2025 – Jubilee Year of Hope

As I sit down to write this message for the ‘New Year’, the wind howls and the rain is beating off the window. But there are always grounds to hope that tomorrow will be a little better (weatherwise at least).

I always think that the ‘New Year’ and particularly ‘New Years Eve’ are always threshold experiences. It’s like we are moving from one room in a big house into a different room, there is something of leaving the old behind and looking forward to what comes next. Perhaps for some the ‘room’ of 2024 has been very comfortable and cosy, for others maybe it hasn’t been so good and we are happy to leave. However, the beginning of the New Year affords us the opportunity to take one more step forward … to make ourselves at home in the room of 2025.

On the Feast of the Annunciation (2024), Pope Francis declared 2025 to be a Jubilee Year for the Universal Church. The theme chosen was “Hope – a hope that does not disappoint” and in recent weeks the Holy Father has opened the ceremonial doors of the basilicas of Rome to usher in this new hope. The Jubilee year runs up to December 28th 2025.

Our world is very much in need of hope … we hear and read so much sad news on the radio, TV and online. We may feel that there is little we can do to influence what happens around the world, but we can have a big influence on what happens in our own heart, in our own home, in the workplace, school or college. The baby Jesus, in December, could have looked at his surroundings – new born king, lying in straw, many miles from home and thought, this is ridiculous and be tempted to give up. But he didn’t. Even his going to the cross never dampened his great sense of hope. This same hope for us, if we are faithful, leads to something greater. This is our hope and joy.

As we launch out into 2025. we too are called to be a people of hope. As we cross the threshold into 2025, something new beckons – there is the invitation to leave the old behind us, particularly, if it brings us down. The challenge is to step forward with hope and with God’s blessing in our hearts.

As we begin this new year of 2025, may I take this opportunity to wish you, your family and friends every blessing for the coming year. May your hopes and dreams come true. Whether near or far, you’re never more than an online ‘click’ away from the parish of Kill, Ardclough and Johnstown – do return to this website to catch up or click the webcam and join us for Mass or any time, day or night, to say a silent prayer.
With every blessing.

Fr. Joe O’Neill