Like many other periods in history, the years leading up to 1300 were dark ones. Wars and disease raged through Europe, leaving Christians dispirited and looking for relief from their suffering. In 1299, groups of believers decided to make a pilgrimage, on foot, to Rome to pray at the tombs of Sts. Peter and Paul, asking for their intercession for the grace and strength to sustain them. So many pilgrims came, and so impressed was Pope Boniface VII by their faith, that he decided to declare the following year, 1300, as a Jubilee, “a year of forgiveness for all sins.”