The tradition of visiting seven churches during the Lenten Season, particularly on Holy Thursday, symbolizes a pilgrimage to reflect on Jesus’ final journey from arrest to crucifixion, with each church representing a significant event in that period. The practice is rooted in the idea of accompanying Jesus on his journey from the Last Supper to his crucifixion, with each church representing a different station or event, namely: Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane, Jesus bound and taken before Annas, Jesus taken before the High Priest Caiaphas, Jesus taken before Pilate, Jesus taken before Herod, Jesus taken before Pilate again and Jesus given the crown of thorns and led to his crucifixion.
The Spanish friars and missionaries brought this practice to the archipelago and have become a Holy Week tradition. The number of churches to visit, be it seven or 14, corresponds to the significant events I mentioned above or some faithful associate it to the Seven Last Words of Jesus or the Seven Holy Wounds of Jesus. Some choose to visit 14 churches to match the 14 Stations of the Cross. A popular variation of Visita Iglesia is “Bisikleta Iglesia,” where pilgrims cycle along a route covering seven churches, praying the Stations of the Cross as a group. On Holy Thursday, after the Mass of the Lord’s Supper, the Blessed Sacrament is placed on the Altar of Repose for adoration. Jesus asked his disciples to stay and watch with Him while they were in the garden, and that’s why we have Adoration after Mass until midnight every year on Holy Thursday and people pray before the Blessed Sacrament.
The Seven Churches Visitation (or Pilgrimage) is credited as beginning in Rome with St. Philip Neri around 1553 in order to combine conviviality and the sharing of a common religious experience through discovering of the heritage of the early Saints. St. Philip Neri would lead groups of faithful to visit each of the seven basilicas of Rome on Holy Thursday night as a way of keeping watch with Christ as though at the Garden of Gethsemane before his passion. The Saint drew up an itinerary that included visits to St. Peter’s Basilica, then St. Paul Outside-the-Walls (San Paolo fuori le mura,) St. Sebastian’s (San Sebastiano,) St. John Lateran (San Giovanni Laterano,) Holy Cross-in-Jerusalem (Santa Croce in Gerusalemme,) St. Lawrence-Outside-the Walls (San Lorenzo fuori le mura) and finally St. Mary Major (Santa Maria Maggiore.) The first station of the Pilgrimage to the Seven Churches is St. Peter’s Basilica, the biggest and the most important church in Christendom and the spiritual center of Christianity. Others soon began to make this pilgrimage, and it became a communal practice, stopping along the roughly 20-kilometer road to pray, sing songs, and reflect. Today, the Lenten devotion is primarily practiced in Latin America, Italy, Poland, and the Philippines.
This time, a year-long Pilgrim Church Visitation were chosen by each Diocese as a celebration of the Jubilee year 2025. This is not only during Lenten Season but throughout the year until the Jubilee Year of 2025 will conclude on Sunday January 6, 2026. Pope Francis opened the Holy Door at St. Peter’s Basilica, inaugurating the Ordinary Jubilee Year of Hope beginning with the opening of the Holy Door of St. Peter’s Basilica on Christmas Eve 2024. The Holy Father has announced that 2025 will be a Jubilee Year, something which happens every 25 years. The theme for Jubilee 2025 is “Pilgrims of Hope,” and it will be a year of hope for a world suffering the impacts of war, the ongoing effects of COVID-19 pandemic, and the climate crisis. Pope Francis encourages people to “fan the flame of hope” and look to the future with an open spirit, a trusting heart, and far-sighted vision. The Holy Year is a time to focus on prayer, pilgrimage, and sacramental repentance.
Unlike the traditional Visita Iglesia where the faithful visit multiple churches, traditionally seven, on Maundy Thursday or any day during Holy Week, the faithful is not obligated to visit all pilgrim churches within the diocese in a single day during the Jubilee Year; the tradition of “Visita Iglesia” allows for flexibility in timing and the number of churches visited, with the focus on prayer and reflection, not to complete a specific number of churches within a set timeframe. The number of churches visited can vary based on individual devotion and physical ability, with some visiting more churches and others focusing on a smaller number.
