Summary of the Papal Bull
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Title of the Papal Bull:
Misericordiae Vultus
Bull of Indiction of the Extraordinary Jubilee of Mercy
Here's how the Pope opens the bull:
Jesus Christ is the face of the Father's mercy. These words might well
sum up the mystery of the Christian faith. Mercy has become living and
visible in Jesus of Nazareth, reaching its culmination in him.
Reason for proclaiming Jubilee 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. ...
At times we are called to gaze even more attentively on mercy so that we
may become a more effective sign of the Father's action in our lives.
For this reason I have proclaimed an Extraordinary Jubilee of Mercy as a
special time for the Church; a time when the witness of believers might
grow stronger and more effective.
Reason for starting the Jubilee Year of Mercy on the solemnity of the Immaculate Conception.
The Holy Year will open on 8 December 2015, the Solemnity of the
Immaculate Conception. This liturgical feast day recalls God's action
from the very beginning of the history of mankind. After the sin of Adam
and Eve, God did not wish to leave humanity alone in the throes of
evil. So he turned his gaze to Mary, holy and immaculate in love (cf.
Eph 1:4), choosing her to be the Mother of man's Redeemer. When faced
with the gravity of sin, God responds with the fullness of mercy. ... I
have chosen the date of 8 December because of its rich meaning in the
recent history of the Church.
In fact, I will open the Holy Door
on the fiftieth anniversary of the closing of the Second Vatican
Ecumenical Council. The Church feels a great need to keep this event
alive. ... We recall the poignant words of Saint John XXIII
when, opening the Council, he indicated the path to follow: "Now the
Bride of Christ wishes to use the medicine of mercy rather than taking
up arms of severity."
Mercy as a key word that indicates God's action toward us.
As we can see in Sacred Scripture, mercy is a key word that indicates
God's action towards us. He does not limit himself merely to affirming
his love, but makes it visible and tangible. Love, after all, can never
be just an abstraction. By its very nature, it indicates something
concrete: intentions, attitudes, and behaviours that are shown in daily
living. The mercy of God is his loving concern for each one of us. He
feels responsible; that is, he desires our wellbeing and he wants to see
us happy, full of joy, and peaceful. This is the path which the
merciful love of Christians must also travel. As the Father loves, so do
his children. Just as he is merciful, so we are called to be merciful
to each other.
Mercy is the very foundation of the Church's life.
Mercy is the very foundation of the Church's life. All of her pastoral
activity should be caught up in the tenderness she makes present to
believers; nothing in her preaching and in her witness to the world can
be lacking in mercy. The Church's very credibility is seen in how she
shows merciful and compassionate love.
The Pope draws from John Paul II's encyclical Dives in Misericordia (Rich in Mercy):
Let us not forget the great teaching offered by Saint John Paul II in his second Encyclical,
Dives in Misericordia,
which at the time came unexpectedly, its theme catching many by
surprise. There are two passages in particular to which I would like to
draw attention. First, Saint John Paul II highlighted the fact that we
had forgotten the theme of mercy in today's cultural milieu: "The
present-day mentality, more perhaps than that of people in the past,
seems opposed to a God of mercy, and in fact tends to exclude from life
and to remove from the human heart the very idea of mercy." ...
Furthermore, Saint John Paul II pushed for a more urgent proclamation
and witness to mercy in the contemporary world: "It is dictated by love
for man, for all that is human and which, according to the intuitions of
many of our contemporaries, is threatened by an immense danger. The
mystery of Christ ... obliges me to proclaim mercy as God's merciful
love, revealed in that same mystery of Christ. It likewise obliges me to
have recourse to that mercy and to beg for it at this difficult,
critical phase of the history of the Church and of the world." This
teaching is more pertinent than ever and deserves to be taken up once
again in this Holy Year.
