

Here we should note the congenital disproportion in humanity
between its capacity for setting ideals and its moral aptitude to

remaining faithful to its programs for civil progress. One is

tempted to say: It is impossible for the world to remain peaceful

Our reply is: no! Christ, our Peace (Eph. 2, 14) makes possible the

impossible (Cfr. Luke 18, 27). If we follow his Gospel the union
between justice and peace becomes a reality; not, of course, be-

coming crystalized and immobile but, on the contrary, in the con-

text of a history that is in a state of continual development; this can

be done! peace can be reborn!

At all levels

This, then, is our program for the Holy Year, reconciliation at all

levels; family, community, national, ecclesial, ecumenical. And at

the social level also! Is it not possible to conceive a human society
which, although there may be diverse and contrasting differences,
is based on an organic and just cooperation and therefore on

human and Christian peace for all those who share in it? Is this no
more than a dream? Is it mere folly? It is precisely on this point

that our thinking is original. We believe that political eschatology,
moral parousia, is a Christian duty, whatever may be the degree of
its practical realization in the contingent circumstances of history.

Love, justice, peace, are good and living ideals. They are the

energy for social development and we must not exchange them for

70



hatred and violence as a means for achieving that real peace which

is expressed in the wisdom and goodness of Christ's words: ''you

are all brothers” (Mt. 23, 8).

The primary task of the Holy Year

There we have another immense task for the Holy Year. Doubt-
less there will be a preference to be given to the third pacification,

the religious peace-making which in fact comes first of all. By this
we mean the reinstatement of each one of us, of the whole Church,
and, God willing, of the world, in a state of relationship and grace

with our heavenly Father. This is the first task of the Holy Year and

must not be omitted; the re-establishment of peace between our-

selves and God which we can only experience by meditating upon
and living up to the incomparable word of reconciliation which was

so dear to St. Paul. This, however, would be a lecture in itself and

so, for the present, we shall be content to entrust it to your memory
for the coming Holy Year: Reconciliation with God, (Cfr. II Cor. 5,
20).

With our Apostolic Blessing.

71



Reconciliation with God:
Primary Aim of Holy Year

General audience, October 31, 1973

The great spiritual event called the Holy Year which has been

announced to the world is beginning to assume enormous propor-

tions. We feel obligated to offer a definition of it and yet we cannot
do so in mere terms of the calendar. The significance which this

religious and historical event must assume is both deep and com-

plex. This is so not only because of the concept of repentance and

indulgence derived from its centuries-old tradition but also owing

to the fact that in the coming Holy Year we can see a living reflec-
tion of the doctrine enunciated by the recent Council. Moreover,

through the multiple aspects of those two themes, renewal and

reconciliation, we can try to make the immense treasury of the
Council’s teachings more accessible to both reflection and action.

We are afraid of repeating ourself, but that cannot but stimulate the
discovery of the ever new and fruitful themes deriving from the

program proposed.

We have merely mentioned reconciliation, for example, recon-
ciliation with our conscience, and with our neighbor; we have not
yet considered the main aspect of this fundamental chapter, which

is reconciliation with God. The Holy Year aims first and foremost

at reconciling men with God, us believers in the first place, and
then as many men as can be induced to this salvific and beatifying
meeting.

It will do us good to recall a striking and synthetic text of St.

Paul. “If any one is in Christ (that is, a real Christian), he is a new

creation: the old has passed away, behold, the new has come. All

this is from God, who through Christ reconciled us to himself and
gave us the ministry of reconciliation; that is, God was in Christ

reconciling the world to himself, not counting their trespasses

against them, and entrusting to us the message of reconciliation.

So we (apostles) are ambassadors for Christ. God making his
appeal through us. We beseech you on behalf of Christ, be recon-
ciled to God” (II Cor. 5, 17-20).

72



The complete synthesis

In these words, which the Apostle repeats in other similar ones

(cf. Rom. 5, 10), the whole conception of our moral life is under-

stood, and the whole doctrinal synthesis of redemption and salva-

tion is expressed.

