A few doors up the road one of our neighbours sells fruit and vegetables at his front gate. Recently it’s included passionfruit which gets its name from Christ’s Passion for several reasons.
Jesuits in South America saw the hammer and nails of the crucifixion in the flower, St. Francis is said to have seen visions of the passion flower vine entwined around the cross, and early Spanish missionaries recorded accounts of seeing the flowers during church holiday seasons, especially during the Lent and Easter holidays.
Thinking about symbols for Antipodean Lent & Easter the passionfruit might be one that has a southern hemisphere “taste”. Passion Week might be “Passionfruit Week” with Easter eggs replaced with the new fruit of the vine.
