With the crucified Christ in front of the altar, Bishop James P. Powers listens to the Mass readings for the Feast of the Holy Family during the opening of the Jubilee Year. (Diocese of Superior photo by Jen Metzger)

Jenny Snarski
Catholic Herald Staff

Writer’s Note: It was incorrectly reported in the Dec. 19 article promoting the Mass to open the Jubilee year that a holy door would be designated at the Cathedral of Christ the King.

On Sunday, Dec. 29, Bishop James P. Powers opened the Holy Door for the Ordinary Jubilee Year for the Diocese of Superior at the Cathedral of Christ the King, Superior. This act coincided with similar celebrations around the globe in Catholic cathedrals and specially appointed shrines after Pope Francis opened the Holy Door in St. Peter’s Basilica in Rome on Christmas Eve.

The solemnity of the event in Superior was aided by the presence of the Knights of Columbus honor guard, the Diocesan Chorale, four of the diocese’s five seminarians serving at the altar and numerous permanent deacons, active and retired diocesan and international priests assisting and concelebrating.

Dcn. Timothy Thom proclaimed a passage from the Gospel of John, “I am the way, and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.” After this, Diocesan Chancellor Peggy Schoenfuss read from Pope Francis’ Bull of Indiction for the Jubilee Year, “Which lays the foundation for the year’s theme ‘Pilgrims of Hope.’ Hope does not disappoint… Hope is also the central message of this Jubilee year, that in accordance with an ancient tradition the pope proclaims every 25 years.

“For everyone,” Schoenfuss read, “may this jubilee be a moment of genuine personal encounter with the Lord Jesus who is the door of our salvation, whom the church is charged to proclaim always, everywhere and to all as our hope.

“In addition to finding hope in God’s grace, we are also called to discover hope in the signs of the times that the Lord gives us, as the Second Vatican Council observed, ‘In every age the church has the responsibility of reading the signs of the times and interpreting them in light of the Gospel.”

These signs, she read, include the immense goodness present in our world, “lest we be tempted to feel ourselves overwhelmed by evil and violence.” Signs of the times which include the “yearning of human hearts in need of God’s saving presence ought to become signs of hope.

“Let us even now be drawn to this hope. Through our witness may hope spread to all those to anxiously seek it.” Schoenfuss read the conclusion, “May the way we live our lives say to them in so many words, hope in the Lord. Hold firm, take heart and hope in the Lord.”

From the Bishop’s cathedra, he prayed, “Christ is the way that leads to the Father, the truth that sets us free, the life that has overcome death,” before incensing the altar and then recessing past the full congregation to the baptismal font, where the water was blessed and a sprinkling rite performed.

At the front of the procession, a group of men carried a large crucifix that was stood upright before the altar facing the people. Behind the servers and clergy, the bishop processed back toward the altar as the chorale led the singing of “O Come All Ye Faithful.”

After Dcn. Thom proclaimed the Gospel for the Feast of the Holy Family, Bishop Powers approached the ambo to deliver his homily. He began thanking God for the good weather that permitted so many to attend the celebration and acknowledged the monthslong preparation culminating in the day’s Mass.

Then quoting Pope Francis, the bishop invited, “We must fan the flame of hope that has been given us and help everyone to gain enough strength and certainty by looking to the future with an open spirit, a trusting heart and far-sighted vision.” It was stated that restoring a climate of hope and trust could be the prelude to the renewal and rebirth that we so urgently desire.

Referencing the Holy Father’s Christmas Eve homily and opening of the Jubilee Holy Door in St. Peter’s, Bishop Powers said he reminded us “that the ultimate source of all hope is Emmanuel, our God-with-us.” He said that the message given by the angels that first Christmas night could be heard by us today “to rediscover lost hope, to renew that hope in our hearts and to sow seeds of hope among the bleakness of our time and our world…

“With haste, then, let us set out to behold the Lord who is born for us. Our hearts joyful and attentive ready to meet him and them bring hope to the way we live our daily lives,” he continued, quoting Pope Francis. “This is our task: to bring hope into the different situations of life. For Christian hope is not a cinematic ‘happy ending’ which we passively await, but rather, a promise, the Lord’s promise, to be welcomed here and now in our world of suffering and sighs. It is a summons not to tarry, to be kept back (by) our old habits, or to wallow in mediocrity or laziness. Hope calls us, as St. Augustine would say, to be upset with the things that are wrong and to find the courage to change them.

