Pope opens the Holy Doors for 2025 Jubilee Year

Pope opens the Holy Doors for 2025 Jubilee Year

By Brian Swanson

With the Holy Year just a few weeks old a growing number of groups throughout the Archdiocese have already answered the Holy Father’s call to be Pilgrims of Hope and join him in Rome for the 2025 Jubilee Celebrations.

By the end of January a million pilgrims had already crossed through the Holy Door of St Peter’s, which was opened by the Pope on Christmas Eve.

Archbishop Nolan will lead the Archdiocese’s Jubilee pilgrimage from September 19th–26th.

The Archdiocesan Youth Office is organising a pilgrimage from Glasgow to coincide with World Youth Day. Pope Francis has invited young people from across the world to join him in Rome from July 28–August 3, 2025.

RCAG Youth will take a group of 18 to 30 year olds on this pilgrimage. Just a few places are left so please enquire now if you want to go by emailing youth@rcag.org.uk

The Bishops’ Conference of Scotland has also given details of its national pilgrimage plans.

Scheduled to take place from 5th to 12th September, pilgrims will spend four nights in Rome and three in Assisi at a cost of approximately £1,400 per person, with a single-room supplement of £168.

More information is available from Jim McKelvie, the Scottish Delegate for the Holy Year 2025, by email at j.mckelvie@holyyear2025.org.uk or by phone 07957 847290.

The Scottish Catholic Education Service is putting the finishing touches to its pilgrimage plans and expects to give details soon.

Individual parishes are also organising Holy Year pilgrimages.

The pilgrimage from Immaculate Conception, Maryhill, will take place from 26th September until October 3 with more details available from Alba Tours by emailing annemariecairns@yahoo.co.uk

At Holy Cross, Croy, Parish Priest Canon Tom White is hoping to announce details soon of a pilgrimage planned for October.

Pilgrims planning to visit the Eternal City privately should consult the website www.iubilaeum2025.va/en.html to book a passage through the Holy Doors of the Roman basilicas.

You can also download the phone app ‘Iubilaeum25’ to obtain a QR code to be shown when arriving at the various holy doors.

Book now for Glasgow pilgrimage to Lourdes

Details of this summer’s Archdiocesan Lourdes Pilgrimage have now been finalised, with direct flights from Glasgow leaving on Wednesday 16 July and returning on Wednesday July 23.

Instead of leaving on Fair Friday in July – as has been tradition since the first pilgrimage in 1948 – the new midweek option is designed to make travelling simpler and cheaper for pilgrims to visit the famous French shrine.

Led by Archbishop Nolan, the theme of the pilgrimage this Holy Year will be ‘With Mary, Pilgrims of Hope.’

The arrangements have once again been put in place by Joe Walsh Tours, and costs start at £949 which includes transfers, seven nights accommodation based on sharing twin/treble rooms at Hotel Eliseo (£1,045pps) or Hotel Agena (£949pps), breakfast, lunch and dinner every day, full religious programme and a guided visit to the Sanctuaries, Grotto, Baths and Basilicas.

For more details email info@joewalshtours.co.uk or Freefone 08081890468.

To express an interest in joining the pilgrimage contact the pilgrimage office, before March 31st, on 0141 226 5898 or email pilgrimage@rcag.org.uk

SCIAF’s 60th year starts with a letter from the Pope

By Brian Swanson

SCIAF – the official aid agency of the Catholic Church in Scotland – has been congratulated on 60 years of service to the world’s poor by none other than the Pope himself.

Pope Francis sent a Papal blessing from Rome to the humanitarian charity, which was founded in Rutherglen back in 1965.

Since then, SCIAF has transformed the lives of millions of people in some of the world’s poorest places.

Pope Francis sent his “prayerful greetings and good wishes” that the “members and supporters will become even more courageous in serving the world’s poor with the same fraternal spirit of care and closeness … as the Good Samaritan.”

SCIAF’s Chief Executive Lorraine Currie said: “To receive this Papal Blessing from his Holiness means so much to me, our staff and I’m sure everyone associated with our amazing charity.

“This is a recognition of the amazing dedication of our staff, our local partners and especially our supporters, not just current but everyone who has worked in our name for the last six decades.”