That is, our human existence is born, lives, unfolds itself and
wanes in an existential and moral relationship with God. Here is

all the wisdom of life, here the philosophy of truth, here the theol-

ogy of our destiny. We are born creatures of God; we are depend-
ent on Him ontologically; and, whether we like it or not, we are
answerable to Him. We are made in this way. Intelligence, will-
power, freedom, heart, love and sorrow, time and work, human and
social relations, life, in short, has a derivation determined in vari-

ous ways, and has a purpose, also defined in various ways, in rela-

tion to God. Man cannot be adequately conceived without this
essential reference to God. However mysterious and transcendent,

and therefore ineffable, God the eternal principle of the universe
may be. He looms over us, knows us, observes us, penetrates us,
preserves us continually; He is the Father of our life. We can ignore
Him, forget Him, refuse to recognize Him, deny Him and disown
Him: He exists. He is alive. He is real. “In him we live and move
and have our being,” as St. Paul affirms at the Areopagus in Athens

(Acts 17, 28).

Strong opposition

This “Weltanschauung,” this conception of the world, is cer-

tainly strongly opposed today. People do not want to admit the
existence of God, they prefer to outrage their own reason with the
absurd aphorism of the “death of God,” rather than train their

minds to seek and experience divine light. Atheism seems to be
triumphant. Religion has no longer any reason for existing? Sin
does not exist? . . . Oh! we are saturated with these ideologies. But
we are always convinced, by the grace of God, that God exists, like
the sun; and that everything comes to us from Him and goes from
us to Him. And you who are listening to us, wise and believing
sons, you are certainly equally persuaded, with us, of this.

We understand then how urgent, modern and strategic the ad-
vent of this Holy Year is. It must confirm for us, within and without,
the sovereign existence of God, and the economy of God, that is

73



the plan—a plan of infinite Love—established by Him, to make us
attentive disciples, faithful servants, but above all, happy sons.

We all feel, some in one way, others in another, that our corre-
spondence with this plan, with this plan of natural and supernatural

relations, has been, and still is, imperfect. Perhaps it has been

hostile and faithless. We feel we are sinners.

Ungrateful sons

Here another immense page, a dramatic, painful and humiliating
one, that of our sin, opens up before us. We have broken the duti-
ful and vital relations that sustained us in God. We have never
equalled with the completeness of our response, with the totality of

our love, the Love that God offers us. We are ungrateful, we are
debtors! In fact we would be lost If Christ had not come to save us.
And so? So now there is the pressing necessity to become recon-
ciled with God “reconciliamini Deo!'’

And here is the amazing good fortune! Reconciliation is possi-

ble! This is the announcement that the Holy Year echoes In the

world and in our conscience: it is possible! May this announcement
reach the bottom of our hearts!

With our Apostolic Blessing.

74



Holy Year inspires personal
renewal, heart searching

General audience, November 7, 1973

The themes proposed by the Holy Year program for an authentic

implementation of Christianity, that is renewal and pacification,

involve many moral and spiritual problems concerning the prepara-

tion of the acts and the activity that their sincere and effective

observance seems to demand.

This coming Holy Year should be characterized by the serious-

ness of its celebration, both individual and collective: a seriousness

all the more necessary, the more superficial the usual course of the

common experience of our life today. The trend of the latter is
that everything Is easy, everything is momentary, everything is

exterior. The psychology of the cinema. We are trying, on the con-
trary, to arrive at strong, constant, interior moments of the spirit.
There is an extremely common word, which expresses very well
this programmatic aspiration of ours; namely, we wish to reach the
heart of the matter.

What then is the heart? Our question is posed in the religious
and moral perspective, which is extended to the psychological and

Ideal one. What is the meaning of this term so much in use?

- God sees the heart

We are tempted to adopt the definition of St. Augustine, which
identifies the meaning of the word heart with the ego: . . cor
meum, ubi ego sum quicumque sum” (Conf. X, 3; P.L. 32, 781).
And we are confirmed in choosing this pregnant sense, Indicative of
the sentimental, intellectual and particularly the operative person-
ality of man, by biblical language, which prescinds from the purely
physiological significance of this organ to indicate what is living,
genetic, operating, moral, responsible and spiritual in man. The
heart Is the interior cell of human psychology; it is the source of
man’s instincts, thoughts, and above all, his actions. Of what is

75



good and what is bad, let us recall the words of Jesus the Master:

“For out of the heart come evil thoughts, murder, adultery, fornica-
tion, theft, false witness, slander. These are what defile a man”
(Mt. 15, 19-20).

