Pope Francis ‘opens’ the holy door to inaugurate the 2025 Jubilee

By Deborah Castellano Lubov

When Pope Francis opened the Holy Door of St. Peter’s Basilica on the evening of December 24, 2024, he ushered in the long-awaited 2025 Jubilee Year of Hope.

With the liturgical gesture of opening the door at the start of Christmas mass at night, as explained in the papal bull for the anniversary Spes non confundit, the Pope inaugurated the general jubilee, a historic event that takes place every 25 years.

The Ordinary Jubilee ends with the closing of the same Holy Door on January 6, 2026, the Solemnity of the Lord’s Epiphany.

The meaning of the holy door

The Holy Door is considered ‘Holy’ as it calls all who enter through it to walk in the holiness of life. In the footsteps of the Pope, during the singing of the jubilee hymn, representatives of all the people of God crossed its threshold, as a prelude to the countless pilgrims of hope from all countries and languages ​​who will visit St. Peter’s Basilica and celebrate the mysteries of salvation in the holy year.

The origin of the custom goes back to Pope Martin V, who, for the extraordinary jubilee of 1423, opened a holy door to enter the Lateran Basilica. In Peter’s Church, it was first used for the jubilee in 1450.

Its location, the back wall of the chapel dedicated by Pope John VII to the Mother of God, corresponds to a place where it is found today. Pope Alexander VI in 1500 endowed this symbol of the opening of the jubilee with a ritual that remained practically unchanged over the centuries, until the turn of the millennium, when in the year 2000, the removal of the former brick wall was replaced by the ceremonial opening of the bronze door already in 1983.

The last opening of the Holy Door for an Ordinary Jubilee was when Pope John Paul II had done so in the year 2000. Pope Francis opened the Holy Door in 2015 for his Extraordinary Jubilee of Mercy in 2016.

Jubilee to strengthen faith and recognize Christ in our midst

“During the Holy Year,” the Pope has prayed, “may the light of Christian hope illuminate every man and woman as a message of God’s love addressed to all! And may the Church bear faithful witness to this message in all parts of the world!”

The Holy Father invited us to pray, to prepare ourselves during this year, so that this jubilee can “strengthen us in our faith, help us to recognize the Risen Christ in the midst of our lives, transform us into pilgrims with Christian hope. “

Returns us to the arms of the Our Father

The Pope took up the jubilee theme of hope in his sermon. He began to recall the Gospel passage according to St. Luke, who tells when the angel of the Lord, bathed in light, illuminates the night and brings glad tidings to the shepherds: ‘I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all people. To you today a savior has been born in the city of David, who is Christ the Lord’ (Luke 2,10-11).

At that moment, the Holy Father reflected on how Heaven breaks forth on earth during the miracles of the poor and the angelic song. “God,” he emphasized, “has become one of us to make us like himself; he has come down to us to lift us up and restore us to the embrace of the Father.”

Little child gives hope to the world

In Emmanuel, “God with us,” the Pope repeated, we find our hope.

“The infinitely great,” he marveled, “made himself small,” and “the glory of heaven appeared on earth as a little child.”

“If God can visit us even when our hearts seem like a humble manger,” the Pope continued, “we can truly say: Hope is not dead; hope is alive and it embraces our lives forever!”

‘There is hope for you’

The Pope recalled that with the opening of the Holy Door, the new Jubilee was inaugurated, which invites each one of us to enter into the mystery of this extraordinary event.

“Tonight the door of hope is opened wide to the world” and “God speaks to each of us and says: ‘there is hope for you too!’ he said.

“With haste,” he said, “let us go out to see the Lord who is born to us, our hearts happy and alert, ready to meet him and then bring hope to the way we live our daily lives. For Christian hope is not a ‘happy ending’ that we passively await, but rather a promise, the Lord’s promise, to be welcomed here and now in our world of suffering and sighing.”

The end of reveling in mediocrity

It is significant, Pope Francis stressed, that the jubilee “is a call not to hesitate, to be held back by our old habits or to wallow in mediocrity or laziness.”

The Pope recalled that Doctor of the Church Saint Augustine had suggested that hope encourages us to be sad about things that are wrong and to find the courage to change them.

With this in mind, as disciples of the Lord, the Holy Father encouraged, “we are called to find our greater hope in Him and then, without delay, carry this hope with us as pilgrims of light in the midst of the darkness of this world.”

Rediscover the joy of meeting the Lord

“Brothers and sisters,” the Pope reminded, “this is the jubilee.”

“This is the season of hope when we are invited to rediscover the joy of meeting the Lord,” he stressed, adding how the Jubilee “calls us to spiritual renewal and commits us to transform our world so that this year can truly be a time of jubilation .”

Pope Francis ended by giving some food for thought.

“Dear sister, dear brother, tonight the ‘holy door’ of God’s heart is open for you. Jesus, God-with-us, is born for you, for us, for every man and woman. With him joy blooms; with Him life changes with Him, hope does not disappoint.”

Opening of sacred doors

On Christmas Day, Pope Francis delivers his Urbi et Orbi message to the people of the city of Rome and the world from the central loggia of St. Peter’s Basilica at noon.

On December 26, for the first time in the jubilee tradition, Pope Francis will open a fifth holy portal in a Roman prison, a gesture of hope that shows his continuing closeness to prisoners.

On Sunday, December 29, the Pope will open the holy door of his cathedral, St. John Lateran, which celebrated the 1700th anniversary of its consecration on November 9 this year.

Then, on January 1, 2025, the Solemnity of Mary, Mother of God, opens the Holy Door of the Pontifical Basilica of Saint Mary Major.

Finally, Sunday January 5, 2025 will mark the opening of the Holy Door of the Papal Basilica of Saint Paul Outside the Walls.

These last three holy doors will be closed on Sunday, December 28, 2025.