Jubilee tradition dates to 1300 AD-a developed set of practices began to form a Jubilee spirituality since the biblical Jubilee was more of an ideal than a set practice. There are both global and personal ways to respond. Brainstorm ideas for reflecting and acting on these Jubilee themes.

The spirit of the Lord God is upon me, because the Lord has anointed me; He has sent me to bring glad tidings to the lowly, to heal the brokenhearted, To proclaim liberty to the captives and release to prisoners, to announce a year of favor from the Lord.

At the end of every seven-year period you shall have a relaxation of debts, which shall be observed as follows. Every creditor shall relax his claim on what he has loaned his neighbor, he must not press his neighbor, his kinsman, because a relaxation in honor of the Lord has been proclaimed.

But during the seventh year the land shall have a complete rest, a sabbath for the Lord, when you may neither sow your field nor prune your vineyard. The aftergrowth of your harvest you shall not reap, nor shall you pick the grapes of your untrimmed vines in this year of sabbath rest for the land. While the land has its sabbath, all its produce will be food equally for you yourself and for your male and female slaves, for your hired help and the tenants who live with you, and likewise for your livestock and for the wild animals on your land.

This fiftieth year you shall make sacred by proclaiming liberty in the land for all its inhabitants. When one of your countrymen is reduced to poverty and has to sell some of his property, his closest relative, who has the right to redeem it, may go and buy back what his kinsman has sold. But if hi does not acquire sufficient means to buy back his land, what he has sold shall remain in the possession of the purchaser until the jubilee, when it must be released and returned to its original owner. When, then, your countryman becomes so impoverished beside you that he sells you his services do not make him work as a slave. Rather let him be like a hired servant or like your tenant working with you until the jubilee year, when he, together with his children, shall be released from your services and return to his kindred and to the property of his ancestors.

The spirit of the Lord is upon me; therefore he has anointed me. He has sent me to bring glad tidings to the poor, to proclaim liberty to captives, recovery of sight to the blind and release to prisoners, to announce a year of favor from the Lord.

Today this Scripture passage is fulfilled in your hearing.

The jubilee year was meant to restore equally among all the children of Israel, offering new possibilities to families which had lost their property and even their personal freedom. On the other hand, the jubilee year was a reminder to the rich that a time would come when their Israelite slaves would once again become their equals and would be able to reclaim their rights. At the times prescribed by law, a jubilee year had to be proclaimed to assist those in need.

In his providence God had given the earth to humanity, that meant that he had given it to everyone. Therefore the riches of creation were to be considered as a common good of the whole of humanity. Those who possessed these goods as personal property were really only stewards, ministers charged with working in the name of God, who remains the sole owner in the full sense, it is God’s will that created goods should serve everyone in a just way. The jubilee year was meant to restore this social justice.

All jubilees refer to the messianic mission of Christ, who came as the one "anointed" by the Holy Spirit, the one "sent by the Father". It is he who proclaims the good news to the poor. It is he who brings liberty to those deprived of it, who frees the oppressed and gives back sight to the blind (cf. Mt. 11:4-5; Lk. 7:22).In this way he ushers in "a year of the Lord’s favor," which he proclaims not only with his words but above all by his actions. The jubilee, "a year of the Lord’s favor," characterizes all the activity of Jesus.

For the church, the jubilee is precisely this "year of the Lord’s favor," a year of the remission of sins and of the punishment due to them, a year of reconciliation between disputing parties, a year of manifold conversions and of sacramental and extra sacramental penance.

From this point of view, if we recall that Jesus came to "preach the good news to the poor" (Mt. 11:5, Lk. 7:22), how can we fail to lay greater emphasis on the church’s preferential option for the poor and the outcast? Indeed, it has to be said that a commitment to justice and peace in a world like ours, marked by so many conflicts and intolerable social and economic inequalities, is a necessary condition for the preparation and celebration of the jubilee.

Thus, in the spirit of the Book of Leviticus (25:8-12). Christians will have to raise their voice on behalf of all the poor of the world, proposing the jubilee as an appropriate time to give thought, among other things, to reducing substantially, if not canceling outright, the international debt which seriously threatens the future of many nations.