Pope Francis to open Holy Door in Roman prison on feast of St. Stephen for 2025 Jubilee

Pope Francis opens the Holy Door in L’Aquila, Italy. / Credit: Vatican Media

Vatican City, Oct 28, 2024 / 13:25 pm (CNA).

Pope Francis will open a Holy Door in Rome’s Rebibbia prison on Dec. 26, the feast day of St. Stephen. It will be the second of five Holy Doors the Holy Father will open during the 2025 Jubilee Year of Hope taking place from Dec. 24, 2024 — Christmas Eve — to Jan. 6, 2026, the feast of the Epiphany.

The opening of the Holy Door in the Roman prison will be a “symbol of all the prisons scattered around the world,” according to Archbishop Rino Fisichella, pro-prefect of the Dicastery for Evangelization.

“In the jubilee year we are called to be tangible signs of hope for so many brothers and sisters who live in conditions of hardship,” Fisichella told journalists on Monday, directly quoting Pope Francis’ May 9 bull of indiction Spes Non Confundit (“Hope Does Not Disappoint”).

“I think of prisoners who, deprived of their freedom, daily feel the harshness of detention and its restrictions, lack of affection, and, in more than a few cases, lack of respect,” he continued.

During the 2025 Jubilee Year of Hope, Pope Francis is calling on governments worldwide to undertake initiatives to restore dignity to prisoners that “go hand in hand with a concrete commitment to respect for the law.”

“I propose to the governments that during the jubilee year they take initiatives that restore hope, forms of amnesty or pardon that help people to regain confidence in themselves and in society, ways of reintegration into the community,” the papal bull reads.

According to Fisichella, Italy is the first country to have signed a Sept. 11 “amnesty” agreement with the Vatican, which will come into effect during the holy year.

“We signed an agreement with the minister of justice of the Republic of Italy, the Honorable Carlo Nordio, and the government commissioner, the Honorable Roberto Gualtieri, to implement during the jubilee year forms of reintegration for several convicts through their employment in social commitment activities,” he stated during the Oct. 28 press briefing.

While the Dec. 26 opening of the Holy Door in the Rebibbia prison is the first time a pope has opened a Holy Door in a prison in the history of jubilees in the Catholic Church, Pope Francis opened a “door of mercy” at a Roman prison during the Jubilee Year of Mercy in 2015 as a sign of tangible sign of God’s forgiveness. 

The other four Holy Doors of the 2025 Jubilee will be located at the Basilica of St. Peter, the Archbasilica of St. John Lateran, the Basilica of St. Mary Major, and the Basilica of St. Paul Outside the Walls.