Year Of Mercy – The 30th Jubilee Year

[simpleazon-image align=”left” asin=”1612788351″ locale=”us” height=”375″ src=”http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51yLQoRsqsL.jpg” width=”305″]In March of this year, Holy Father, Pope Francis announced a Year of Mercy which will run from December 8th, 2015, to November 20th, 2016, and will involve the Catholic Church throughout the world .  It is the fervent prayer and desire  of the Pope that every Christian will in some way come face to face with the mercy of God.  Pope Francis has said that he is convinced that the whole church can find in this Jubilee, the joy of rediscovering and making fruitful the Mercy of God, with which we are all called to give consolation to every man, every woman, every child of our time.  This will be the 30th Jubilee in the history of the Catholic Church.

A jubilee year is a great religious event that started in Judaism and was an occasion for universal pardon and reconciliation.  In the Old Testament – the book of Leviticus – it is written that the Jubilee year occurred every fifty years, and that in the fiftieth year, slaves were set free, prisoners were pardoned, wrongs were forgiven and debts were cancelled.  The mercy of God was made more manifest.  For the small and oppressed, the poor, the downtrodden, a Jubilee was a really beautiful time for them as it meant a time when they would be forgiven of their debts, or they will be set free.  However, for the rich and powerful, it meant that they had to cancel debts and extend pardon.  This did not go down well with them; and so this practice was stopped sometime between the old and new Testament times.  With this in mind, we can begin to understand the immense joy that must have been felt when Jesus stood up in the temple and announced a year of favor.

The spirit of the Lord is on me, for he has anointed me to bring the good news to the afflicted. He has sent me to proclaim liberty to captives, sight to the blind, to let the oppressed go free, to proclaim a year of favour from the Lord. He then rolled up the scroll, gave it back to the assistant and sat down. And all eyes in the synagogue were fixed on him. (Luke 4: 18-20)

Somewhere around the year 1300, the Catholic Church revived the Jubilee Year tradition, and has had 29 such Jubilee years since then; this year of Mercy being the thirtieth.  Ever since his election to Rome, Pope Francis has always been speaking of the Mercy of God and constantly reminding all that God did not send His Son into the world to condemn it but to save it, and that His (God’s) desire is that all be saved and inherit eternal life.  So the announcement of the Year of mercy by Pope Francis should not surprise anyone.