The Diocese of Brooklyn marked the start of a year of celebration last weekend with two special masses and a procession through the streets of Brooklyn.
Bishop Robert Brennan kicked off the Year of Jubilee 2025 on Dec. 29 with a morning mass at the Cathedral Basilica of St. James, then embarked on a march to the Co-Cathedral of St. Joseph, where he celebrated a Spanish mass with parishioners.
The day marked a momentous occasion in the Catholic church, the start of the Jubilee Year 2025. A jubilee year is declared by the pope roughly every 25 years, and the last one was celebrated by St. John Paul II in 2000, which welcomed the church into its third millennium.
The bishop led two special masses on Dec. 29. Photo courtesy of Bishop Robert Brennan/Facebook
In the Catholic faith, a jubilee year marks a time for pilgrimage, prayer, and repentance. In 2025, Catholics are encouraged to make pilgrimages to Rome to pray, attend missions and events at local churches, and do some good deeds — like visiting prisons or nursing homes and taking one day a week to fast from distractions like social media or watching TV.
Various churches around the U.S. will also be made special places of prayer for pilgrims who can’t go abroad.
“How appropriate that was as every once in a while, we have to stop in our tracks, go back, find Jesus in our lives and see him in new ways,” Brennan said in his homily. “To the faithful in Brooklyn and Queens, I extend this invitation to go forth and begin your journey as a joyful, missionary disciple of Jesus, giving witness to the tenderness and nearness of God’s own love.”
Pope Francis proclaimed 2025 as The Jubilee of Hope, with a central theme of “hope does not disappoint” and a call to Catholics worldwide to become “pilgrims of hope.”
The celebrations will continue through January 2026. Photo courtesy of John Quaglione/Brooklyn Diocese
The 2025 Jubilee Year officially started on Dec. 24th at St. Peter’s Basilica in the Vatican and will continue until Jan. 6th, 2026. Pope Francis invited pilgrims to the Vatican to walk through the Holy Door at St. Peter’s. The next Jubilee Year is not planned until 2033 to commemorate the anniversary of the crucifixion of Christ.
“This Jubilee comes at a time when the world is recovering from various crises, including the COVID-19 pandemic, and facing ongoing challenges such as social division and environmental concerns,” wrote Fr. Joseph R. Gibino, pastor of St. Charles, in an announcement of the celebration. “The theme ‘Pilgrims of Hope’ reflects the call to journey together in faith, seeking renewal and transformation.”
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An affordable housing lottery has launched for 59 apartments in the first of what will be a two-building complex in Greenpoint dubbed Greenpoint Central. Across the street from the waterfront, the development replaces NuHart Plastics, a recently demolished one-story factory well known locally for its curving Art Moderne glass-block exterior and toxic contamination.
The recently completed seven-story, 194-unit building at 75 Dupont St., which started leasing market rate units in October, sits on the eastern portion of the NuHart Plastics site. A brownfield formerly known as 26 Clay Street, it was remediated before construction started in 2022, according to Greenpointers.
While all the studio, one-, and two-bedroom apartments in the lottery are income restricted and rent stabilized, none are intended for those with very low incomes. The 30 most affordable units are for families earning 80% of the Area Median Income, with income limits set between $67,475 and $134,160 for households of one to five people, according to the Housing Connect listing.
A rendering of a bedroom in the building. Rendering courtesy of NYC Housing Connect
Nine are studios going for $1,869 a month, 15 are one-bedroom apartments priced at $1,993, and six are two-bedroom units that will rent for $2,375. The remaining apartments in the lottery are for households earning 130% AMI, or between $117,360 and $218,010 for one to five people, including five two-bedrooms priced at $4,376 a month.
Designed by architect firm Hill West, the apartments have white finishes, large windows with black frames, and open plan kitchens, renderings show. They are outfitted with quartz countertops, in-unit washers and dryers, and air conditioning.
The development will have a number of amenities including a pickleball court, pet spa, gym, yoga studio, business center, landscaped rooftop and outdoor areas, garages, bike parking, and a shared laundry room. Some amenities require an additional fee, and tenants pay for electricity.
Meanwhile, the western part of the former NuHart Plastics property, 22 Clay St., is a state Superfund site that was finishing up remediation as of October. Plans call for an eight-story, 279-unit building on the Superfund site, whose new address will be 65 Dupont St.
The development has a shared gym and other amenities. Rendering courtesy of NYC Housing Connect
Once complete, the entire complex will have 473 apartments and run the length of Franklin Avenue between Dupont and Clay streets. The two buildings will form a letter P shape around an interior courtyard. The main entrance to the development is on Dupont Street.
Renderings show an extensive, boxy development clad in white brick on the lower levels and light gray on the uppers. Rectangular windows of varying widths, setbacks, and angled surfaces provide interest. Greenery sprouts from terraces on the upper levels.
Hill West is also behind the designs for the development replacing Grand Prospect Hall in Park Slope, as well as the Olympia in Dumbo, and the Miami-inspired Ocean Drive in Coney Island, among others in Brooklyn.
The future courtyard at the development. Rendering courtesy of NYC Housing Connect
In 2012, Dupont Developers LLC purchased the NuHart site at 280 Franklin St. for $23.25 million, city records show. The following year, an illegal Halloween rave on the property was closed down by the fire department, which the building department said had found “flammable chemicals” stored behind “flammable curtains.”
The former plastics manufacturing plant left significant pollution that has been the subject of years of remediation and public concern. Prior to its 2010 designation as the NuHart Superfund Site, preservationists spent years trying to save the main factory building and its curving 1930s facade.
At one point, owner reps said the developer hoped to incorporate 280 Franklin’s distinctive curved glass-block front into the development, and plans for a five-story building were filed with the address 93 Dupont Street, but they did not move forward.
The NuHart Plastics site in 2019. Photo by Susan De Vries
In 2021, lender and developer Madison Realty Capital took over the entire site after its old owner filed for bankruptcy protection.
There has been significant local concern about the cleanup process, and NYU has conducted an ongoing health survey to measure the cleanup’s effects on local residents.
The property, which is part of the 2005 Williamsburg and Greenpoint rezoning and its Greenpoint-Willamsburg Inclusionary Housing Program, is being developed under the city’s Inclusionary Housing Program. The project is also expected to qualify for the 421-a tax break.
