The Catholic News Agency recently published an article on where the palms for Palm Sunday come from. In the United States, there are southern states where palms grow and which can be harvested for fresh leaves for Palm Sunday, but in Finland there are no palm trees. So where do our palm leaves come from? Katolinen.net checked with a couple of the Catholic parishes in Finland, and it turns out there are various ways of getting palm leaves. St Henry's Cathedral Parish uses both big and small palm leaves. The big ones come to the Cathedral from Italy, the small ones are purchased locally, through a wholesaler. Holy Cross Parish in Tampere also uses a local wholesaler, which sources its palm fronds in the Netherlands. There is no centralised system for the parishes in Finland to purchase the palm fronds for Palm Sunday. |