Turban-Clad Canada PM Mark Carney Celebrates Sikh Festival on Palm Sunday
Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney celebrated the Sikh holiday of Vaisakhi in an event in Ottawa for which he donned a turban.

Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney celebrated the Sikh holiday of Vaisakhi in an event in Ottawa for which he donned a turban.

A convalescing Pope Francis greeted the crowd in St. Peter’s Square on Palm Sunday, wishing more than 20,000 faithful a “Good Palm Sunday, a good Holy Week,” in yet another reassuring public sign of his recovery from a life-threatening battle with double pneumonia.

British prime minister Boris Johnson declined to offer Holy Week greetings for Good Friday, Maundy Thursday, and Palm Sunday on social media — but made time to recognise the Tamil and Sinhalese new year and publish video messages to mark the Jewish Passover and Sikh Vaisakhi.

Indonesian police said on Monday that the perpetrators of the Palm Sunday suicide bombing attack on a cathedral in Makassar were a married couple that belonged to an extremist group allied with the Islamic State. The bombers were the only fatalities in the attack, which injured about twenty people.

A suicide bombing outside a cathedral after Palm Sunday Mass on the Indonesian island of Sulawesi has injured more than a dozen churchgoers, some seriously.

Eggs on the table and a toy rabbit on the dresser — with a few decorations, Palestinian Christian Sawsan Bitar attempts to salvage some normality from an Easter overshadowed by coronavirus.

JERUSALEM — A small group of Franciscan monks and Roman Catholic faithful took to the streets of Jerusalem’s Christian Quarter in the Old City Sunday to distribute olive branches after the traditional Palm Sunday procession was cancelled due to restrictions imposed to contain the spread of the coronavirus.

Pope Francis has issued a special message for Holy Week, urging Christians to cling to hope in the midst of the coronavirus lockdown.

A homeless man in San Antonio, Texas, is taking his troubled life and turning it around by making and selling crosses he makes by hand out of palm leaves to members of the community.

JERUSALEM — Hundreds of Christians are marking Easter by flocking to Jerusalem’s Church of the Holy Sepulchre, built on the site where they believe Jesus was crucified, buried and resurrected.

The Cuban dissident group Ladies in White reports that at least 36 of their members were arrested violently this weekend while participating in pro-democracy protests and attempting to attend Catholic Mass on Palm Sunday.

In his Palm Sunday homily, Pope Francis said that Jesus was warmly welcomed by those who felt “left behind” by society, while inciting anger among the elites of his day.

Israeli President Reuven Rivlin said the persecution of Middle East Christians was “a stain on humanity,” during a meeting on Wednesday with leaders of Jerusalem’s Christian community.

Egyptian security forces killed a gunman suspected of shooting dead a policeman near St. Catherine’s Monastery in the Sinai Peninsula, the interior ministry said on Wednesday.

TEL AVIV — Writing in an encrypted message service, Islamic State militants and supporters have celebrated the news of deadly twin suicide bombings at two Coptic churches in Egypt on Palm Sunday.

Israel has closed its Taba border crossing to Egypt following a warning by its anti-terrorism office of an “imminent” militant attack there.

Pope Francis on Sunday decried a deadly attack on a Coptic church in Egypt during Palm Sunday celebrations, just weeks before his planned visit to Cairo.

Christians worldwide celebrate Palm Sunday, commemorating the Triumphal Entry of Jesus Christ into Jerusalem at the beginning of Holy Week, a week that would end with his death on Good Friday, then followed by Easter Sunday.

In his homily at Palm Sunday Mass, Pope Francis compared Jesus’ sufferings in his Passion to the treatment of outcasts, asylum-seekers and refugees in our own day, saying that Pontius Pilate exhibited the same sort of indifference that migrants face

Fox announced that on Palm Sunday it will televise “The Passion,” a live 2-hour musical hosted by Tyler Perry retelling Jesus Christ’s final hours against the backdrop of modern day New Orleans.