What a sad introspection! And what makes it grave is the warn-

ing in the Bible that God sees clearly our heart, this secret hiding-

place of our moral reality. “Man looks on the outward appear-
ance,” Holy Scripture says, “but the Lord looks on the heart” (1

Kings 16-7); he searches our mind (Jer. 17, 10).

We could bring forward many other striking quotations about the
penetration of God’s judging eye into the most secret recess of our

hearts; but now we are anxious to observe how God’s judgment is
passed on this inner life of ours, thus thrown open. Christ has no

time for hypocrisy, make-believe virtue, formal and lying justice.

The Gospel is full of the Lord’s expressions of intolerance for a

pseudo-observance of religion, unconnected with the truth of the

good and the sincerity of love. We should reread chapter XXIII of
St. Matthew to feel again the force of Christ’s invectives against the

cunning factions of two social groups, the Pharisees and the

Scribes of that time, in order to tremble about the fundamental

necessity of a real relationship with God, sincerity of heart, ex-

pressed by consistency of thought, words and deeds. We must,
therefore, go back to the study of that word which has now entered

current use, “metanoia,” which means interior conversion, the
change of heart of which we have spoken on other occasions. We
cannot pass over in silence our painful amazement at the indul-
gence, and more, the publicity and propaganda, so ignobly wide-

spread today, for what upsets and defiles minds, with pornography,

immoral shows and licentious exhibitions. Where is human
“ecology”?

Need of courage

In order to celebrate the Holy Year well, action at the deepest

and most jealously protected level of our moral psychology is nec-

essary. We must be courageous and bold in our resolve to bring
renewal and pacification to bear on the very core of our personal

conscience.

We are stimulated by two topical motives. One is the importance
now given to psychoanalysis, this vivisection of the unconscious

76



process of our activity, that is, of our temperament, our morals,

our peculiar personality (cf. L. Ancona, “La Psicoanalisi”). We
esteem this now famous movement of anthropological studies,

although we do not always find them consistent with one another,

nor always confirmed by satisfactory and beneficial experiences,

nor integrated by that science of hearts which we draw from the

school of Catholic spirituality. This suffices for the moment to

point out how reasonable and topical is the analysis of our souls,

from the standpoint of theology, ethics and Christian ascetism,

such as the Holy Year invites us to think of again and deepen. A

new interest in the interior pedagogy of lived faith seems to de-

mand our attention and to require the didactic skills of our teach-
ers, both academic and spiritual.

Another reason is the supremacy assumed by personal con-

science today over the external norm that governs our behavior at

every moment. Here we should indeed defend conscience, not

separating it, however, as we have said on other occasions, from
defense of the guidance that conscience needs, and which it re-

ceives from law and authority, objectively justified in the exercise

of their functions, not humiliating, but integrating the personality

of conscious man.

This reference, too, to the prerogatives recognized or attributed

to conscience today, can remind us how providential is the exercise

in depth that the Holy Year proposes to us, precisely for the reso-

lute and systematic exploration of our heart, that is, of our con-

science, in order to renew and reconcile the new man, whom we
are seeking, for ourselves, for the world surrounding us, for the

kingdom of God, to which we are called (cf. the old, but classic
“Combattimento spirituale" of Scupoli).

With our Apostolic Blessing.

77



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The Holy Year, a Year of Prayer

by

Jesus Solano, SJ.

Prayer and the Holy Year

Prayer is composed of all those positive acts of religion which

are knowingly and willingly referred to God, directly and explicitly.

This seems to be a description of prayer which in no way betrays the

meaning of prayer in the Holy Scriptures or diminishes its wealth

and breadth in anyway. (K. Rahner).

In other words, prayer means our conscious relationship with

God in the religious field or the consciousness of our religious rela-

tionship with Him. The classic saying of the Fathers is even more

simple: Prayer is a conversation with God. On January 27, 1973,
Paul VI said: “Prayer expresses our relationship with God, our

intimate relationship with the Father.”

