Rome is getting ready for an invasion in 2025 – a peaceful invasion of 32 million pilgrims, according to the Italian statistics office. Shopkeepers, hoteliers, souvenir vendors and restaurants are looking forward to an €8 billion bonanza, with some 70 per cent of pilgrims coming from abroad. Two-and-a-half million are expected from the United States. This is in addition to the millions of tourists who visit the city annually.
According to a vague tradition, an elderly man presented himself at the court of Pope Boniface VIII (1294-1303), claiming that his father had brought him to Rome as a child to claim a Jubilee indulgence. Boniface had never heard of such a practice, but, inspired by the old man, convoked a Jubilee year, echoing the Jewish practice of cancelling debts and concluding wars every 50 years.
