Palm Sunday, a Catholic celebration also observed by various Christian denominations, including the Orthodox, Anglican, and Protestant churches, marks the commencement of Holy Week and takes place on the final week of Lent. During the Palm Sunday Mass, Catholics receive palm branches and reenact Jesus’ entry into Jerusalem.
On April 14, 2025, Catholic News Agency reported that “President Donald Trump issued two messages on Palm Sunday,” acknowledging the “glory” of “Easter Sunday.” Easter Sunday is one of the most unifying celebrations, bringing Roman Catholics, Protestants, and Orthodox together to celebrate the resurrection of Jesus Christ on Sundays.
Catholic News Agency published the following:
• “President Donald Trump issued two messages on Palm Sunday recognizing the importance of the Holy Week leading up to Easter.” [1]
• “Christians around the world remember the crucifixion of God’s only begotten Son, Our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ and, on Easter Sunday, we celebrate his glorious resurrection and proclaim, as Christians have done for nearly 2,000 years, ‘HE IS RISEN!’, Trump said.” [1]
• “Trump, who describes himself as a nondenominational Christian, wished fellow Christians ‘a happy and very blessed holiday’ and called the United States ‘a nation of believers,’ adding: ‘We need God, we want God and, with his help, we will make our nation stronger, safer, greater, more prosperous, and more united than ever before’.” [1]
• “During this sacred week, we acknowledge that the glory of Easter Sunday cannot come without the sacrifice Jesus Christ made on the cross,’ Trump said.” [1]
• “The president also urged prayers for ‘an outpouring of the Holy Spirit upon our beloved nation’ and that the United States ‘will remain a beacon of faith, hope, and freedom for the entire world, and we pray to achieve a future that reflects the truth, beauty, and goodness of Christ’s eternal kingdom in heaven’.” [1]
Political leaders certainly have a right to practice and express their faith in public; however, when they use their political platform to make statements such as honoring the glory of Easter Sunday or declaring that we need God to make our nation stronger and more prosperous and we need to bring about the outpouring of the Holy Spirit, this kind of religious language is leading many to believe that the federal government has a role in bringing about a moral and religious revival in the nation—an idea that challenges the principle of separation of church and state. This blending of political authority with spiritual aspiration risks creating confusion about the limits of government influence in matters of personal faith.
Furthermore, the celebration of Easter played a significant role in establishing Sunday as the universal day of rest and worship within Christianity. Since the resurrection of Jesus occurred on the first day of the week, early apostate Christians began to associate Sunday with the biblical seventh-day Sabbath without any scriptural authority. This growing reverence for Sunday was further reinforced when Emperor Constantine legalized Christianity and enacted the first Sunday law in A.D. 321, mandating rest on “the venerable day of the Sun” and firmly establishing Sunday as the official day of worship throughout Christendom.
The Bible teaches that we commemorate the resurrection of Jesus not through Sunday worship, but through baptism, which symbolizes death to sin and new life in Christ.
Romans 6:3-4 says, “Know ye not, that so many of us as were baptized into Jesus Christ were baptized into his death? Therefore we are buried with him by baptism into death: that like as Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life.”
This passage clearly connects the believer’s experience in baptism with the resurrection of Christ.
Colossians 2:12 reinforces this truth: “Buried with him in baptism, wherein also ye are risen with him through the faith of the operation of God, who hath raised him from the dead.”
Nowhere does Scripture command us to honor the resurrection by setting aside Sunday as a holy day. Instead, Jesus said, “If ye love me, keep my commandments” (John 14:15), and the fourth commandment calls us to remember the seventh day Sabbath (Exodus 20:8-11). Baptism, not Sunday worship, is God’s appointed memorial of Christ’s resurrection.
Sources
[1] https://www.catholicnewsagency.com/news/263363/trump-issues-holy-week-messages-he-is-risen
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