“This conscious contact with God” or this “rising up of the mind

and heart to God” is the most spontaneous and elementary mani-

festation of the relationship between man and God. It is the soul
of religion itself and is the general way of manifesting religion not

only in the most developed religions, but in primitive worship as

well.

The Holy Father, in the general audience on Wednesday, August

22, 1973 summarized the meaning of prayer in these words: “It is

the breath of the mystical Body; it is a conversation with God; it is

an expression of love (charity); it is an effort to reach out to the

Father; it is an acknowledgment of His Providence; it is our appeal

for mercy and for His aid where our forces fail. Prayer grows from

a double root: religious sentiment (the natural root) and the grace

of God (supernatural root). Prayer is the highest expression of the
Church but at the same time it is its nourishment and its source.
The Holy Year, as a religious event, should be animated by prayer.

The degree of fervor in prayer will be the measure of the sincerity
of religious renewal we bring to this event.

79



“When we propose a religious renewal"—the Pope said in the
general audience mentioned above

—
“we naturally think of a re-

vival in both individual and collective prayer."

This subject is so vast that we must limit it in this article to the
aspects which are characteristic of this particular Holy Year.

The insistence on making the Holy Year a year of prayer meets

with an obstacle which requires special effort and good will to over-

come. It is difficult, in these times of indifference to religion, for

most people to pray spontaneously and joyfully.

Many of our contemporaries believe prayer to be useless as
though there were no Divine Being to address. Some say that
prayer is harmful to human self-sufficiency and to the personality
of modern man. Others, without worrying about doctrine, live their
lives with no thought of God.

We Christians live in this environment. It is therefore essential,
in these times to lay great stress on prayer, whereas in other cir-

cumstances prayer would have been quite natural.

It is most urgent that we be aware of this reality and by our faith
try to overcome this difficulty. Paul VI mentioned this “great diffi-

culty, which impedes the religious renewal sought by the past

Council and programmed for this coming Holy Year" (August

22nd).

The intensification of prayer in this Holy Year acquires an apos-

tolic value as it becomes the witness of our Faith theoretical and

practical in a world where God is put aside.

The thought that the need of God is co-natural to man, should be

an encouragement to overcome the difficulty of the lack of practice

of religion. In the present younger generation there seems to be a

searching for collective mysticism which well might be a sincere

seeking for God. Andrew Greeley writes this year: “A great number

of theologians, I believe, have been in too much of a hurry to assert
the existence of the man without religion. (There are in reality few
sociological statistics to confirm their existence)." (Concilium,

n. 81, January 1973.)

The heart of man

Prayer finds its source in the inner life, in the heart of man.

This perhaps is the right place to quote the wise words of the emi-

80



nent scientist Albert Einstein: “The problem is not one of atomic

energy but it lies in the conscience and heart of man.”

This inner life has been heavily underlined by the Holy Father

in relation to the Holy Year. When the Pope announced it, he said:
“It is necessary to make quite clear the essential meaning of the
Holy Year. It is a renewal of the inner man . . . man must be re-
newed in his inner life. It is a time of grace which cannot be ac-

quired unless we bow our heads humbly in prayer.” (May 9, 1973).

Just before Pentecost, when the local Churches began to learn

of the spiritual movement for the Holy Year, the Pope spoke about
how the Paraclete should act within the heart of man. He spoke of
the heart as “the intimate—free—deep and personal center of our
Inner life. Within the heart thoughts are conceived—the fruit of
prayer.” (June 6, 1973).

At the beginning of this year 1973, In a letter for the centenary

of St. Teresa of the Child Jesus, Pope Paul called our attention to

the need of a life of intimacy with God, “a difficult but necessary

aim” and added a serious warning: “The apostolate at all levels

must have its origin in prayer. It must reach the heart of Christ

otherwise it will become only activity with the name of evangeliza-
tion.” (January 2, 1973).

The Holy Spirit

Following the line he has taken during his Pontificate, the Pope

declares: “One of the most absorbing and fruitful studies of the
Holy Year, should be to complete the study of Christology and espe-

cially of Ecclesiology by a new cult to the Holy Spirit as an inevit-
able complement of the teaching of Vatican II.” (June 6th).

