PALM SUNDAY. - The Sunday that precedes Easter has been called, since the time of Isidore of Seville (d. 636), D. delle p. (dies palmarum). Previously, by the Latin Fathers, it was called de passione Domini; other names were Capitilavium (from the custom in Spain for catechumens to wash their head and whole body in preparation for Baptism), Pascha competentium (from the custom of the Gallican Church of giving on this day to the competentes, or candidates for Baptism, the traditio symboli) or dominica indulgentia (from the reconciliation of penitents; Lectionary of Würzburg and Sacramentary of Prague, of Isen). Today it presents three particular features: a) the blessing of the p.; b) the procession with them; c) the commemoration of the Passion of Christ in the Holy Mass.
I. THE BLESSING OF THE PALMS
It takes place before the principal Mass; branches of palm or olive are blessed, and in northern countries (from as early as the 9th century) also those of other trees, such as willow, box, yew, and even flowers (dies florum, Pascha floridum; v. Pseudo-Alcuin), both with a view to the following procession and for the use of the blessed branches as sacramentals. Originally the blessing was not given to the branches, but to those who carried them.
The blessing of the palms occurs for the first time in the 8th century in the Gallican and Mozarabic Sacramentaries (e.g., Bobbio, no. 558), and in the 9th century in the Sacramentaries of Bavaria (e.g., that of Isen or Cod. of Prague, no. 85; that of Salzburg, ed. Dold, p. 79). The formulas multiply in the following centuries. Two customs are distinguished (Hallinger): in the Romano-Frankish regions (e.g., Pseudo-Alcuin, Cluny) formulas composed of prayers alone were used in the principal church itself, whereas in the Germanic regions, in a church distinct from the principal one, a richer rite was celebrated, composed of lessons and prayers, in a form similar to that of an Ordo Missae, the Canon excepted. This rite, however, is not the remnant of a distinct Mass said in the church from which the procession set out, but, as Callevaert writes, an artificial construction for arranging the ceremonies, that is, the lessons and prayers, in a logical order. In fact the blessing begins after the Gospel with a preface, like that of the blessing of the baptismal font.
This solemn rite already occurs in a Sacramentary of the 9th century (Munich 3005), spreads with the Germanic Pontifical of the 10th-11th century, and was accepted by Rome in the 11th-12th century (v. Vetus Missale Romanum, ed. Azevedo, Rome 1752; Ordo Off. Eccl. Lat. [of 1145], ed. L. Fischer, Munich 1914).
The Roman rite of today is formed by a Missa catechumenorum, that is, by an antiphon of the Introit (Mt. 21:9; without psalm), by the prayer « Deus, quem diligere », by the reading of Ex. 15:27 and 16:1-7, by the responsory Collegium (Jo. 11:47; 49, 50, 53) or In monte Oliveti (Mt. 26:39 and 41), by the Gospel Cum appropinquasset (ibid. 21:1-9; in ancient times also Mc. 11:1 ff. or Jo. 12:12 ff.). Then follows the solemn blessing with many reminiscences of the prayers of the Greek rite. The Preface, taken from a Gallican Mass for the apostles or martyrs, adapted to the Roman rite not before the 15th century, is followed by the Sanctus, because it contains the Hosanna and the Benedictus of this day. The palms, blessed with holy water and incense, are distributed during the singing of the antiphons Pueri Hebraeorum. After a prayer the procession follows.
II. LA PROCESSIONE
It is older than the blessing of the palms and is carried out following the example of that of Jerusalem, described by Egeria in the 4th century, in imitation of Christ's triumphal entry. It first appears in Spain and in Gaul; Amalarius already mentions it as a general custom. From a church outside the city (in an elevated place to represent Bethany or the Mount of Olives), where the branches were blessed, the procession moved toward the city. The person of the Lord was represented by the book of the Holy Gospels or by a large uncovered and garlanded Crucifix; in England the Blessed Sacrament was also carried in procession; in Germany the so-called "palm donkey" was in use: a wooden donkey fitted with a pulley, with the figure of the Savior. At the city gate, solemn homage was paid to the Redeemer: the schola, having spread their copes and sacred vestments on the ground and laid down the branches before the Cross, adored it on bended knee (to the singing of Theodulf's hymn "Gloria, laus et honor"); the people came in small groups and laid their flowers before the Cross; then the bishop followed with the clergy. At the words of the antiphon Percutiam pastorem, a cleric with his hand or with a palm struck the bishop on the shoulders levi ictu. Then the procession entered the city. Having reached the Cathedral, the Benedictus was intoned and the bishop concluded the procession with a prayer. This ancient rite, described by Pseudo-Alcuin and in an Ordo of Besançon, is still maintained today in the various dioceses of Germany. In the current Roman rite, the procession must leave the church. On its return it finds the door closed. The hymn of Theodulf is sung, alternately with singers who have remained inside, at the end of which the subdeacon carrying the cross strikes the door with the tip of the processional cross. All re-enter to the singing of the responsory Ingrediente. The ceremony of the striking of the door, already contained in the Roman Pontifical of the 12th century, was introduced into the Roman Missal in 1604, under Clement VIII.
