As Year for Priests begins, Pope prepares to close Pauline Year

Vatican City, Jun 23, 2009 / 08:21 am

Right now the Church is in a period of liturgical overlap, with the Year for Priests having begun last Friday and the Year of St. Paul set to conclude on June 28. The Pope's Office of Liturgical Celebrations announced today that the Holy Father will close the Pauline Year with Vespers next Sunday.

The period of dual celebration is due to Pope Benedict XVI's desire to adhere to the liturgical feasts connected with the two saints associated with the two Years—St. Paul and St. Jean Vianney. The year dedicated to St. Paul is scheduled to conclude on the vigil of the Solemnity of Sts. Peter and Paul, while the Year for Priests was opened on the 150^th anniversary of the death of St. Jean Vianney.

The Office of Liturgical Celebrations of the Supreme Pontiff announced on Tuesday that the Year of St. Paul will officially close at 6 p.m. on Sunday, June 28, in the Roman basilica of St. Paul Outside-the-Walls with the celebration of Vespers.

The Office also gave notice that Pope Benedict will preside over a Eucharistic celebration on Monday, June 29, with the new metropolitan archbishops he has named in recent months. The Holy Father will bestow palliums—a circular band about two inches wide and made from the wool of two blessed lambs—on the new archbishops. The pallium signifies the duty of shepherding the universal Church that the archbishops are entrusted with alongside the Pope.