The Church's call during the Jubilee Year of Mercy:
The Church makes herself a servant of this love and mediates it to all
people: a love that forgives and expresses itself in the gift of one's
self. Consequently, wherever the Church is present, the mercy of the
Father must be evident. In our parishes, communities, associations and
movements, in a word, wherever there are Christians, everyone should
find an oasis of mercy.
Key scripture for the Jubilee Year: "Be merciful just as your Father is merciful" (Lk 6:36).
We want to live this Jubilee Year in light of the Lord's words: Merciful
like the Father. The Evangelist reminds us of the teaching of Jesus who
says, "Be merciful just as your Father is merciful" (Lk 6:36). It is a
programme of life as demanding as it is rich with joy and peace. ...
Merciful like the Father, therefore, is the "motto" of this Holy Year.
In mercy, we find proof of how God loves us. He gives his entire self,
always, freely, asking nothing in return. He comes to our aid whenever
we call upon him
Pope's burning desire that during this Jubilee, the Christian people may reflect on the corporal and spiritual works of mercy.
It is my burning desire that, during this Jubilee, the Christian people
may reflect on the corporal and spiritual works of mercy. It will be a
way to reawaken our conscience, too often grown dull in the face of
poverty. And let us enter more deeply into the heart of the Gospel where
the poor have a special experience of God's mercy. Jesus introduces us
to these works of mercy in his preaching so that we can know whether or
not we are living as his disciples. Let us rediscover these corporal
works of mercy: to feed the hungry, give drink to the thirsty, clothe
the naked, welcome the stranger, heal the sick, visit the imprisoned,
and bury the dead. And let us not forget the spiritual works of mercy:
to counsel the doubtful, instruct the ignorant, admonish sinners,
comfort the afflicted, forgive offences, bear patiently those who do us
ill, and pray for the living and the dead.
This is to be a "Year of the Lord's favour" or "mercy":
Luke writes that Jesus, on the Sabbath, went back to Nazareth and, as
was his custom, entered the synagogue. They called upon him to read the
Scripture and to comment on it. The passage was from the Book of Isaiah
where it is written: "The Spirit of the Lord God is upon me, because the
Lord has anointed me to bring good tidings to the afflicted; he has
sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the
captives, and freedom to those in captivity; to proclaim the year of the
Lord's favour" (Is 61:1-2). A "year of the Lord's favour" or "mercy":
this is what the Lord proclaimed and this is what we wish to live now.
This Holy Year will bring to the fore the richness of Jesus' mission
echoed in the words of the prophet: to bring a word and gesture of
consolation to the poor, to proclaim liberty to those bound by new forms
of slavery in modern society, to restore sight to those who can see no
more because they are caught up in themselves, to restore dignity to all
those from whom it has been robbed. The preaching of Jesus is made
visible once more in the response of faith Christians are called to
offer by their witness. May the words of the Apostle accompany us: He
who does acts of mercy, let him do them with cheerfulness (cf. Rom
12:8).
The season of Lent during this Jubilee Year is to be lived more intensely, with emphasis on the Sacrament of Reconciliation:
The season of Lent during this Jubilee Year should also be lived more
intensely as a privileged moment to celebrate and experience God's
mercy. How many pages of Sacred Scripture are appropriate for meditation
during the weeks of Lent to help us rediscover the merciful face of the
Father! ... The initiative of "24 Hours for the Lord," to be
celebrated on the Friday and Saturday preceding the Fourth Week of Lent,
should be implemented in every diocese. So many people, including the
youth, are returning to the Sacrament of Reconciliation; through this
experience they are rediscovering a path back to the Lord, living a
moment of intense prayer and finding meaning in their lives. Let us
place the Sacrament of Reconciliation at the centre once more in such a
way that it will enable people to touch the grandeur of God's mercy with
their own hands. For every penitent, it will be a source of true
interior peace.