The cult of the Holy Spirit should be the source of a new prayer
life. Just as In the first era of the Church, perseverance in prayer

followed the coming of the Holy Spirit (Acts 2, 42, 47) and was
crowned by the fullness of that same Spirit (Acts 4, 31).

The Holy Spirit fills us in prayer with that confidence and that
intimacy which is proper to the children of God: “Those who follow
the leading of God’s spirit are all God’s sons” (Rom. 8, 14).

“To prove that you are sons, God sent out the Spirit of His Son
into your hearts, crying out in us, Abba, Father” (Rom. 8, 15; Gal.

4, 6).

81



“You are God's temple and God’s spirit has his dwelling in you”

(1 Cor. 3, 16).

The most decisive factor is that it is not we who pray but the
Holy Spirit himself who prays in us: “Only, as before, the Spirit
comes to the aid of our weakness; when we do not know what
prayer to offer, to pray as we ought, the Spirit himself intercedes
for us, with groans beyond all utterance: and God, who can read
our hearts, knows well what the Spirit’s intent is: for indeed it is

according to the mind of God that he makes intercession for the

saints.” (Rom. 8, 26-27).

The Biblical formula “pray at all times in spirit” will become a
new reality as we learn to understand the action of the Holy Spirit
within us and we allow ourselves to be moved by this same Spirit.

“So no one else can know God’s thoughts, but the Spirit of God.

And what we have received is no spirit of wordly wisdom; it is the
Spirit that comes from God, to make us understand God’s gifts to
us; gifts which we make known, not in such words as human wis-
dom teaches, but in words taught us by the Spirit, matching what
is spiritual with what is spiritual. Mere man with natural gifts can-
not take in the thoughts of God’s Spirit; they seem mere folly to

him, and he cannot grasp them because they demand a scrutiny
which is spiritual. (1 Cor. 2, 12-14).

The life of the spirit will mean that those who belong to Christ
have crucified their flesh, with all its passions, all its desires (Gal.

5, 34). In this way, the number will be increased of those who
according to the expression of St. John of the Cross in his spiritual

canticle, by the action of the Holy Spirit perceive the choicest

virtues flourishing in their souls. The Holy Spirit must be allowed

to work in his marvellous and mysterious way in us so that prayer

be transformed into something heavenly quite beyond our own
attainment.

The prayer of a priestly people

The personal aspect of renewal and of prayer in this Holy Year

has been greatly stressed by the Holy Father, as we mentioned
above in speaking of the heart of man.

The Pope did not hesitate to affirm that the aim of the Holy

Year is not only of value in itself but is of primary consequence to

82



US here and now: the conversion of heart, the renewal of soul, first

in each man individually, and then in all people collectively.

The union of all people in the Church needs no further stress in

this post-conciliar time. Pope Paul has called our attention to love

for the Church brought so much to the fore in these days, and

again recalls how this love should lead us to the celebration of the

Holy Year. (Sept. 12, 1973). He insisted, shortly before this, when

speaking of the Year of Reconciliation that the Church “is one only,

full and perfect" that which was founded by Christ on Peter and

the Apostles (August 29, 1973).

The Vatican Council gives the Church the title of the “People of

God." This title summarizes Catholic ecclesiology according to the

Divine-human relationship within the Church and according to the

pattern of history in the course of centuries, before Christ, during

his life and after it.

It is also an expression of modern thought on present social

facts. (Sept. 5, 1973).

In this same meditation the Pope spoke of the Church as: “the
People of God." “You are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a con-

secrated nation, a people God means to have for Himself." (1 Pet.

2,9).

The fundamental character of Vatican II refers to the People of

God as “a royal race of priests for God" partaking of the priesthood
of Christ. We must say that nowadays this office of priesthood is
especially felt by Christians in the world.

Our prayer during the Holy Year should be a priestly prayer, fol-

lowing the line of spirituality given us by Vatican II. The whole life

of Christians should be priestly as described in the Document

“Lumen Gentium": “For all their works, prayers, and apostolic
endeavors, their ordinary married and family life, their daily labor,

their mental and physical relaxation, if carried out in the Spirit, and

even the hardships of life, if patiently borne—all of these become
spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ (cf. 1
Pet. 2:5). During the celebration of the Eucharist, these sacrifices

are most lovingly offered to the Father along with the Lord’s Body.

