1950 -- Holy Year
As many as five million Roman Catholics are expected to make a pilgrimage to Rome during 1950—a "Holy Year" for Catholicism. It is the belief of devout papists that all who visit the four basilicas of St. Peter, St. Paul, St. John Lateran, and St. Mary Major during the year will earn plenary indulgences. Such indulgences are supposed to erase punishment from past sins, which otherwise would have to be expiated in the fires of purgatory after death.
The pope himself inaugurated the ceremonies on the "Holy Year" by opening up on Christmas eve the "holy door" of St. Peter's basilica. On Christmas eve 1950, he will wall up the door, which will then remain closed for 25 years, until the next "holy year" arrives. This traditional ceremony of Catholicism, dating back more than seven centuries, was originally planned to happen only once each one hundred years. But in 1350, Clement VI, hard pressed for money, was persuaded to shorten the interval to every fifty years. (A "holy year" is always immensely profitable to the Vatican, as we will explain in the next paragraph.) It was urged upon Clement that with the celebration coming only once a century, thousands of people would be born, live a normal life span, and die without ever having had the privilege to earn the plenary indulgences possible during holy years. Urban VI, successor to Clement, shortened the span to 33 years; then Nicholas V, in 1450, set the interval at 25 years. This is the schedule that has been followed ever since, except when some special jubilee is pronounced, as in 1933, when the pope declared a "holy year" in commemoration of the 1900th anniversary of the death of Christ.
Welcome The Dollars
Immense and elaborate preparations have been made in Rome to accommodate the influx of pilgrims from all over the earth. Every Catholic in the world who is financially able to do so will try to go to Rome this year. While there he will spend hundreds of dollars (thousands if he is able) having masses said for himself and for his loved ones. He will buy religious relics and "holy objects" by the score. Handkerchiefs, belts, buttons, icons, pins, crucifixes, and innumerable other objects which have been blessed by the Pope will be sold by the millions. Some devout American Catholics will probably purchase as many as a thousand "holy objects" to be distributed among their kin, friends, and employees; some may even purchase many times that amount, as no limit is set on the number that can be had. Is it any wonder that the Vatican looks forward with considerable relish to one of these lucrative "holy years"? And this year especially, when travel by fast transcontinental planes makes the trip possible for thousands of rich Catholics who otherwise would not have been able to take the time for the trip, the "take" for the Vatican ought to be fabulous.
In her doctrine of purgatory, Catholicism has found the fulcrum for her lever. (Archimedes said, "Give me another world as a fulcrum on which to base my lever, and I will move this earth out of its orbit.") With the threat of purgatory as an ever-present force, the hierarchy can well-nigh move her superstitious followers to make any sacrifice she may desire. Purgatory is the "other world" for which Archimedes longed. To escape the fires of that punishment, Catholics will pay all the money they have or can borrow.
Intelligent men can but be amazed at the hold this dread power has over the hearts of men. For many of the men who go to Rome will not be evil men at all; they will be misguided, devoutly religious men. Having accepted the dogma of the infallibility of the pope, they are ready to obey whatever the pope commands. They give to men all the honor and adoration that should go to God alone. They bow down and worship the creature rather than the Creator; they have changed the glory of the incorruptible God into the likeness and image of corruptible men.
Present Obligation
Catholicism today is no greater and no more firmly entrenched than was paganism in the days of Paul. As those early disciples of the Lord went forth conquering and to conquer, so must their brethren today go forth in the strength of God with the same indomitable determination, the same unshakeable resolve. What they did, their brethren can do.
But with us, as with them, it will call for toil, tears, blood, and sweat. There is no easy road to success. Breaking the hold of Catholicism is no job for weaklings or cowards. It may well be that the only road will be that same blood-soaked path the martyrs trod, a road strewn with the broken bodies of those who have died rather than forsake their Savior. If it be so, then let us all pray that there will not be lacking those who are willing to walk in their steps, to follow their example even to the stake or the gallows.
Meanwhile, however, there is a more urgent, and a less dramatic duty upon us. Whatever the years ahead may bring, the immediate need is for a whole-hearted concerted effort by every follower of Christ. Our duty is clear. The gospel of Christ, a simple gospel, unadorned by the traditions, dogmas, and institutions of men, must be preached in all the earth. It was by the preaching of this gospel that the Roman Empire was broken and finally conquered; it is by this, and this alone, that the power of Catholicism can be broken in our day. Neither laws nor armies nor organizations can break the power of Rome; the gospel of Christ can do it, and that alone.