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Jubilee of Mercy

JUBILEE YEAR OF MERCY

December 8, 2015 — November 20, 2016 For more information on The Holy Year of Mercy visit the Jubilee website at www.im.va or the Archdiocesan website at http://rcan.org/

Explanation of the Logo for the Jubilee of Mercy

The logo and the motto together provide a fitting summary of what the Jubilee Year is all about. The motto Merciful Like the Father (taken from the Gospel of Luke, 6:36) serves as an invitation to follow the merciful example of the Father who asks us not to judge or condemn, but to forgive and to give love and forgiveness without measure (cfr. Lk 6:37-38). The logo - the work of Jesuit Father Marko I. Rupnik - presents a small summa theologiae of the theme of mercy. In fact, it represents an image quite important to the early Church: that of the Son having taken upon his shoulders the lost soul demonstrating that it is the love of Christ that brings to completion the mystery of his incarnation culminating in redemption. The logo has been designed in such a way so as to express the profound way in which the Good Shepherd touches the flesh of humanity and does so with a love with the power to change one's life. One particular feature worthy of note is that while the Good Shepherd, in
his great mercy, takes humanity upon himself, his eyes are merged with those of man. Christ sees with the eyes of Adam, and Adam with the eyes of Christ. Every person discovers in Christ, the new Adam, one's own humanity and the future that lies ahead, contemplating, in his gaze, the love of the Father. 

 

The scene is captured within the so called mandorla (the shape of an almond), a figure quite important in early and medieval iconography, for it calls to mind the two natures of Christ, divine and human. The three concentric ovals, with colors progressively lighter as we move outward, suggest the movement of Christ who carries humanity out of the night of sin and death. Conversely, the depth of the darker color suggests the impenetrability of the love of the Father who forgives all. 

El logo y el lema ofrecen juntos una buena síntesis del Año jubilar. Con el lema Misericordiosos como el Padre (tomado del Evangelio de Lucas, 6,36) se propone vivir la misericordia siguiendo el ejemplo del Padre, que pide no juzgar y no condenar, sino perdonar y amar sin medida (cfr. Lc 6,37-38). El logo – obra del jesuita Marko I. Rupnik – se presenta como un pequeño compendio teológico de la misericordia. Muestra, en efecto, al Hijo que carga sobre sus hombros al hombre extraviado, recuperando así una imagen muy apreciada en la Iglesia antigua, porque indicaba el amor de Cristo que lleva a término el misterio de su encarnación con la redención. El dibujo se ha realizado de manera que se destaque el Buen Pastor que toca en profundidad la carne del hombre, y lo hace con un amor capaz de cambiarle la vida. Además, es inevitable notar un detalle particular: el Buen Pastor con extrema misericordia carga sobre sí la humanidad, pero sus ojos se confunden con los del hombre. Cristo ve con el ojo de Adán y este lo hace con el ojo de Cristo. Así, cada hombre descubre en Cristo, nuevo Adán, la propia humanidad y el futuro que lo espera, contemplando en su mirada el amor del Padre.

 

La escena se coloca dentro la mandorla que es también una figura importante en la iconografía antigua y medieval por cuanto evoca la copresencia de las dos naturaleza, divina y humana, en Cristo. Los tres óvalos concéntricos, de color progresivamente más claro hacia el externo, sugieren el movimiento de Cristo que saca al hombre fuera de la noche del pecado y de la muerte. Por otra parte, la profundidad del color más oscuro sugiere también el carácter inescrutable del amor del Padre que todo lo perdona.

Hymn for the Holy Year of Mercy

The Authors of the original music (Paul Inwood) and text (Eugenio Costa, S.J.) have donated the copyright of this work to the PCPNE in order to facilitate the distribution of the Hymn of the Jubilee of Mercy throughout the Catholic Church.  

 

Click on play to listen

Inno per l'Anno Santo della Misericordia - Music - Paul Inwood and text - Eugenio Costa, S.J.
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Excerpts from Pope Francis’ letter on the Year of Mercy

“We need constantly to contemplate the mystery of mercy. It is a wellspring of joy,serenity, and peace. Our salvation depends on it.

Mercy: the word reveals the very mystery of the Most Holy Trinity.

Mercy: the ultimate and supreme act by which God comes to meet us.

Mercy: the fundamental law that dwells in the heart of every person who looks sincerely into the eyes of his brothers and sisters on the path of life.

Mercy: the bridge that connects God and man, opening our hearts to the hope of being loved forever despite our sinfulness.”

YEAR OF MERCY PRAYER


Lord Jesus Christ, you have taught us to be merciful
like the heavenly Father, and have told us
that whoever sees you sees Him. Show us your face and
we will be saved.

Your loving gaze freed Zacchaeus and Matthew

from being enslaved by money; the adulteress and Magdalene from
seeking happiness only in created things; made Peter weep
after his betrayal, and assured Paradise to the repentant thief.
 

