Palm Sunday is a Christian
moveable feast that falls on the
Sunday before
Easter. The feast commemorates Jesus'
triumphal entry into Jerusalem, an event mentioned in each of the four
canonical Gospels.
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In many Christian denominations, worship services on Palm Sunday include a procession of the faithful carrying palms, representing the palm branches the crowd scattered in front of Jesus as he rode into
Jerusalem. The difficulty of procuring
palms in unfavorable climates led to their substitution with branches of native trees, including
box,
olive,
willow, and
yew. The Sunday was often named after these substitute trees, as in
Yew Sunday, or by the general term
Branch Sunday.