Puerta Santa de la Catedral de Santiago de Compostela

A Jacobean Holy Year (), also known as the Compostela Holy Year, is a

Catholic The Catholic Church (), also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the List of Christian denominations by number of members, largest Christian church, with 1.27 to 1.41 billion baptized Catholics Catholic Church by country, worldwid ...

celebration that takes place in the Spanish city of

Santiago de Compostela Santiago de Compostela, simply Santiago, or Compostela, in the province of Province of A Coruña, A Coruña, is the capital of the autonomous communities of Spain, autonomous community of Galicia (Spain), Galicia, in northwestern Spain. The city ...

, Galicia. It occurs in the years in which 25 July, the

Feast of Saint James The Feast of Saint James, also known as Saint James' Day, is a commemoration of the apostle James the Great celebrated on July 25 of the liturgical calendars of the Catholic Church and the Church of England. The Eastern Orthodox liturgical ...

, falls on a Sunday. This occurs with a regular cadence of (6, 5, 6, 11) years, so that fourteen Jacobean Holy Years are celebrated every century (except when the last year of a century is not a leap year, resulting in a lapse of 7 or 12 years). The celebration of each

holy year A jubilee is a special year of remission of sins, debts and universal pardon. In the Book of Leviticus, a jubilee year is mentioned as occurring every 50th year (after 49 years, 7x7, as per Leviticus 25:8) during which slaves and prisoners would ...

grants a

plenary indulgence In the teaching of the Catholic Church, an indulgence (, from , 'permit') is "a way to reduce the amount of punishment one has to undergo for (forgiven) sins". The ''Catechism of the Catholic Church'' describes an indulgence as "a remission bef ...

to all those faithful who: visit the

Santiago de Compostela Cathedral The Santiago de Compostela Archcathedral Basilica ( Spanish and Galician: ) is part of the Metropolitan Archdiocese of Santiago de Compostela and is an integral component of the Santiago de Compostela World Heritage Site in Galicia, Spain. The ...

, say a prayer (at least the

Apostles' Creed The Apostles' Creed (Latin: ''Symbolum Apostolorum'' or ''Symbolum Apostolicum''), sometimes titled the Apostolic Creed or the Symbol of the Apostles, is a Christian creed or "symbol of faith". "Its title is first found c.390 (Ep. 42.5 of Ambro ...

or the

Our Father The Lord's Prayer, also known by its incipit Our Father (, ), is a central Christian prayer attributed to Jesus. It contains petitions to God focused on God’s holiness, Will of God, will, and Kingship and kingdom of God, kingdom, as well as h ...

), and pray for the intentions of the Pope. It is also recommended to attend Holy Mass and receive the sacraments of penance and communion; that is, to confess and take communion (in the fifteen days before or after the visit to the cathedral). It is customary, moreover, to access the cathedral through the Holy Door, which is opened only on the occasion of the Holy Year.

Background

The Holy Year of Compostela was established in 1122 (to first occur in 1126) by Pope Callixtus II, who had completed a

pilgrimage A pilgrimage is a travel, journey to a holy place, which can lead to a personal transformation, after which the pilgrim returns to their daily life. A pilgrim (from the Latin ''peregrinus'') is a traveler (literally one who has come from afar) w ...

when he was Archbishop of

Vienne Vienne may refer to: Places *Vienne (department), a department of France named after the river Vienne *Vienne, Isère, a city in the French department of Isère * Vienne-en-Arthies, a village in the French department of Val-d'Oise * Vienne-en-Bessi ...

, France. On 27 February 1120, Callixtus'

bull A bull is an intact (i.e., not Castration, castrated) adult male of the species ''Bos taurus'' (cattle). More muscular and aggressive than the females of the same species (i.e. cows proper), bulls have long been an important symbol cattle in r ...

''Omnipotentis Dispositione'' elevated Santiago de Compostela to archiepiscopal dignity, transferring the metropolitan see of Mérida to this city, in accordance with the wishes of

Diego Gelmírez Diego Gelmírez or Xelmírez (; c. 1069 – c. 1140) was the second bishop (from 1100) and first archbishop (from 1120) of the Catholic Archdiocese of Santiago de Compostela in Galicia, modern Spain. He is a prominent figure in the history of ...