A Jubilee Year is a special year of grace and conversion, celebrated every 25 years by the Catholic Church. It’s a time for prayer, pilgrimage, and sacramental repentance, aiming to inspire holiness and strengthen the Church’s witness to God’s mercy. The concept of “Jubilee” has its origins in the Book of Leviticus (chapter 25) as a special year of reconciliation, pilgrimage, and coming home. This chapter focuses on sin offerings, specifically for unintentional sins committed by individuals. Leviticus chapter 25 details the year of Jubilee, a special year of release and restoration, including the return of land to original families and the freeing of slaves. Hebrew law, as prescribed in Leviticus 25 and 27, declared every fiftieth year to be a jubilee year during which time slaves would be emancipated, debts would be forgiven, and even the land would be allowed to rest. “And you shall hallow the fiftieth year and proclaim liberty throughout the land to all its inhabitants; it shall be a jubilee for you, when each of you shall return to his property and each of you shall return to his family” (Leviticus 25, 8-10).
The early Christian Church adopted the idea of a Jubilee year, but initially, the frequency was not fixed. In the Christian era, after the first Jubilee of 1300, Pope Boniface VIII fixed the frequency of Jubilee celebrations to every 100 years. Instead of focusing on freeing slaves, the Christian version offered liberation from sins, and from the punishment due to sin that must be faced in Purgatory. Following a plea from the people of Rome to Pope Clement VI (1342), the frequency was reduced to every 50 years. In 1389, in remembrance of the number of years in the life of Christ, Pope Urban VI chose to set the Jubilee cycle to every 33 years and called for a Jubilee in 1390—though it was only celebrated after his death by Pope Boniface IX. Despite this, in 1400, at the end of the previously fixed 50-year period, without having declared a Jubilee ahead of time, Pope Boniface IX granted a Jubilee indulgence to the pilgrims who had flocked to Rome.
In 1425, Pope Martin V celebrated a new Jubilee, opening the holy door of St John Lateran for the first time. The last to celebrate a Jubilee on the 50-year cycle was Pope Nicholas V in 1450. Pope Paul II extended the inter-jubilee period to 25 years, and in 1475 a Holy Year was celebrated by Pope Sixtus IV. From then on, ordinary Jubilees were held at regular intervals. Unfortunately, the Napoleonic wars prevented the celebrations of the Jubilees of 1800 and 1850.
The Jubilees were resumed in 1875, after the annexation of Rome to the Kingdom of Italy, although that year it was celebrated without the traditional solemnity. Today, the Catholic Church celebrates the Ordinary Jubilee years every 25 years, a shift from the Old Testament’s 50-year cycle, due to a gradual evolution of the practice. However Special or Extraordinary Jubilees (outside of the 25-year cycle) are not predetermined and can be announced by the Pontiff in the event or events of particular importance. The last extraordinary Jubilee was that of 2015 wanted by Pope Francis from December 8, 2015 – November 20, 2016, in the Bull of Indiction, Misericordiae vultus a Holy Year of Mercy, to highlight the Catholic Church’s “mission to be a witness of mercy.” This year, the Ordinary Jubilee Year of Hope will conclude on January 6, 2026.
Traditionally during a Jubilee year, the Holy Door of the Basilica of St. Peter is opened. The doors are normally sealed by mortar and cement from the inside so that they cannot be opened. They are ceremonially opened during Jubilee years designated by the Pope, for pilgrims who enter through those doors to piously gain the plenary indulgences attached with the Jubilee year celebrations. During the Extraordinary Jubilee Year of Mercy and this year’s Ordinary Jubilee Year of Hope, Pope Francis expanded the tradition by having each Latin Catholic Diocese throughout the world designate Holy Doors on local pilgrim churches so that Catholics could gain the plenary indulgences granted during the Jubilee year without having to travel to Rome. The Holy Door represents Jesus as the “door” to salvation, inviting people to enter into a deeper relationship with God and experience his boundless mercy.