Thus, as worshippers whose every deed is holy, the laity conse-

crates the world itself to God." (LG 34).

83



Pope Paul’s recent decalogue on conversation with God in its

communitary and priestly aspect is most timely. It contains also

points which deal with personal prayer.

The great themes of prayer

Our modest task is simply to touch on some aspects of prayer
which are specific to this Holy Year, so that they may become sub-
ject matter of our conversation with God in this period.

Prayer on this earth enables us to partake of the heavenly liturgy

“together with all the choirs of angels we sing a hymn of glory to
God’’ (SC 8) and so we nourish our souls by true adoration. (PO

18; cf. LG 28, 41, 51). Jesus himself announced “but the time is

coming, nay, has already come, when true worshippers will worship
the Father in spirit and in truth’’ (Jn. 4, 23).

The discovery of the marvels of nature and the recent interplane-

tary space travel reawakens in us the sense of adoration. Here we
can apply what Sir Bernard Lovell said in 1970 about the recent
astronomical discoveries: “Such knowledge makes us hold our
breath.’’ The latest Interplanetary travels are only a feeble intima-

tion of the immensity of the universe.

Many believe that the words of St. Paul are now coming to pass
before the eyes of this generation: “Make no mistake about it;
you cannot cheat God. A man will reap what he sows . . .’’ (Gal. 6,
7).

The Pope calls our attention to the problem of moral decadence

(Sept. 19, 1973). With the Apostle, we can only accept the myste-
rious plan of Salvation and repeat: “How deep is the mind of God’s
wisdom, of His knowledge; to Him be glory throughout all ages.
Amen. (Rom. 11, 33, 36).

For a Christian conversation with God must be an expression of

inexhaustible love. By deepening our knowledge of the Holy Spirit

during this Holy Year, we shall learn to live by love. Our Lord “sent
the Holy Spirit upon all men that He might inspire them from within
to love God with their whole heart and their whole soul, with all
their mind and all their strength’’ (LG 40). Following the teaching

of the word of God, St. Augustin calls the Holy Spirit “the God of

love’’ (De Trinitate 15, 17, 31).

84



The third centenary of the apparitions of the Sacred Heart to

St. Margaret Mary Alacoque (1673-1675) is another incitement to

a loving relationship with God.

Vatican Council II is a gift, amongst many others, for which we

must thank God untiringly. The Pope declares that this Council has

given “a new psychology to the Church and to the world” (Novem-

ber 18, 1965). “Vatican II has left an inestimable mark on our

times” said the Holy Father (April 23, 1969).

Following the teaching of Our Lord
—

“. . . and forgive us our

trespasses . . .” (Mt. 12)—the forgiveness of sins is one of the
frequent themes of Christian prayer. Nowadays we share more
acutely in “the sin of the world” (Jn. 1, 29) and “the truth is that

the imbalances under which the modern world labors are linked

with that more basic imbalance rooted in the heart of man” (GS
10).

Lastly, petition is characteristic of prayer. New personal, social
and universal needs urge us in this age “to wrestle” in prayer with

God as St. Paul expresses it (Rom. 15, 30).

At the meeting of the Central Committee for the Holy Year there

appeared immediately some pastoral problems concerning which
initiatives should be undertaken both at the national and interna-

tional level. These problems are listed here so that they may be-
come intentions for prayer during this Holy Year; Faith and the
practice of religion in the world of work and in the world of youth;

in the cultural world; in the development of society and trade; in

the world of social communications, entertainment and leisure.

Two other problems are priestly and religious vocations in the
new community life of the Church and the reawakening of the mis-
sionary mandate of the whole Church.

Prayer, a condition and fruit of the Holy Year

St. Thomas Aquinas exposed some errors of former times which
unfortunately are still to be lamented today.

He explained that prayer does not mean making our needs
known to God as though He was ignorant of them, but it makes us
aware of the need we have of divine help. Neither do we pray that
God might change his decisions, but we pray that His Divine Will

85



may be done with the help obtained by prayer. In other words,
prayer becomes a part of the Divine Plan of Salvation (S. Tho. 22 q.
83 a.).

