As the Guadalupan Jubilee of 2031 draws near, Leo XIV has declared a jubilee year to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the current basilica at Tepeyac.
Pope Leo XIV has granted a Guadalupan Jubilee year to mark the 50th anniversary of the October 12, 1976, dedication of the current Basilica of Our Lady of Guadalupe at Tepeyac, Mexico.
Cardinal Carlos Aguiar Retes, the archbishop of Mexico, announced the news on September 9 “with profound joy and gratitude.” The jubilee will be inaugurated with a solemn Eucharistic celebration on the date of the anniversary, and will end exactly one year later.
A plenary indulgence will be granted during this jubilee year to those who visit the Basilica of Tepeyac “with devotion and a contrite spirit” and participate in a liturgy or dedicate time to prayer there. Pilgrims must also fulfill the other usual conditions for obtaining a plenary indulgence. These include freedom from all attachment to sin; confession and Holy Communion, either while visiting the Basilica or within the days immediately before or after; praying the Creed; and praying for the Holy Father’s intentions.
The current basilica, which was inaugurated nearly 50 years ago and became the new “sacred little home” of Juan Diego’s “tilma” with the image of Our Lady, replaced an earlier building. This previous construction, completed in 1709, had become both too small to welcome the growing multitudes of pilgrims, and dangerously unstable due to ground subsidence and earthquake damage.
Two Guadalupan jubilees
This jubilee corresponds to the fifth year of the nine-year novena leading up to the jubilee marking the 500th anniversary of Our Lady’s apparitions to St. Juan Diego. The novena began in Mexico four years ago. Since then, the bishops of that country have invited the bishops of the United States and Canada to join in their initiative for the remaining five years.
Bishop Oscar Cantú, chairman of the USCCB’s Subcommittee on Hispanic/Latino Affairs, presented a broad proposal for activities for participating in these years of jubilee preparation. One proposal is that each diocese “be offered an exact replica of the tilma of Our Lady of Guadalupe, printed on similar cloth and touched to the original, making it a third-class relic.” These images would be enthroned following a ritual provided in English and Spanish by the episcopal conference of Mexico, which the USCCB has already shared on its website.