A Holy Door is a visual symbol of internal renewal, which begins with the willing desire to make peace with God, reconcile with your neighbors, restore in yourself everything that has been damaged in the past, and reshape your heart through conversion. In John 10:9, Jesus is quoted as saying, “I am the gate. Whoever enters through me will be saved.” In Luke 11:9 is found, “And I tell you, ask and you will receive; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you.” Revelations 3:20 says, “Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, (then) I will enter his house and dine with him, and he with me.”
The most distinctive feature in the ceremonial of the jubilee is the unwalling and the final walling up of the “holy door” in each of the four great basilicas which the pilgrims are required to visit. While the focus is on the Holy Doors in Rome, bishops worldwide are encouraged to designate their cathedrals or significant churches as special pilgrimage sites. In the Philippines hundreds of churches around the country have been designated as Jubilee Churches, each with a Holy Door for pilgrims to enter. This initiative aims to provide opportunities to the faithful for spiritual renewal and the experience of God’s mercy. What makes this year special is that instead of confining pilgrims to the Holy Door in Rome, Pope Francis made the Holy Door accessible to selected churches in the Philippines and around the world. This makes it available for pilgrims who do not have the time or means to come to Rome to enjoy the indulgences attached to it. The doors represent the passage to salvation Jesus opened to humanity. It is mercy in action!
The tradition of Holy Doors dates back to the 1300s, when Pope Boniface VIII convoked a holy year, and they are typically opened in 7 major basilicas like St. Peter’s Basilica in Rome, Basilica of St Paul Outside the Walls, Basilica of St. John Lateran and Basilica of Saint Mary Major being central, and the other three Basilica of Holy Cross in Jerusalem, Basilica of Saint Lawrence Outside the Walls and Basilica of St Sebastian Outside the Walls. The first station of the Pilgrimage to the Seven Churches is St. Peter’s Basilica, the spiritual center of Christianity. The beauty and the grandeur of St. Peter’s Basilica help us to contemplate the omnipresence of God, the creator of all beauty, to participate in the great experience of faith, thus inducing a desire for heaven.
Aside from the Holy Doors of the 4 Major Basilicas of St. Peter, St. John Lateran, St Paul Outside the Wall and St. Mary Major all in Rome, there were other Holy Doors canonically designated by the Holy See in PERPITUITY including one in the Philippines when Pope Benedict XVI granted a holy door to the Pontifical University of Santo Tomas in Manila, Philippines on 21 December 2010, to honor the university’s 400th anniversary in 2011. In October 2015, a temporal privilege was extended by Pope Francis through the Papal bull of Indiction, “Misericordiae Vultus” for an ordinary bishop to designate his own Holy Door for the purpose of the “Extra Jubilee Year of Mercy”. Holy Doors were to be designated in every diocese throughout the world and could be located at the diocesan Cathedral or at other popular church shrines. And this year, the same temporal privilege is granted to the bishops of each Diocese to choose Pilgrim Churches throughout the Philippines and the entire Catholic Church. Although there isn’t a specific requirement for each diocese to have exactly seven. The Dioceses of Iba and Marbel have one each while the Dioceses of Cebu and Daet has 31 Pilgrim Churches in all. More Dioceses have 7 Pilgrim Churches including the Diocese of Legaspi. This Jubilee Year of Hope, Pope Francis will open 5 Holy Doors in Rome beginning with the holy door at the Basilica of St. Peter at the Vatican and concluding with the 3 other papal basilicas in Rome (St. John Lateran, St Paul Outside the Wall and Mary Major) and an Italian prison, the Rebibbia New Complex Prison, as a symbolic gesture of hope and closeness to prisoners.
Pope Francis officially declared 2025 a Year of Jubilee with a papal bull, titled meaning “Hope Does Not Disappoint.” Pope Francis is calling on all Catholics to renew in the hope of Christ, using St. Paul the Apostle as a guide for this special year. A special Jubilee prayer reflects the essence and theme of the 2025 Jubilee’s Pilgrim of Hope.
The Jubilee Prayer
Father in heaven, may the faith you have given us in your son, Jesus Christ, our brother, and the flame of charity enkindled in our hearts by the Holy Spirit, reawaken in us the blessed hope for the coming of your Kingdom.
May your grace transform us into tireless cultivators of the seeds of the Gospel. May those seeds transform from within both humanity and the whole cosmos in the sure expectation of a new heaven and a new earth, when, with the powers of Evil vanquished, your glory will shine eternally.