Our desires for the Holy Year are nothing more nor less than the

renewal and reconciliation of man according to the teaching of
Vatican II. From whom can we expect this, if not from Him who
gives us “every good and perfect gift”? (James 1, 17).

By witnessing God’s power to those who do not believe, by re-
newing the heart and inner life in the faithful, by reviving the active

and efficacious devotion to the Holy Spirit, by stressing the uni-

versal sharing in the priesthood of Christ, the Holy Year will give

new vigor and growth of prayer.

This period of time is called “holy” because it is a time of a par-

ticular bond of love between God and man. God is holy and sancti-

fies or consecrates all those who are united to Him. To pray means
to be aware of our relationship with God. We cannot live the Holy
Year as faithful and responsible people, unless we live in prayer
and by prayer.

The attitude of Our Lady together with the Apostles while await-

ing the Holy Spirit will be our example of prayer in this Holy Year.

The Apostles were “all with one mind, and gave themselves up to

prayer, together with Mary the Mother of Jesus, and the rest of the

women and his brethren.” “While they were all gathered together
in unity of purpose . . . they were all filled with the Holy Spirit.”

(Acts 1, 14; 2, 1, 4).

The Pope has shown his trust in devotion to Our Lady: “If we
wish this Holy Year to attain its end of renewal, we must rely on
the aid of the Blessed Virgin” therefore, “we must trustingly ask
Our Lady for her help.” (May 30, 1973).

86



Decree of the Sacred Apostolic
Penitentiary on the Indulgences

of the Holy Year

September 24, 1973

The Cardinal President of the Central Committee for the cele-

bration of the Holy Year has asked this Sacred Apostolic Peni-

tentiary to determine the requirements for gaining the “gift of the

Indulgence” which the Holy Father promised in order to strengthen

the spirit of reconciliation and renewal proper to this Holy Year.

At the direction of His Holiness the Sacred Penitentiary makes

the following provisions: namely that from the first Sunday of Ad-

vent of the present year until the day on which the Holy Year is

solemnly inaugurated here in Rome, the faithful of the various

local Churches may gain:

1) A Plenary Indulgence, at times to be determined by the
Episcopal Conferences, if they make a pilgrimage to the Cathedral
Church, or to other churches designated by the local Ordinary,

where a solemn community celebration is to take place;

2) A Plenary Indulgence, also at times to be determined by
the Episcopal Conferences, if they make group pilgrimages (e.g.
families, schoolchildren, professional associations, members of
pious sodalities) to the Cathedral Church, or to other churches

designated by the local Ordinary, and there spend some time in
devout recollection, concluding with the recitation or singing of

the Lord’s Prayer and the Apostles’ Creed, together with a prayer

to Our Blessed Lady;

3) A Plenary Indulgence if, being unable to take part because
of illness or other serious reason, they join spiritually with those

making the pilgrimage, and offer their prayers and sufferings to

God.

With regard to the Diocese of Rome, which appropriately should

serve as an example and encouragement to the other ecclesial com-

87



munities in this matter, the Sacred Penitentiary decrees that the

times and manner of gaining the above-mentioned Plenary In-

dulgence are to be determined by the Cardinal Vicar of the City.

Anything to the contrary notwithstanding.

Given at Rome, from the Sacred Apostolic Penitentiary, on the

24th day of September 1973.

J. Card. PAUPINI

Major Penitentiary

J. SESSOLO
Regent



Accompanying Letter of the
Secretary General of the Central
Committee to the Presidents of

the Episcopal Conferences

In the name of Cardinal de Furstenberg, the President of the
Central Committee, I am sending a photocopy of the Decree of the
Sacred Penitentiary relative to the Jubilee Indulgence which may
be gained during the celebration of the Holy Year in the local

Churches. I am enclosing as well an official translation of the text
in the vernacular.

