Vatican City, 31 March 2015 (VIS) –
Following the first announcement of the next extraordinary Holy Year
by Pope Francis on 13 March, the Holy Father will proceed with the
official indiction of the Jubilee of Mercy with the publication of
the Bull of Indiction on Saturday 11 April, at 5.30 pm in St. Peter’s
Basilica.
The rite of publication will involve
the reading of various passages of the Bull before the Holy Door of
the Vatican Basilica. Pope Francis will subsequently preside at the
celebration of First Vespers of Divine Mercy Sunday, thus underlining
in a particular way the fundamental theme of the extraordinary Holy
Year: God’s Mercy.
The term bull (from the Latin bulla =
bubble or, more generally, a rounded object) originally indicated the
metal capsule used to protect the wax seal attached with a cord to a
document of particular importance, to attest to its authenticity and,
as a consequence, its authority. Over time, the term began to be used
first to indicate the seal, then the document itself, so that
nowadays it is used for all papal documents of special importance
that bear, or at least traditionally would have borne, the Pontiff’s
seal.
The bull for the indiction of a
jubilee, for instance in the case of an extraordinary Holy Year,
aside from indicating its time, with the opening and closing dates
and the main ways in which it will be implemented, constitutes the
fundamental document for recognising the spirit in which it is
announced, and the intentions and the outcomes hoped for by the
Pontiff, who invokes it for the Church.
In the case of the last two
extraordinary Holy Years, 1933 and 1983, the Bull of Indiction was
published on the occasion of the Solemnity of the Epiphany of the
Lord. For the next extraordinary Holy Year, the choice of the
occasion on which the publication of the Bull will take place clearly
demonstrates the Holy Father’s particular attention to the theme of
Mercy.
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