“Hope calls us to become pilgrims in search of truth, dreamers who never tire, women and men open to being challenged by God’s dream, which is of a new world where peace and justice reign.”

The bishop continued, expressing his own hope that the Holy Father’s challenge “doesn’t scare us,” because in all reality, it’s not something new, it’s what we as a diocese have been doing for the past several years now.

“We maybe didn’t call it ‘pilgrimage of hope,’ but our renewed emphasis on evangelization … to get in touch with our own faith pilgrimage, to open our eyes and our hearts to the working of the Lord, the Holy Spirit in our lives that we might better share that message of God’s love, that message of hope with others.

“How can we be pilgrims of hope if we don’t know that foundation of hope?” Bishop Powers asked, “Where we don’t know that promise? That gift of God’s love and mercy in our lives?”

He stated that every baptized person is called to be a prophet of God’s love and hope, a privileged duty to gently invite and welcome others back home. The bishop also commented on the diocesan participation in both the Synod on Synodality process and the National Eucharistic Revival, commenting, “How beautifully all of these things come together today on this feast of the Holy Family of Jesus, Mary and Joseph.”

The bishop added that this feast reminds not only of the importance of family but that the Holy Family was a real family like ours. He said how easy it is to get lost in the beauty and serenity of the Christmas story’s seeming perfection, but that we need to remember the Holy Family wasn’t saved from all struggles of human life.

“Each and every one of our families is called to be holy,” he encouraged, describing the family as the place of first experiences of tenderness, forgiveness, respect and identity. He credited St. Paul’s words in the second reading to the Colossians with providing a formula: heartfelt compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness, patience, bearing with one another and forgiving one another with love being put on over all.

“That is the bond of perfection and let that peace of Christ control your hearts – the peace into which you are also called in one body to be thankful,” he concluded.

“If we do this,” the bishop assured, “we will be pilgrims of hope, not just for this year but for every single day of our lives. The love, the respect, the hope that we live will naturally spill out to all we come in contact with.”

Bishop Powers acknowledged that not everyone would be able to make a pilgrimage to Rome or the Holy Land during the Jubilee year but invited all to make a pilgrimage to the Cathedral or St. Joseph’s Church in La Pointe on Madeline Island. He noted that the historic native parish dates back to 350 years before the diocese was even established. He also offered the three Marian shrines in Wisconsin as worthy of pilgrimage: the National Shrine of Our Lady of Champion near Green Bay, Holy Hill near Milwaukee and the Shrine of Our Lady of Guadalupe in La Crosse.

If none of those are possible, he suggested making a personal pilgrimage to a neighboring parish for Eucharistic adoration with the spiritual mindset behind the effort as one of being a hope-filled people “to see and to understand anew that we’re created for so much more than what this world can offer.”

Bishop Powers reflected, “If our hope is on the things of this world, we’re never going to be satisfied or have enough, because we’re always going to be hoping for that one more, that one bigger, that one better thing.” It is hope in God, he said, that brings us comfort and allows us to be a sign and witness of hope to others.

The bishop’s final reflection was on the Eucharist and how receiving the source of hope and author of life can sustain the witness to hope that we can offer to all we come into contact with. In this way we can fulfill “that call of the Holy Father,” Bishop Powers asserted, to be pilgrims of hope, not passively waiting but knowing that God has blessed and commissioned us, “sent us forth to proclaim the gift of his love, the gift of his hope.

“May God bless us, and may we know that blessing as never before,” he concluded.

More information about the Jubilee celebrations in the Diocese of Superior can be found at catholicdos.org/2025-jubilee-year, see the “Jubilee Handbook.”