Palm Sunday

Place and Community

Palm Sunday is celebrated by Christians all over the world. It falls on the Sunday before Easter.

Dates for Palm Sunday from 2007-2020

Dates for Palm Sunday, 2007-2020
Year	Western	Eastern
2007	April 1st
2008	March 16th	April 20th
2009	April 5th	April 12th
2010	March 28th
2011	April 17th
2012	April 1st	April 8th
2013	March 24th	April 28th
2014	April 13th
2015	March 29th	April 5th
2016	March 20th	April 24th
2017	April 9th
2018	March 25th	April 1st
2019	April 14th	April 21st
2020	April 5th	April 12th

Description

Palm Sunday is a moveable feast which celebrates the Triumphal Entry of Jesus into Jerusalem in the days before his Passion. A moveable feast in Christianity is a holy day in the Christian calendar which falls around Easter. The particular day is fixed in accordance with Easter. Some other moveable feasts include Lazarus Sunday, Triumph of Orthodoxy, Ash Wednesday and All Saints Day.

Many a time it gets difficult to procure palms on that day to celebrate the occasion. It is then substituted with boughs of other native trees like willow or yew. The Sunday is therefore given names like Yew Sunday or the more general Branch Sunday. The feast finds mention in all the four Canonical Gospels, namely Mark 11:1-11, Matthew 21:1-11, Luke 19:28-44, and John 12:12-19.

The Roman Catholic Church originally called this Sunday, the Second Sunday of the Passion and later changed to Passion Sunday which led to a lot of confusion as the name was fixed for the previous Sunday or the fifth within Lent. It is now called as Palm Sunday of the Lord's Passion.

The palm fronds or the other native trees are blessed with holy water on the occasion of Palm Sunday. This occasion takes place in Roman Catholic, Anglican Church and even in Lutheran churches. Outside the church building, a procession enters re-enacting the entry of Jesus into Jerusalem while palm fronds in Oriental Orthodox churches at the sanctuary steps. Here in India, marigolds are strewn in the sanctuary itself. The procession of singers pass through and outside the church. The celebration style is slightly different in Lutheran churches where children are given palms. They also take part in the procession while adults remain seated. Many churches save these palms to be burned and used as ashes for Ash Wednesday. The color of the vestments are that of blood indicating the sacrifice of Christ. (DOU 17092007)