Pope Francis launched the Catholic jubilee year with a ceremony at St Peter's Basilica, opening the Holy Door and calling for peace amid global conflicts.
The Eternal City has been given a facelift in preparation for the event, with monuments cleaned up and roads redesigned to improve the flow of traffic. Pope Francis opened the “ Holy Door ” of St Peter’s Basilica on Christmas Eve, launching the jubilee year of Catholic celebrations set to draw millions. The 88-year-old pontiff, who has recently been suffering from a cold, was pushed in a wheelchair up to the huge, ornate bronze door and knocked on it, before the door opened.
In a ceremony watched on screens by thousands of faithful outside in St Peter’s Square, the Argentine pontiff went through the door followed by a procession, as the bells of the basilica tolled. Over the next 12 months, Catholic pilgrims will pass through the door – which is normally bricked up – by tradition benefiting from a “plenary indulgence”, a type of forgiveness for their sins. Pope Francis then presided over the Christmas Eve mass in St Peter’s, where he turned once again to the victims of war. “We think of wars, of machine-gunned children, of bombs on schools and hospitals,” he said in his homily. The pope drew an angry response from Israel at the weekend for condemning the “cruelty” of Israel’s strikes in Gaza that killed children. He was due to deliver his traditional Christmas Day blessing, Urbi et Orbi (to the city and the world), at midday on Wednesday. Some 700 security officers are being deployed around the Vatican and Rome for the jubilee celebrations, with measures further tightened following Friday’s car-ramming attack on a Christmas market in Germany. Much of Rome has also been given a facelift in preparation, with monuments such as the Trevi Fountain and the Ponte Sant’Angelo cleaned up and roads redesigned to improve the flow of traffic
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