May the grace of the Jubilee reawaken in us, Pilgrims of Hope, a yearning for the treasures of heaven. May that same grace spread the joy and peace of our Redeemer throughout the earth. To you our God, eternally blessed, be glory and praise for ever. Amen
The Jubilee Year 2025 logo, designed by Italian artist Giacomo Travisani, features four stylized figures representing humanity, embracing each other, and clinging to a dynamic cross that bends towards humanity, symbolizing solidarity, fraternity, faith, and hope, with the Latin motto “Peregrinantes in Spem” (Pilgrims of Hope).
Here’s a more detailed breakdown of the logo’s elements and their meanings: Four Figures: The four stylized figures represent all of humanity, coming from the four corners of the earth, embracing each other to symbolize the solidarity and fraternity that should unite all peoples. The Cross: The cross, a symbol of faith and hope, is dynamic, bending down towards humanity, offering certainty and hope. The lower part of the cross is elongated into the shape of an anchor, a well-known symbol of hope, which is let down into the rough waves below. Rough Waves: The rough waves under the figures symbolize that life’s pilgrimage is not always smooth, and that often the circumstances of daily life and events in the wider world require a greater call to hope. Motto: The Latin motto “Peregrinantes in Spem” (Pilgrims in Hope) conveys the spiritual theme of the Jubilee Year. And the color: The motto is printed in green, the color of hope.
Legazpi Bishop Most Rev. Joel Z. Baylon, D.D., through Diocesan Circular No. 37, s. 2024, announced the designation of seven Jubilee Churches in the Diocese of Legazpi for the diocesan pilgrimage route, known as the “Camino de Esperanza” for the 2025 Jubilee of Hope. The seven designated Jubilee churches include: 1. Parish Church of Saint James the Greater, Libon, Albay Parish Church of Saint Stephen the Proto-martyr, Ligao City 3. Parish Church and Diocesan Shrine of Saint Vincent Ferrer, San Vicente, Tabaco City 4. Parish Church and Diocesan Shrine of Our Lady of Salvation, Joroan, Tiwi, Albay 5. Parish Church and Diocesan Shrine of Saint Padre Pio, Rawis, Legazpi City 6. Filipino-Chinese Personal Parish Church and Diocesan Shrine of Saint Jude Thaddeus, Lapu-Lapu Street, Legazpi City and 7. Cathedral Parish of Saint Gregory the Great, Legazpi City. The Bishop also announced that a Plenary Indulgence would be granted to pilgrims who will visit the designated churches and meet the usual conditions, such as sacramental confession, reception of the Eucharist, and prayers for the intentions of the Holy Father.
To properly visit pilgrim churches, prepare spiritually with prayer and reflection, obtain a Pilgrim’s Passport (if offered), engage in prayer and adoration at each church, and consider attending Mass and seeking reconciliation.
Here’s a more detailed breakdown:
Spiritual Preparation:
Prayer and Reflection: Before starting your pilgrimage, spend time in prayer, seeking God’s guidance and reflecting on the intentions you wish to bring before Him. Intention: Consider what you hope to gain from the pilgrimage and pray for those intentions throughout your journey.
Obtaining a Pilgrim’s Passport (if applicable): Check for Availability: Some churches offer Pilgrim’s Passports, which guide you through the pilgrimage and allow you to collect stamps from each church visited. Request at the First Church: At your first church visit, inquire about a Pilgrim’s Passport and obtain one if available. Get Your Passport Stamped: After completing your visit and prayers at each church, have your Pilgrim’s Passport stamped by a church official.
Loving God, thank you for this pilgrimage of Hope, a journey that will bring us closer to you and to each other. We are grateful for the blessings we will receive and the spiritual growth we will experience. May we carry the lessons and graces of this journey with us, and may we continue to grow in faith, Hope and love. Amen.
Researched, Prepared, Revised and Posted by Doc Bobby for the St. Joseph Association of Ligao, The St. Stephen The Protomartyr Parish and Pilgrim Church. Ligao City, Albay, Philippines. March 28, 2025.
