Praying with the Whole Church

In the Old Testament we read about Jubilee years happening every 50 years. It was an incredible year – farmers allowed a fallow year  for their land to rest, slaves were freed, debts were cancelled!

Since 1300 the Catholic Church has celebrated the tradition of a Jubilee Year. Normally it is celebrated every 25 years with the hope that every generation will be able to celebrate at least one Jubilee Year.

Some of you might remember celebrating the Jubilee Year in 2000, perhaps you even made a pilgrimage to Rome to go through the Holy Door. Or you may have celebrated the extraordinary Jubilee in 2015, the Year of Mercy.

In modern times, Jubilee Years are an opportunity for the Church and all her members to have a focussed year of pilgrimage, prayer and reconciliation.

If the Jubilee Year isn’t until 2025, you may wonder why we are telling you about it now! This is because Pope Francis has said:

We have lots of amazing prayer resources which you can access as part of a Collective Worship subscription:

• Weekly Assemblies
• Daily Classroom Prayers
• Weekly Staffroom Prayers
• Prayer Resources for Parents to use at home with their children
• And of course, past resources in the Content Library

During Summer Term 2024, through our Daily Prayer resources we will be enabling staff and pupils to experience the exciting variety and breadth of prayer in the Catholic tradition. As part of these resources, to inspire and encourage children on their journey of faith, we will be featuring short testimony videos from children, young people and adults sharing about their experiences of prayer.

Pope Francis has asked that particular focus be given to the prayer that Jesus taught His disciples – the Our Father. Therefore, as well as a couple of our weekly resources featuring the Our Father as their main inspiration, we are also creating a special one-off prayer time focussing on the Our Father.

In September 2024, we are launching our rebranded Collective Worship resources to harness the wisdom offered in the new Prayer and Liturgy Directory.

We are so grateful for all the teachers who have been part of our Collective Worship review process – we cannot wait to share more with you about the exciting developments coming within our prayer and liturgy resources!