That Christmas Eve our family gathered in the dark of night outside those doors on the patio, we lit our full four candles of the advent wreath and together recited the prayer the Holy Father had authored for the entire church to pray upon crossing the threshold of hope. Our friends and family always asking us, what gives with the red ribbon on the doors, which in itself opened an opportunity to evangelize and catechize on the Great Jubilee 2000. For an entire year we suffered through the consequence of having to go outside through a less convenient kitchen door. We had closed off our set of double doors that led to our patio with a giant red ribbon that was crossed and sealed with wax. I recall quite clearly taking part in this ritual in our home. He realized that not everyone could come to Rome to make pilgrimage, although over 10 million did, so he encouraged each diocese to set aside a holy door in its individual Cathedral and churches of particular cultural importance, he also invited individual Catholics to implement a Holy Door in their home if possible, to seal those doors during the year immediately preceding the great Jubilee and to use that closed door as a symbol of anticipation and waiting and to join him in opening the Holy Door on Christmas Eve.Īnd like he would, to cross the “Threshold of Hope”. He invited the entire world to come to Rome and to “Cross the threshold of hope” into the third Christian Millennium and to take an active part the new “Springtime of evangelization”. That in a very real way the Holy Doors represented a portal of change, a physical and spiritual portal of conversion. The Holy Doors in Rome are opened only during Holy Years, and as such the Holy Father saw them as a great metaphor for our lives.
One of the special exercises that the Holy Father introduced was that of the Holy Door as being a powerful portal of conversion. They were to help center us on the amazing event that was to come, the Holy Year the Great Jubilee 2000 itself. These years of preparation served an important purpose. He proclaimed 1997 the Year of Jesus, and led us on a year long catechism of the Son of God, and similarly he did so for 1998 which was dedicated as a Year of The Holy Spirit and 1999 as a Year of God the Father, and in each of those specific years he asked us to reflect on the special role that the Blessed Virgin Mary played as mother, spouse and daughter of God Himself. But before celebration, he invited us to pray and to study. The Holy Father, Venerable John Paul II proclaimed a Holy Year, the Great Jubilee 2000 and invited people to come and celebrate with the Church in Rome, to celebrate in their home counties and Particular Churches, that is their local dioceses, to celebrate in their domestic churches, that is their homes. He began to speak about the New Evangelization, and the Great Springtime of the church that would be the third Christian millennium and as his pontificate progressed he began organizing ecclesiastical study sessions aimed at focusing the entire Church on this amazing opportunity, a period of time when the entire world could step back and collectively prepare to celebrate the 2000 th anniversary of the most momentous occurrence of all time, when time literally was consecrated, that is made holy by the physical presence of God Himself taking on human nature when he was born of a virgin in the most humble of circumstances. The late Holy Father, the recently named Venerable John Paul II said the Great Jubilee 2000 was the event that he believed God had called him to lead the church through.Īs such, he began preparing for this momentous occasion almost immediately upon his elevation to the See of Peter by prayer and study. As we rapidly approach the Christmas Eve vigil of 2009, I am reminded of another Christmas Eve just 10 years ago, a Christmas Eve that I had spent six years preparing for in a special way.
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