III. LA S. MESSA
It is consecrated to the memory of the Passion of Christ (v. Ps. 21: Deus, Deus meus, of the Introit and the Tract); the Epistle treats of the humiliation. Already in the time of Pope Leo I (Serm. de Pass. D., I, 5) the Passion written by St. Matthew was read. Around the year 1000, in the churches of the north the custom was introduced of having the Passion chanted by three singers; in Italy, from the 15th century onward, the singing of the words of the people (turba) is entrusted to a choir of singers, sometimes performed in figured music. The special signs in the Passio (T = tacite, or trahe or tene; C = cito, celeriter; S = sursum or sonoriter), which served to indicate the melody, today designate the persons who perform or sing: the T, or (since the Middle Ages) the cross, the part of Christ, C the part of the narrator, S the part of the various persons. At the words emisii spiritum the narrative is interrupted, one kneels and meditates for some time: a custom of certain Benedictine monasteries already in the time of St. Louis, King of France (d. 1270), who introduced it into his private chapel, accepted at Rome at the end of the 14th century.
Bibliography9 works
Pietro Saffrin
IV. FOLKLORE
Palm Sunday opens the cycle of traditional customs of Holy Week, which closes on Easter Monday. It is also called "flowering Easter," because of the use made in it, in the various ceremonies, of flowers or flowering branches.
Popular devotion follows the official liturgy faithfully, only enlivening it with expressions of innate artistic taste and intense faith. The focal point is constituted by the blessed palms, which are distributed in church during the services and which each of the faithful carries away and keeps, because miraculous virtues are attributed to them, especially against storms. In homes the palms are placed, as a rule, above the bed, next to some sacred image. Frequently they are adorned with ribbons or gilded with bronze powder and woven so as to assume original and pleasing forms. Of particular importance for the whole Catholic world is the distribution of the palms that takes place at St. Peter's in Rome. By concession of Pope Sixtus V, the prerogative of supplying them belongs to the descendants of the Bresca family of San Remo. Three hundred of the finest palms of the Riviera are chosen for this purpose, and from them are formed bundles of 60 branches each, which are then taken in charge by the Vatican standard-bearer and skillfully woven: from the detached fronds are made as many crosses, which are attached to the olive branches. Another 300 palms are sent to the Chapters and to the monasteries. But the great palm offered to the pope is worked by the Camaldolese nuns, by privilege granted to them by Leo XII in 1829. It has the form of a trophy: it rests on a small wooden base, is adorned with flowers and bears at the top a sacred image on cardboard surrounded by palms. Intense too is the distribution in St. Peter's Square, and not only of olive branches, but of true palms, by women and boys who hand them over for a small coin. Depending on the climate of the different countries and their respective flora, these palms assume numerous varieties. In France the branches of laurel are especially used; in the canton of Aargau (Switzerland) the palm consists of a small pine tree decorated with ribbons, fruit and eggs. Artificial palms are also made of gilded cardboard, often adorned with seasonal sweets. In some regions of France it is customary to wrap the main Cross of the cemetery with blessed palms. The manner of distribution too assumes variety and originality of aspects. Thus at Sciacca (Sicily) it was the custom that all the palm or olive branches were first arranged so as to cover a large Cross and then, at a given signal, thrown to the people, who contended for them animatedly. Also in Sicily, the scene of Christ's entry into Jerusalem is re-enacted in dramatic form: at Syracuse the representation, which is silent, except for the singing of the choir, takes place in the church of the Carmine: at the culminating moment, the door of the temple is flung open and Jesus, mounted on a little donkey and surrounded by the Apostles, enters blessing. The quest for eggs, which as a rule is made during the week, takes place, in some villages, on Palm Sunday: thus at Alatri groups of boys go around offering an olive branch and singing this couplet: "Here is the palm for whoever wants to make peace - we go away and you remain in peace." In Abruzzo on this day omens are drawn as for New Year's, and among the ritual foods is eaten the quajjato (curdled milk) with the meaning of purification.
Some scholars have wished to see in the ceremony of the palms a revival, in a Christian climate, of the festivals that among the Greeks were called Thargelia and Pyanepsia, during which olive branches decorated with woven wool were carried to the temple of Helios and then of Apollo: but a more thorough examination has revealed the groundlessness of this hypothesis (v. the works of Harrison and Laisnel de la Salle, cited in the bibliography).