Jubilee of Mercy News:1. Is the Jubilee of Mercy attracting far fewer pilgrims to Rome than expected? 2. Experimentation returns to the Papal Liturgy; Gospel accompanied by "dramatization" in Jubilee Mass for the Sick at St. Peter's

1. Is the Jubilee attracting fewer pilgrims than expected?

On June 10, Archbishop Rino Fisichella of the Pontifical Council for the New Evangelization announced that since the beginning of the current Jubilee, 9,100,935 pilgrims have visited the four Papal Basilicas - St Peter's, St John Lateran, S. Maria Maggiore and S. Paolo Fuori le Mura - and the Sanctuary of our Lady of Divine Love. The Jubilee of Mercy started on December 8, 2015 and will end on November 20, 2016, which means that we are already slightly more than halfway through the Jubilee year. While the summer season (peak season for tourists despite the heat) is still ahead, the Christmas, Lent, Holy Week and Easter seasons favored by numerous pilgrims have long been over.

Francis: "Only one who truly loves is able to forgive and forget."

A Reminder on the Jubilee of Mercy

Much has been written or posted, in this blog and elsewhere, about the unsettling circumstances attending the declaration of the Jubilee of Mercy. We have every reason to expect that under the cover of this Jubilee many things will be said and done even by the highest-ranking prelates that will only worsen the climate of heterodoxy in the Church as a whole. Rorate will continue to provide coverage of the intensifying attacks on orthodoxy that, we expect, will be perpetrated in the name of "Mercy". 

At the same time, it would be a mistake to allow our indignation and anger at the crisis in the Church and its enablers to prevent us from making use of the graces of the Jubilee. In many dioceses, the Jubilee is being marked with increased opportunities to receive the Sacrament of Penance. In this Holy Year we have almost unlimited opportunities for obtaining the Jubilee indulgence that were granted by Pope Francis on the first of September: passing through any of the numerous Holy Doors that have been opened throughout the world and the performance of the spiritual and corporal works of mercy, plus the special opportunities for indulgences granted to the sick, the elderly and the imprisoned. (Speaking of the corporal and spiritual works of mercy, Francis said that "each time that one of the faithful personally performs one or more of these actions, he or she shall surely obtain the Jubilee Indulgence".)

Exclusive Op-Ed - Pio Pace reveals for Rorate: "The Post-Synodal Exhortation has been ready since September"

We are very honored to post this new article by a very wise, knowledgeable, and highly influential cleric, writing under the pen name of don Pio Pace.

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 "The Post-Synodal Exhortation has been ready since September"

by Father Pio Pace

Will there be a Post-Synodal Exhortation of the Synod of the Family, the commentators on Vatican matters ask. In fact, it was already completely ready before the Synod! Several months before the Ordinary Assembly of the Synod of Bishops for the Family, last October, the group of Cardinal Lorenzo Baldisseri, Secretary General of the Assembly, together with men such as Abp. Bruno Forte, Special Secretary, Abp. Paglia, President of the Council for the Family, and a few others, had already established a campaign plan in four stages:

1st: Pretending to base itself on the conclusions of the Extraordinary Assembly of October 2014, the Instrumentum Laboris, the roadmap for the 2015 Assembly, was unveiled in June 2015. It was in its third part that the explosive mines were placed to destroy the bastion of traditional doctrine: regarding eucharistic access for "remarried" divorcees, the Instrumentum inserted this proposal (n. 123): "Others refer to a way of penance, meaning a process of clarifying matters after experiencing a failure and a reorientation which is to be accompanied by a priest who is appointed for this purpose. This process ought to lead the party concerned to an honest judgment of his/her situation. At the same time, the priest himself might come to a sufficient evaluation as to be able to suitably apply the power of binding and loosing to the situation."

"God is Father and Mother": as Jubilee of Mercy nears, Francis calls for "revolution of tenderness" and criticizes his own Church.

ZENIT has published an English translation of Pope Francis' interview with "Credere", the official magazine of the Jubilee of Mercy. We are posting the most important sections here; emphases ours. At the end of this article is our commentary on the extreme danger posed to Catholicity by the Pope's assertion that God is "Father and Mother". And then there is the, by now, depressingly familiar line about how the Church "excludes people" and is too legalistic, following a "hard line", "stressing only the moral rules." 

The Italian text of the interview was published on the Vatican website yesterday, December 2, 2015. We repeat: the original of this interview is on the VATICAN WEBSITE. 

