During my juvenile religious career I participated in no less than a dozen "Palm Parades" on the Sunday before Easter. What I find interesting is the remnants of Palm Sunday memories that remain after all these years. I wanted to do a post on the Christian significance of Palm Sunday and interject some of my vintage memories from this day. As I started to write, my words stumbled when I tried to describe the symbolism of Palm Sunday.
The vintage scraps of memory were there but they were not of the Bible, Jesus or The Passion. Instead what I remember is parading around the sanctuary in Church waving a palm branch. Getting yelled at for peeling the leaves off the palm branch. Not being able to wear my pretty new dress, because it was for Easter Sunday, next Sunday. Competing with the other kids to see who could collect them most palm branches after 'the service'. Smacking the other kids with the palm branch and them smacking me. My mother saying "get that out of your mouth". Taking home a palm branch or two or three or however many I could get my hands on. Mom insisting that the palm branch be placed in a glass of water to keep it alive then subsequently watching it wilt and crumble in the coming days.
All of this got me thinking about the Church buying these palms. I started wondering where do they come from and how much do they cost. A quick search on the internet revealed that several Church supply joints sell them. The ones that I remember are the 'date palm branches'. A package of 4 sells for about $15.00. Yawza that's expensive. If Churches supplied them to their members like they did when I was a kid that would be nearly a thousand dollars for a congregation of 250. No wonder us kids fought over who could collect the most after the service and my mom wanted to keep them alive. Maybe we knew someday those puppies would be worth solid gold. I mean heck today an innovative young entrepreneur could become a profitable reseller to the Church down the street. Unfortunately inflation has hit Palm Sunday celebrations and now suppliers sell bundles of single leaves off of a branch. So instead of clenching a stately branch in your fist and waving it over your head you pinch a puny leaf between your thumb and index finger. Somehow it's not the same.
Oh yeah the significance of the Palm..... It symbolizes victory of the faithful over enemies of the soul. It is particularly used in conjunction with martyrs to represent spiritual triumph.