The Presidents of the Episcopal Conferences will determine the

manner in which the document will best be made public, whether,
for example, through a press conference (after October 25th) or

through communication by the local Ordinaries. In any case, it

would appear opportune that the Ordinaries, beyond the simple

announcement of the Decree, should explain to the people the

sense and the intent of the text. Of particular interest would be

the apt expressions chosen by the Penitentiary when speaking of

the “donum indulgentiae” which the Holy Father has promised
“ad spiritum confirmandum reconciliationis et renovationis, quae

huius Anni Sacri sunt propriae”.

That which is of primary importance for the Holy Year, both on

the level of theology and on the level of consequent pastoral initi-

atives which are made available to the people, is the spirit of
reconciliation and interior renewal. Toward that spirit must be

directed all practices of piety, penance, and charity. This would in-

clude, of course, that most significant Jubilee demonstration of

piety, the Pilgrimage itself.

As a sign of his response to and whole-hearted confirmation of

these exterior manifestations of interior conversion and the will to

persevere in charity, the Holy Father grants the “gift of the In-

dulgence”.

As Cardinal de Furstenberg has pointed out in a previous letter.

89



there is a definite hierarchy of values which must be remembered
in explaining the' Holy Year and in planning its programs so that

that which is of fundamental importance is ever kept in mind and

becomes the goal of all efforts.

I should like to ask that, in applying the present Decree, a cer-

tain uniformity of initiative might be found. This does not gainsay,

of course, the liberty of action granted by the Holy Father to the

Episcopal Conferences (cf. Pont. Letter on the Holy Year addressed

to the Cardinal President) nor does it ignore the diversity of situa-

tions and mentalities found in the Church. It is merely a reminder

that a certain common thrust should characterize all efforts in
order that the ecclesial dimensions and objectives of the Holy Year

might be realized.

Expressing again my pleasure in being able to send you an
official document which will prove helpful to all Conferences and

National Committees in their work for the Holy Year, I remain

Sincerely in Christ,

^ ANTONIO MAZZA
The Most Reverend ANTONIO MAZZA

Secretary General



HOLY YEAR-1975

ORDER FOR THE CELEBRATION OF THE HOLY YEAR
IN THE LOCAL CHURCHES. Central Commission for the
Celebration of the Holy Year. Sections include: Path to

Salvation-Advent, Christmas, Sundays in Ordinary Time,

Lent and Easter; Week of Reconciliation; Mass for the
Holy Year; Prayers for the Pope; Prayers for the Holy

Year, public, private; Readings for Masses and Other

Celebrations; Litany of the Saints. ICEL translation. (V-297)

$2.50

IN CHRIST'S NAME BE RECONCILED. Holy Year Poster.
(V-301) 50i

TOWARDS RECONCILIATION. By Walter F. Burghardt,
S.J. A series of articles on the Holy Year theme. Includes:
Who Needs Reconciliation? Reconciliation Between God
and Man; Reconciliation Within Man Himself; Reconcili-
ation Between Man and Nature; Reconciliation: Deeds not
Words. Forword by Cardinal Manning (V-307) 75^

BULL PROCLAIMING THE HOLY YEAR 1975. Aposfo-
lorum Limina. 5/23/74. Pope Paul VI (VI-122) 35^

HOLY YEAR DOCUMENTS AND MESSAGES. Includes:
Bull Proclaiming Holy Year; What is the Holy Year?; Mes-
sage of Cardinal Krol; several addresses of Pope Paul on
the Holy Year; Pope Paul's Letter at Opening of Holy Year;
Commentary on Pastoral Aims of the Holy Year; Pastoral

Document on the Holy Year and the Young. Decree on the
Holy Year Indulgence. (V-338) 95^

HOLY YEAR PRAYER CARD. Full color design of the Holy
Year Central Committee. 3V2 x 6". "The Holy Year Prayer

has been duly issued. It would be a good thing to recite

it in the community and all the churches, also among the
"Prayers of the Faithful," and spread it in families, insti-

tutes, religious communities and among the sick. It may
serve a great deal to drive home the aims and the spirit

of the Holy Year to the faithful of the whole world."—The
Central Committee for the Holy Year in Pastoral Aims of

the Holy Year. (V-347) 15^ each; 50 and over 120 each;

100 and over 80 each; 500 and over 60 each; 1,000

and over 50 each; 5,000 and over 40 each.

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