SCIAF is marking its 60th anniversary in 2025 with a number of events and campaigns across the year. Alongside calling on supporters to do a “60 for 60” challenge to raise vital cash for the charity, SCIAF has recently launched a new campaign calling on world leaders to cancel unjust global debts which trap countries in cycles of poverty.

Lorraine said: “Our motto for the 60th anniversary is ‘A Better World is Possible.’ Thanks to the work of SCIAF, the world is now a better place than it was 60 years ago. There’s a lot more work still to do, but we believe that we can build a world free from poverty and injustice.”

Archbishop’s Holy Land peace pilgrimage

By Ronnie Convery

Do not be afraid to walk in the land of Jesus … that’s the message of Archbishop Nolan following his visit with an international group of bishops to the Holy Land.

The Bishops from Europe and America were able to experience first-hand the sense of hope which fills the air following the ceasefire between Israel and Hamas.

“The atmosphere was calm,” said the Archbishop on his return, “and there is a lot of hope… but not much optimism. The fear of Palestinian Christians is that until there is new leadership on both sides of the divide, no long term planning can take place.”

The group were able to catch up via video call with Fr Gabriel Romanelli – the Parish Priest of Gaza who visited Glasgow last year and charmed all he encountered with his gentle pleas for peace.

Archbishop Nolan said: “He seemed well and said that he was finally able to sleep a bit better since the violence has stopped. Many Christians have been sheltering in the church complex in Northern Gaza and from there Fr Gabriel has been directing an operation to support 60,000 Gazans a month.

“Despite the devastation around them, he told us his people’s first priority is education for their children. Before the war there were three Catholic schools … one has been destroyed by bombing, one is badly damaged and the third is used as a shelter for homeless victims of the violence. The totally destroyed school belongs to the Rosary sisters. They left Gaza during the conflict. No one knows if they will return.

“Now the parish wants to find a way to allow schooling to resume in Gaza and restore some form of educational provision for the children. That kind of commitment is so impressive.”

The bishops also met with the most senior Catholic in the Holy Land, the Patriarch of Jerusalem, Cardinal Pierbattista Pizzaballa. Cardinal Pizzaballa, who is from Bergamo in northern Italy, reminded the bishops of the importance of providing aid to the small Christian community of the Holy Land. He had been able to channel funds to Gaza during the war to support humanitarian efforts.

Archbishop Nolan shared with the Patriarch the concerns of people in Glasgow for the people of their twin city of Bethlehem and the wider territory. He was told that 140 Christian families have left Bethlehem in the last year alone, further diminishing the Christian presence in the city.

He said: “The Patriarch’s plea was for Christians to return on pilgrimage to the Holy Land. There is a very real fear that people will stay away because of concerns about safety, but the strong message was that it is now safe to go.

“The Christian communities rely on pilgrimages to support their families and it was clear that many shops which once catered to the pilgrim market are now closed and boarded up.

“The Patriarch also reminded us of the importance of avoiding inflammatory language when discussing the Gaza situation… explaining that polemics are unhelpful in making practical progress towards peace.”

Later the Bishops visited other Christian sites to encourage people in the troubled region to keep going and to ensure them that they had not been forgotten. They visited the seminary, a medical facility run by the Church in Ramallah, a German pilgrim hostel and various parishes.

They held Sunday Mass in the little village of Aboud in the West Bank and the people were overjoyed to welcome their visitors – so much so that they managed to source a St Andrew’s Saltire to welcome their Scottish visitor!

Archbishop Nolan said: “Aboud does not get many visits. It’s in Palestinian territory and has a Christian majority, but the Israeli authorities have recently put a gate on the village and the day after we visited the gate was shut.

“In this way villages are isolated from each other and everyday life becomes hugely difficult. A 40-minute journey can take four hours because of security checkpoints… that is if they can leave at all.”

Despite the difficulties the Archbishop returned home with a spirit of hope – appropriately for the start of the Jubilee Year of Hope.

He told Flourish: “I have been going to the Holy Land for many years and I have to say that the life for Palestinian Christians and the wider community gets worse. People on both sides of the conflict see their own tragedies and injustices and remember their own losses and that’s very understandable.

“It will probably take a new generation of leaders on both sides to build any kind of lasting peace, but for now the ceasefire is holding and the Holy Land is open to visitors. That has got to be a real sign of hope.”