, the first archbishop of the

Archdiocese of Santiago de Compostela The Archdiocese of Santiago de Compostela () is a Latin Church archdiocese of the Catholic Church in Spain. It is the most senior of the five districts into which the church divides the region of Galicia.Alfonso VII of León. (Callixtus was the king's uncle, by the marriage of his brother

Raymond of Burgundy Raymond of Burgundy (c. 1070 – 24 May 1107) was the ruler of Galicia as vassal of Alfonso VI of León and Castile, the Emperor of All Spain, from about 1090 until his death. He was the fourth son of Count William I of Burgundy and Stephanie ...

with the Infanta

Urraca of León Urraca (also spelled ''Hurraca'', ''Urracha'' and ''Hurracka'' in medieval Latin) is a female first name. In Spanish, the name means magpie, derived perhaps from Latin ''furax'', meaning "thievish", in reference to the magpie's tendency to collect ...

, daughter of

Alfonso VI of León Alphons (Latinized ''Alphonsus'', ''Adelphonsus'', or ''Adefonsus'') is a male given name recorded from the 8th century ( Alfonso I of Asturias, r. 739–757) in the Christian successor states of the Visigothic Kingdom in the Iberian Peninsula. ...

.) In 1122, coinciding with the laying of the last stone of the

, Calixtus granted the privilege of regularly celebrating the Jacobean Holy Year from 1126, provided that the

(25 July) fell on a Sunday so that the same graces that were granted in Rome in the jubilee years (which were then held every 25 years) could be earned in Compostela. This privilege was confirmed and extended by later pontiffs including Pope Eugene III, and Pope Anastasius IV. Alexander III, in the bull ''Regis aeterni'' of 25 July 1178, declared the perpetual character of the privilege and equated it to those of

Rome Rome (Italian language, Italian and , ) is the capital city and most populated (municipality) of Italy. It is also the administrative centre of the Lazio Regions of Italy, region and of the Metropolitan City of Rome. A special named with 2, ...

and

Jerusalem Jerusalem is a city in the Southern Levant, on a plateau in the Judaean Mountains between the Mediterranean Sea, Mediterranean and the Dead Sea. It is one of the List of oldest continuously inhabited cities, oldest cities in the world, and ...

. Such provisions extraordinarily boosted during the Middle Ages the rise of pilgrimages from all over Europe through the

Camino de Santiago The Camino de Santiago (, ; ), or the Way of St. James in English, is a network of pilgrims' ways or pilgrimages leading to the shrine of the apostle James in the cathedral of Santiago de Compostela in Galicia in northwestern Spain, where tra ...

. Recent celebrations have been observed in 1993, 1999, 2004 and 2010. The most recent, 2021, was extended one year due to the

COVID-19 pandemic in Spain The COVID-19 pandemic in Spain has resulted in confirmed cases of COVID-19 and deaths. The virus was first confirmed to have spread to Spain on 31 January 2020, when a German tourist tested positive for SARS-CoV-2 in La Gomera, Canary Island ...

. This was the second time that the Jacobean Holy Year had been celebrated for two consecutive years. The first was during the

Spanish Civil War The Spanish Civil War () was a military conflict fought from 1936 to 1939 between the Republican faction (Spanish Civil War), Republicans and the Nationalist faction (Spanish Civil War), Nationalists. Republicans were loyal to the Left-wing p ...

, in which the holy year of 1937 was also extended throughout 1938, as granted by Pope Pius XI at the request of the Compostela prelate Tomás Muniz de Pablos. During a Jacobean holy year, pilgrims may enter the cathedral through the holy door (Porta Santa) to gain a

. During a holy year, the

lantern A lantern is a source of lighting, often portable. It typically features a protective enclosure for the light sourcehistorically usually a candle, a oil lamp, wick in oil, or a thermoluminescence, thermoluminescent Gas mantle, mesh, and often a ...

of the Berenguela Tower is lit throughout the year. otherwise it stays unlit. The light acts as a

lighthouse A lighthouse is a tower, building, or other type of physical structure designed to emit light from a system of lamps and lens (optics), lenses and to serve as a beacon for navigational aid for maritime pilots at sea or on inland waterways. Ligh ...

to guide pilgrims to the cathedral during the holy years.

