Flowering of the Passion

Legend has it that in 1620 a Jesuit Priest came across the plant we now know as passion flower. Enthralled with its beauty, that night he had a vision likening its floral parts to the elements of the passion of Christ. The five petals and five sepals became the ten apostles (omitting Peter who denied Jesus and Judas who betrayed Jesus). The three pistils became the nails of the cross; the purple corona (or filaments) was the crown of thorns, and the stemmed ovary was the Lord's chalice of suffering which he accepted at Gethsemane.