Interview - SSPX Superior-General Bp. Bernard Fellay: "As a result of the Pope’s act, during the Holy Year, we will have ordinary jurisdiction."

The Superior-General of the Society of St. Pius X (SSPX), Bp. Bernard Fellay, granted an interview with many important answers (and signs...), which was released this Monday. The interview is an official one, that is, made by the Society's own news agency DICI, and was released as part of the latest "Letter to Friends and Benefactors".

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On September 1^st, Pope Francis, on his own initiative, decided to allow all the faithful to make confessions to priests of the Society of St. Pius X during the Holy Year. How do you interpret this gesture? What does it mean for the Society?

We were in fact surprised by this action of the Holy Father on the occasion of the Holy Year because we, like everyone else, learned about it through the press. How do we understand this gesture? Allow me to make use of an image. When a fire is raging, everyone understands that those who have the means to do so must endeavor to put it out, especially if there is a shortage of firefighters. So it is that through all fifty years of this terrible crisis that has shaken the Church, particularly the tragic lack of confessors, our priests have devoted themselves to the souls of penitents, invoking the case of emergency foreseen by the Code of Canon Law.

As a result of the Pope’s act, during the Holy Year, we will have ordinary jurisdiction.

URGENT: POPE FRANCIS GRANTS ABSOLUTION POWERS TO SSPX PRIESTS DURING YEAR OF MERCY (Updated: SSPX Communiqué)

MERCY

[Excerpt:]

"A final consideration concerns those faithful who for various reasons choose to attend churches officiated by priests of the Fraternity of St Pius X. This Jubilee Year of Mercy excludes no one. From various quarters, several Brother Bishops have told me of their good faith and sacramental practice, combined however with an uneasy situation from the pastoral standpoint. I trust that in the near future solutions may be found to recover full communion with the priests and superiors of the Fraternity. In the meantime, motivated by the need to respond to the good of these faithful, through my own disposition, I establish that those who during the Holy Year of Mercy approach these priests of the Fraternity of St Pius X to celebrate the Sacrament of Reconciliation shall validly and licitly receive the absolution of their sins."

Our Comment: As we at Rorate have often explained since our very first editorials on the issue in 2006-8 (and, for instance, in our February 2014 post, "Nixon goes to China: 'Pope Francis, you are the man to regularize the SSPX'"): "We have always believed that, though negotiations are important to smooth details, only a generous and kind unilateral settlement by the Supreme Legislator could get things done -- that was the only way Summorum Pontificum was promulgated as well." Pope Francis' unilateral act today proved this right one more time. And, as he said, it is an action "in the meantime", while solutions are found "in the near future", he "trust[s]."

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[Update (6:00 PM GMT): Communiqué of the General House of the SSPX:

The Society of St. Pius X learned, through the press, of the provisions taken by Pope Francis on the occasion of the upcoming Holy Year. In the last paragraph of his letter addressed September 1, 2015, to Archbishop Rino Fisichella, president of the Pontifical Council for the Promotion of the New Evangelization, the Holy Father writes:

«I establish that those who during the Holy Year of Mercy approach these priests of the Society of St Pius X to celebrate the Sacrament of Reconciliation shall validly and licitly receive the absolution of their sins.»

The Society of St. Pius X expresses its gratitude to the Sovereign Pontiff for this fatherly gesture. In the ministry of the sacrament of penance, we have always relied, with all certainty, on the extrdaordinary jurisdiction conferred by the Normae generales of the Code of Canon Law. On the occasion of this Holy Year, Pope Francis wants all the faithful who wish to confess to the priests of the Society of St. Pius X to be able to do so without being worried.

During this year of conversion, the priests of the Society of St. Pius X will have at heart to exercise with renewed generosity their ministry in the confessional, following the example of tireless dedication which the holy Curé of Ars gave to all priests.

Menzingen,

September 1, 2015] [SOURCE]

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Source: Letter of the Holy Father Francis to the President of the Pontifical Council for the Promotion of the New Evangelization at the beginning of the Extraordinary Jubilee of Mercy. Full letter below:

To My Venerable Brother

Archbishop Rino Fisichella

President of the Pontifical Council

for the Promotion of the New Evangelization

With the approach of the Extraordinary Jubilee of Mercy I would like to focus on several points which I believe require attention to enable the celebration of the Holy Year to be for all believers a true moment of encounter with the mercy of God. It is indeed my 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.