Holy door

A Holy Door (Latin: Porta Sancta) is traditionally an entrance portal located within the Papal major basilicas in Rome.

[2] One of the earliest accounts of the Holy Year dates back to a Spanish historian, traveler and pilgrim called Pedro Tafur in 1437.

He noted its existence in pagan times for all who crossed the threshold of the Puerta Tarpea, previously upon the site of the Archbasilica of St. John Lateran.

Accordingly, at the request of Emperor Constantine I, Pope Sylvester I published a Papal Bull proclaiming the same immunity from punishment for Christian sinners who took sanctuary there.

[3] The privilege was quickly abused and at some point was even commercialised, resulting in popes ordering the door to be sealed with a wall, only to be unsealed during Jubilee years.

[3] In the papal bull, Incarnationis mysterium of 29 November 1998, Pope John Paul II formally announced the Great Jubilee of 2000 saying that the Holy Door "evokes the passage from sin to grace".

[9] "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.

"[10] 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.

Until the Great Jubilee of 2000, the Pope knocked upon the door three times with a silver hammer, singing the versicle "Open unto me the gates of justice".

Pope Francis later opened the Holy Door at St Mary Major and at the Caritas center near Rome's central train station.

[14] 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 "Jubilee Year of Mercy".

[15] On 29 November 2015, prior to the official 8 December start of the Jubilee Year of Mercy, Pope Francis opened the Holy Door at the Cathédrale Notre-Dame in Bangui, Central African Republic.

[16] Holy Doors were subsequently opened in 40 different countries around the world, including locations such as Westminster Cathedral, Prinknash Abbey in Gloucestershire,[14] and St. Paul's Basilica in Toronto.

[25][26][27] The claim of a new ritual appeared to stem from a New York Post article with a misleading title referring to the opening of an additional door at a Rebibbia prison.