2024 - Year of Prayer

Holy Mass for the 60th Anniversary of the Second Vatican Council (11 February 2022)

 

After the year dedicated to reflection on the documents and the study of the fruits of the Second Vatican Council in 2023, Pope Francis has asked that 2024 be marked as a Year of Prayer. The Holy Father announced its launch on Sunday 21 January 2024, on the fifth annual celebration of the ‘Sunday of the Word of God’. Previously, in a letter written on 11 February 2022, addressed to the Pro-prefect, Archbishop Rino Fisichella, to entrust the organization of the Jubilee to the Dicastery for Evangelization, the Pope wrote: “From now on I am happy to think that the year preceding the Jubilee event, 2024, will be dedicated to a great ‘symphony’ of prayer. First of all, to recover the desire to be in the presence of the Lord, to listen to him and adore him.” In preparation for the Jubilee, therefore, individual dioceses are invited to promote the centrality of individual and community prayer during this year.

The Dicastery has made some useful resources available to help people to better understand and rediscover the value of prayer. In addition to the 38 catecheses on Prayer that Pope Francis himself presented from 6 May 2020 to 16 June 2021, a series of booklets entitled, "Notes on Prayer" is being published by the Vatican publishing house, Libreria Editrice Vaticana. The eight titles are designed to put the need for a profound relationship with the Lord back at the center of people’s lives, through the many forms of prayer to be found in the rich Catholic tradition of prayer. In addition, a pastoral aid is available online, in a digital version, to help parish communities, families, priests, cloistered nuns and young people to become more aware of the need for daily prayer.

Discover the “Notes on Prayer”

The “Notes on Prayer” series, promoted by the Dicastery, is made up of eight short booklets, available to Episcopal Conferences and diocesan communities. This is a useful aid to help people to deepen and rediscover the centrality of prayer in the various forms that the Spirit has inspired and continues to inspire. 

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"Teach Us to Pray" Resource Now Available

The "Teach Us to Pray" pastoral resource is now available online, and can be downloaded on the website in digital format in several languages, free of charge.

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Translations of the “Notes on Prayer” series

The volumes will be available soon:

-    in English, translated by the Indian Episcopal Conference

-    in Spanish: published by Biblioteca de Autores Cristianos and Sociedad de     San Pablo and translated by the Mexican Episcopal Conference

-    in Portuguese, translated by the Brazilian Episcopal Conference

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