When I was 12-14, I was in foster care. One family I lived with was lutheran, and the "dad" was a lutheran pastor. They actually found me about a month ago somehow, so I have been thinking a lot about them and my experience living in their home. One of the things I remember most is the time between Ash Wednesday and Easter Sunday. On Palm Sunday, Jo (the "mom") taught me to fold individual leaves from a huge palm branch she had ordered through the florist, into crosses. I should still have one in my Bible at my ex-house. I folded at least 200 for the congregation. After the sermon, we all went outside and waited for the leadership to do a procession past us.
Palm Sunday (today!)
On the Sunday through Wednesday of Holy week, Christ prepared to have his last supper with His Apostles.
In the accounts of the four canonical Gospels, Jesus' triumphal entry into Jerusalem takes place about a week before his resurrection.
According to the Gospels Jesus rode a donkey into Jerusalem, and the celebrating people there lay down their cloaks in front of him, and also lay down small branches of trees. The people sang part of Psalms 188:25 - ... Blessed is He who comes in the name of the Lord. We bless you from the house of the Lord ....
The symbolism of the donkey may refer to the Eastern tradition that it is an animal of peace, versus the horse, which is the animal of war. Therefore, a king came riding upon a horse when he was bent on war and rode upon a donkey when he wanted to point out that he was coming in peace. Therefore Jesus' entry to Jerusalem symbolized his entry as the Prince of Peace, not as a war waging king.
In many lands in the ancient near East it was the custom to cover in some way the path of someone thought worthy of the highest honor. The Hebrew Scriptures (2Kings 9:13) reports that Jehu, son of Jehoshaphat, was treated this way. Both the Synoptic Gospels and the Gospel of John report that people gave Jesus this form of honor. However, in the synoptics they are only reported as laying their garments and cut rushes on the street, whereas John more specifically mentions palm fronds. The palm branch was a symbol of triumph and victory in Jewish tradition, and is treated in other parts of the Bible as such. Because of this, the scene of the crowd greeting Jesus by waving palms and carpeting his path with them has become symbolic and important.
In the 16th and 17th century Palm Sunday was marked by the burning of a Jack 'o' Lent figure. This was a straw effigy which would be stoned and abused. Its burning on Palm Sunday was often supposed to be a kind of revenge on Judas who had betrayed Jesus. It could also have represented the hated figure of Winter whose destruction prepares the way for Spring.
On Palm Sunday, in the Roman Catholic Church, as well as many Anglican and Lutheran churches, palm fronds (or in colder climates some kind of substitutes) are blessed with an aspergilium outside the church building (or in cold climates in the narthex when Easter falls early in the year). A procession also takes place. It may include the normal liturgical procession of clergy and acolytes, the parish choir, the children of the parish or indeed the entire congregation as in the churches of the East.
In many Protestant churches, children are given palms, and then walk in procession around the inside of the church while the adults remain seated.
The palms are saved in many churches to be burned the following year as the source of ashes used in Ash Wednesday services. The Roman Catholic Church considers the palms to be sacramental. The vestments for the day are deep scarlet red, the color of blood, indicating the supreme redemptive sacrifice Christ was entering the city who welcomed him to fulfill- his Passion and Resurrection in Jerusalem.
In the Episcopal and many other Anglican churches and in Lutheran churches as well, the day is nowadays officially called The Sunday of the Passion: Palm Sunday; however, in practice it is usually termed "Palm Sunday" as in the 1928 American Book of Common Prayer and in earlier Lutheran liturgies and calendars, by way of avoiding undue confusing with the penultimate Sunday of Lent in the traditional calendar, which was "Passion Sunday."
In the Church of Pakistan (a member of the Anglicans), on Palm Sunday the faithful carry palm branches into the church, as they sing Psalm 24.
In the Russian Orthodox Church, Ukrainian Orthodox Church, Ukrainian Catholic Church, and Ruthenian Catholic Church, the custom developed of using pussy willow instead of palm fronds because the latter are not readily available that far north. There is no canonical requirement as to what kind of branches must be used, so some Orthodox believers use olive branches. Whatever the kind, these branches are blessed and distributed together with candles either during the All-Night Vigil on the Eve of the Feast (Saturday night), or before the Divine Liturgy on Sunday morning. The Great Entrance of the Divine Liturgy commemorates the "Entry of the Lord into Jerusalem", and so the meaningfulness of this moment is punctuated on Palm Sunday as everyone stands holding their branches and lit candles. The faithful take these branches and candles home with them after the service, and keep them in their icon corner as an evloghia (blesing).
In Russia donkey walk processions took place in different cities, but most important in Novgorod and, since 1558 until 1693, in Moscow. It was prominently featured in testimonies by foreign witnesses and mentioned in contemporary Western maps of the city. The Patriarch of Moscow, representing Christ, rode on a "donkey" (actually a horse draped in white cloth); the Tsar of Russia humbly led the procession on foot. Originally Moscow processions began inside the Kremlin and terminated at Trinity Church, now known as Saint Basil's Cathedral, but in 1658 Patriarch Nikon reversed the order of procession. Peter I, as a part of his nationalisation of the church, terminated the custom; it has been occasionally recreated in the 21st century.
In Oriental Orthodox churches palm fronds are distributed at the front of the church at the sanctuary steps, in India the sanctuary itself having been strewn with marigolds, and the congregation processes through and outside the church
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