Calendar calculations

The cadence (6, 5, 6, 11) of the Jacobean years during the 19th and 20th centuries can be explained by the rhythm of

leap years A leap year (also known as an intercalary year or bissextile year) is a calendar year that contains an additional day (or, in the case of a lunisolar calendar, a month) compared to a common year. The 366th day (or 13th month) is added to keep ...

and the fact that the week has seven days. If there were no leap years, there would be a Jacobean year every seven years. Because years divisible by 100 are only leap years when they are also divisible by 400, at the turn of a century a gap of seven or twelve years can be given between two consecutive holy years. If there is any alteration in the leap sequence, the cadence of the Jacobean years will also be altered. This happened with the

Gregorian reform The Gregorian Reforms were a series of reforms initiated by Pope Gregory VII and the circle he formed in the papal curia, c. 1050–1080, which dealt with the moral integrity and independence of the clergy. The reforms are considered to be na ...

of the year 1582 and, consequently, also happens in centenary years that are not multiples of 400. This table is correct for the 20th and 21st centuries, since the year 2000 was a leap year. The cadence will change in the following centuries, since the years 2100, 2200 and 2300 will not be leap years (they are evenly divisible by one hundred, but not by four hundred). The last holy year of the 21st century will be 2094; the first of the 22nd century will be 2106 (12 years later), and the following will be 2117 (11 years later), resuming the (6, 5, 6, 11) cadence. A year is a Jacobean Holy Year if and only if it is either a

common year starting on Friday A common year starting on Friday is any non-leap year (i.e. a year with 365 days) that begins on Friday, 1 January, and ends on Friday, 31 December. Its dominical letter hence is C. The most recent year of such kind was 2021, and the next one wil ...

or a

leap year starting on Thursday A leap year starting on Thursday is any year with 366 days (i.e. it includes 29 February) that begins on Thursday 1 January, and ends on Friday 31 December. Its dominical letters hence are DC. The most recent year of such kind was 2004, and the n ...

(except for special circumstances, such as for 1938 and for 2022, as noted earlier in this article). In terms of

dominical letter Dominical letters or Sunday letters are a method used to determine the day of the week for particular dates. When using this method, each year is assigned a letter (or pair of letters for leap years) depending on which day of the week the year st ...

s, the year must have dominical letter C or DC.

Other celebrations

Apart from being celebrated in Santiago de Compostela, the Jacobean Holy Year is also celebrated in other Spanish towns, such as in

Gáldar Gáldar is a town and a Spanish municipality in the north of the island of Gran Canaria in the Province of Las Palmas in the Canary Islands. Its population is (2013), Gáldar was granted the privilege by a papal bull issued by

Pope Paul VI Pope Paul VI (born Giovanni Battista Enrico Antonio Maria Montini; 26 September 18976 August 1978) was head of the Catholic Church and sovereign of the Vatican City State from 21 June 1963 until his death on 6 August 1978. Succeeding John XXII ...

in 1965, and in 1993

John Paul II Pope John Paul II (born Karol Józef Wojtyła; 18 May 19202 April 2005) was head of the Catholic Church and sovereign of the Vatican City State from 16 October 1978 until his death in 2005. In his youth, Wojtyła dabbled in stage acting. H ...

granted it in perpetuity.

References

External links

*
Official website of the Camino de Santiago in Galicia

Official website of the Jacobean Holy Year of Gáldar

''Codex Calixtinus'' Official Blog

Xacobeo 2021. Good pilgrim way

Blog of the Jacobean Holy Year, Xacobeoo

The pilgrim's website to Santiago de Compostela

Stages of the Camino de Santiago

Pilgrim's blog, Camino de Santiago.

Xacobeo Year 2021–2022, the first time it happens in the history of the Camino de Santiago
{{authority control Santiago de Compostela Jubilee (Christianity)

Background

Calendar calculations

Other celebrations

See also

Further reading

References

External links