JUBILEE (OF. jubile, Fr. jubilf% from Lat. jabihrus, from Heb. yOb(71. blast of a trumpet). An occasion of extraordinary spiritual privileges in the Roman Catholic Church. The name and the fundamental idea are borrowed from the old Hebrew custom. (See YEAR oF.) The principal characteristic of the jubilee is the sol emn offering to the faithful of a plenary in dulgence (see IxDrLuEccE) en special terms. An extraordinary jubilee is proclaimed as a rule for a short period, and may be either for the whole Church or for definite localities. The or dinary jubilees, which now occur every twenty five years. are proclaimed first for Rome, lasting a year, and then for the rest of the world during the following year. The beginning of the jubilee is marked by the opening with great solemnity of the 'holy door' in Saint Peter's. where the Pope officiates, while three legates perform a similar ceremony at the churches of Saint John Lateran, Santa Maria Maggiora, and Saint Paul Without the Walls. This takes place after the first vespers of Christmas, and the doors are closed again in like manner a year later. Besides the plenary indulgence, to gain which, in addi tion to the usual conditions, a number of visits to prescribed churches are required. special privi leges are given to confessors to absolve penitents from all sins (with one small group of excep tions). even those usually reserved to the Pope or bishops, and to commute or sometimes to dispense from simple vows.
The origin of this observance is traced to Pope Boniface VIII, who issued. for the year 1300. a bull granting a plenary indulgence to all pilgrim visitors to Rome during that year, on condition of their penitently confessing their sins and visit ing the Church of Saint Peter and Saint Paul. fifteen times if strangers, and thirty times if residents of the city. The invitation was ac cepted with marvelous enthusiasm. Innumerable
troops of pilgrims from every part of the world flocked to Rome. Giovannilani. a contem porary chronicler, states that the constant num ber of pilgrims in Rome, not reckoning those who were on the road going or returning. during the entire year, never fell below 200.000. As instituted by Boniface. the jubilee was to have been held every hundredth year. Clement in compliance with an earnest request from the people of Rome. abridged the time to fifty years. His jubilee accordingly took place in 1330. and was even more numerously attended than that of Boniface, the average number of pilgrims until the beat of summer suspended their frequency, being according to Matted Villani, no fewer than 1.000,000. The term of interval was still further abridged by Urban VI., and again by Paul II., who. in 1470, ordered that henceforth each twenty-fifth year should be held as jubilee— all arrangement which has continued ever since to regulate the ordinary jubilee. Paul 11. extended still more. in another way. the spiritual ad vantage, of the jubilee. by dispensing with the personal pilgrimage to Rome, and granting the indulgence to all who should visit any church in their own country designated tor the purpose, and should. if their means permitted. contribute a sum toward the expenses of the holy wars. In later jubilee years the pilgrimages to Home grad ually diminished in frequency, the indulgence being. for the most part. obtained by the per formance of the prescribed works at home; but the observance itself has been punctually main tained at each recurring period, with the single exception of the year 1500. in which, owing to the vacancy of the Holy See, and the troubles of the times, it was not held. Consult Loiseaux. 'Trait(' canonique et pratique du jubile (Tournai, 1S59).