Let us hear, as if addressed to each one of us, the words that you
spoke to the Samaritan woman: “If you knew the gift of God!”
You are the visible face of the invisible Father, of the God who
manifests his power above all by forgiveness and mercy:
let the Church be your visible face in the world, its Lord risen and glorified.
You willed that your ministers would also be clothed in weakness
in order that they may feel compassion for those in ignorance and error:

let everyone who approaches them feel sought
after, loved, and forgiven by God.
 

Send your Spirit and consecrate every one of us with its anointing, so that the
Jubilee of Mercy may be a year of grace from the Lord,
and your Church, with renewed enthusiasm, may bring good news
to the poor, proclaim liberty to captives and the
oppressed, and restore sight to the blind.

 

We ask this through the intercession of Mary, Mother of Mercy, you who live and
reign with the Father and the Holy Spirit for ever and ever.

 

Amen.

Pilgrimage Churches

 

Archbishop Myers has designated the following churches in the Archdiocese of Newark as Pilgrimage Churches during the Jubilee Year of Mercy:

 

Cathedral Basilica of the Sacred Heart

89 Ridge Street 

Newark, NJ

973-484-4600

 

Our Lady of Mercy

2 Freemont Avenue 

Park Ridge, NJ

201-391-5315

 

Most Sacred Heart of Jesus

127 Paterson Avenue 

Wallington, NJ

973-778-7405

 

Saint Francis Xavier

243 Abington Avenue

West Newark, NJ

973-482-8410

 

Saint Theresa of the Child Jesus

131 East Edgar Road 

Linden, NJ 

908-862-1116

 

Divine Mercy Parish

232 Central Avenue 

Rahway, NJ

732-388-0082

 

Our Lady of Mercy

40 Sullivan Drive 

Jersey City, NJ

201-434-7500

 

For more info on these Pilgrimage Churches and when their Holy Door will be open go to http://rcan.org/yearofmercy-pilgrimagechurches

Two Types of Indulgences: Partial  and Plenary 

A Plenary Indulgence is: “the remission before God of the temporal punishment due for sins already forgiven as far as their guilt is concerned.” Forgiveness of sin is separate from consequence for the sin. Through sacramental confession we obtain forgiveness, but we aren’t let off the hook as far as the consequences goes.

 

A Partial indulgence removes part of the temporal punishment due for sins. A plenary indulgence removes all of it. This punishment may come either in this life, in the form of various sufferings, or in the next life, in purgatory. What we don’t get rid of here we suffer there. The indulgence allows for the complete remission of all temporal punishment due to sin. 

 

In a September 1 letter to Archbishop Rino Fisichella, president of the Pontifical Council for the Promotion of the New Evangelization, Pope Francis said it was his “wish that the jubilee be a living experience of the closeness of the Father, whose tenderness is almost tangible, so that the faith of every believer may be strengthened and thus testimony to it be ever more effective.”

 

As with other jubilee years, the Holy Father has instructed that special indulgences be available for the faithful through the duration of the year. Here’s how to get one.

 

For able-bodied Catholics:
Take a pilgrimage. Make a journey to your local Holy Door (a physical portal in your local cathedral, shrine or other designated Church) or to one of the Holy Doors in the four papal basilicas in Rome. Crossing through a Holy Door is a spiritual journey that signals, as the Holy Father said, “the deep desire for true conversion.”  You don’t have to travel to Rome to pass through the Holy Door, Catholics can visit any Cathedral or designated “Pilgrim Church” throughout the world. In the Archdiocese of Newark besides passing through the Holy Door at the Cathedral Basilica (and fulfilling the specific conditions) you may be granted a Plenary Indulgence at the Pilgrimage Churches listed on this page

  • Cross through the Holy Door which signals, "the deep desire for true conversion"

  • Go to confession.

  • Pray for the pope and for his intentions.

  • Receive the Holy Eucharist “with a reflection of mercy.”

  • Make a profession of faith.

 

For the elderly, confined and the ill:
Pope Francis said that they may obtain the indulgence by “living with faith and joyful hope this moment of trial.”

 

For those in prison:
The incarcerated may obtain the indulgence in their prison chapels.
Said Pope Francis: “May the gesture of directing their thought and prayer to the Father each time they cross the threshold of their cell signify for them their passage through the Holy Door, because the mercy of God is able to transform hearts, and is also able to transform bars into an experience of freedom.”


For the deceased:
Through the prayers of the faithful, indulgences may be obtained for the dead.

 

For all Catholics:
Perform a spiritual or corporal work of mercy. Pope Francis said that an indulgence may be obtained when a member of the “faithful personally performs” one of these merciful acts. “The experience of mercy, indeed, becomes visible in the witness of concrete signs as Jesus himself taught us,” he said. Year of Mercy

 

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