During Lent, Pope Francis will send out Missionaries of Mercy:
During Lent of this Holy Year, I intend to send out Missionaries of
Mercy. They will be a sign of the Church's maternal solicitude for the
People of God, enabling them to enter the profound richness of this
mystery so fundamental to the faith. There will be priests to whom I
will grant the authority to pardon even those sins reserved to the Holy
See, so that the breadth of their mandate as confessors will be even
clearer. They will be, above all, living signs of the Father's readiness
to welcome those in search of his pardon. ... I ask my brother Bishops
to invite and welcome these Missionaries so that they can be, above all,
persuasive preachers of mercy. May individual dioceses organize
"missions to the people" in such a way that these Missionaries may be
heralds of joy and forgiveness.
Goal of conversion in mind for those involved in criminal organizations and in corruption:
May the message of mercy reach everyone, and may no one be indifferent
to the call to experience mercy. I direct this invitation to conversion
even more fervently to those whose behaviour distances them from the
grace of God. I particularly have in mind men and women belonging to
criminal organizations of any kind. For their own good, I beg them to
change their lives. ... The same invitation is extended to those who
either perpetrate or participate in corruption. This festering wound is a
grave sin that cries out to heaven for vengeance, because it threatens
the very foundations of personal and social life. Corruption prevents us
from looking to the future with hope, because its tyrannical greed
shatters the plans of the weak and tramples upon the poorest of the
poor.
Granting of indulgences for the Jubilee:
A Jubilee also entails the granting of indulgences. This practice will
acquire an even more important meaning in the Holy Year of Mercy. God's
forgiveness knows no bounds. In the death and resurrection of Jesus
Christ, God makes even more evident his love and its power to destroy
all human sin. Reconciliation with God is made possible through the
paschal mystery and the mediation of the Church. Thus God is always
ready to forgive, and he never tires of forgiving in ways that are
continually new and surprising. ... To gain an indulgence is to
experience the holiness of the Church, who bestows upon all the fruits
of Christ's redemption, so that God's love and forgiveness may extend
everywhere. Let us live this Jubilee intensely, begging the Father to
forgive our sins and to bathe us in His merciful "indulgence."
Mercy in Judaism and Islam:
There is an aspect of mercy that goes beyond the confines of the Church.
It relates us to Judaism and Islam, both of which consider mercy to be
one of God's most important attributes. ... I trust that this Jubilee
year celebrating the mercy of God will foster an encounter with these
religions and with other noble religious traditions; may it open us to
even more fervent dialogue so that we might know and understand one
another better; may it eliminate every form of closed-mindedness and
disrespect, and drive out every form of violence and discrimination.
Towards the end of the bull, Pope Francis turns to Mary, Mother of Mercy:
My thoughts now turn to the Mother of Mercy. May the sweetness of her
countenance watch over us in this Holy Year, so that all of us may
rediscover the joy of God's tenderness. No one has penetrated the
profound mystery of the incarnation like Mary. Her entire life was
patterned after the presence of mercy made flesh. The Mother of the
Crucified and Risen One has entered the sanctuary of divine mercy
because she participated intimately in the mystery of his love.
After Mary as the Mother of Mercy, Pope extends his thoughts to
the saints and blessed ones who have made divine mercy their mission in
life. In this regard, he singles out St. Faustina:
Our prayer also extends to the saints and blessed ones who made divine
mercy their mission in life. I am especially thinking of the great
apostle of mercy, Saint Faustina Kowalska. May she, who was called to
enter the depths of divine mercy, intercede for us and obtain for us the
grace of living and walking always according to the mercy of God and
with an unwavering trust in his love.
How the Pope ends his bull:
In this Jubilee Year, may the Church echo the word of God that resounds
strong and clear as a message and a sign of pardon, strength, aid, and
love. May she never tire of extending mercy, and be ever patient in
offering compassion and comfort. May the Church become the voice of
every man and woman, and repeat confidently without end: "Be mindful of
your mercy, O Lord, and your steadfast love, for they have been from of
old" (Ps 25:6).
