THE JUBILEE ALREADY EXISTS AND IS PRESENT

+ Sergio Sebastiani

All things considered, what the Great Jubilee of the Year 2000 is going to be and how it is going to be lived, we have already been fortunate enough to see in advance. It happened in Poland, in the long pilgrimage that took John Paul II to his homeland. The Jubilee dimension, indeed, the Jubilee nature of this new extraordinary visit - which followed the historic visits to Sarajevo and Beirut - was manifested from the very first steps, starting, significantly, from the International Eucharistic Congress in Wroclaw, already ideally linked to the last one of the millennium which will be held during the Holy Year in Rome.

So, an entirely jubilean pilgrimage. But with a culmination, a climax, which, in Poland, could not but be on the hill of Jasna Góra. John Paul II entrusted the entire preparation for the Great Jubilee of Christianity to the intercession of Our Lady of Czestochowa. A tender and solemn invocation: «Mother, I humbly beseech you, surround with your maternal protection the days and years which still separate us from the year 2000». And on the esplanade in Gorzow, before a huge crowd of believers, the Pope recalled once again the words uttered in the Conclave by Cardinal Wyszynski, immediately after his election: «You must now lead the Church into the new millennium».

For this mission John Paul II returned to the age-old routes of his homeland, and so that he might fulfil it to the end he beseeched the faithful to «beg God on your knees that I can succeed». Truly the Jubilee already existed and was present on the route of this pilgrimage of heart and soul which once again amazed the world, because of the extraordinary intensity of all its moments.

So it is with the Pope's visit to Poland that we open this number of Tertium Millennium, which, as well as presenting a series of significant testimonies about the figure of Jesus Christ ("But you, who do you say I am?"), presents a dossier devoted to the relationship between the Jubilee and information. A particularly important theme - we must stress - and several times at the centre of the Pope's interventions, who spoke of the "first Jubilee of the telematic age".

Because of the importance of the event, on the theme of communication it is natural to make a comparison with the Second Vatican Council. Over the last decades, technological progress has profoundly changed the already complex panorama of information. But perhaps, as far as the Jubilee is concerned, a new, different discourse is outlined not only in relation to technical means, but also to subject-matter.

For the mass-media the transition from one millennium to another - in the very middle of a technological revolution which is opening ever new frontiers - begins to demand a reflection, if not a real examination of conscience, with regard to the increasingly delicate role assigned to the communications society. On a theme like this dialogue and confrontation are the first elements for a far-reaching discourse, such as the Jubilee, already in its preparatory stage, demands.

This, above all, is the sense of the dossier which, on the other hand, intends to point out how even information can benefit from a great event like the 2000th anniversary of the birth of Christ, so that it may give itself a higher profile and resume its practice - which may have been lost to some extent - of contending with the great themes which, moreover, humanity at the end of the millennium posits more strongly.

The presentation of World Youth Day, to be held in Paris, an up-dating on the work of commissions and committees - already geared towards the second year of preparation, dedicated to the Holy Spirit - and a broad panorama of the Jubilee preparation in the world, form the other main sections of this new number of Tertium Millennium. But one new venture should be mentioned in particular: the start of a Bulletin-Agency which supplements the magazine (also taking its title) and which will be published in 4 languages, every fortnight.

It is a further step forward towards a communications system whose aim is above all to impart, as well and as effectively as possible, the contents and rich spiritual significance of the Great Jubilee of the Year 2000.