25. Here then, venerable
brothers, We have presented the entire list of what We have done or decreed
to be done, so that all the inhabitants of Our City may receive the spiritual
fruits of the Holy Year. We wish you to take the same measures so that your
people who, in the coming year will undertake holy pilgrimages to this City,
may obtain equal benefit and the same abundance of heavenly blessings. What
We have hitherto said on the subject of pilgrims making a sacramental
confession before their departure had already been decreed by the Council of
Bourges in 1584: "Whosoever makes a pilgrimage to the holy places should
be fortified by the due and complete confession of their sins and by the
sacrament of the Eucharist before they set out" (canon 2 in Harduin,
tome 10, pp. 1466f). Our predecessor Innocent XII echoes this teaching in his
proclamation of the year of Jubilee in 1700; in his proclamation, he
especially insists on a salutary expiation of sins, saying: "Be
sanctified, therefore, most beloved sons, and prepare your hearts for the
Lord. Be washed, be pure, remove your evil thoughts from God's sight and,
renewed in the spirit of your mind, be urgent in prayers, fast often, and
give alms". To prevent the conclusion that he addressed these words only
to Romans, he wisely added words to include others. "Adorned furthermore
with these ornaments of the Christian life, fortified with the aid of the
virtues, come with confidence, impetuously and with a holy speed of spirit,
to this holy city of God on earth as to the throne of grace, that you may
obtain mercy".
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