Fresh Fire

A recent comment asked why Lent 5 (this coming Sunday), the Sunday before Palm Sunday, was previously called “Passion Sunday”. Was there at some stage of Christian history a reading of the Passion on this day? The Church of England continues to call this “Passion Sunday”. The NZ Lectionary also calls this “Passion Sunday” and the (now-nearly-never-used- does-anyone-at-all-still-us-it?) NZ home-grown “Two Year Series” of readings also calls Lent 5 “Passion Sunday” (with the theme “the cross”) NZPB page 579. I have looked in some books, looked around online, and tweeted the question, but have not received what I regard as a sufficient explanation. Personally, I’m with the renewed lectionary that sees Palm Sunday as Passion Sunday and each year has a different reading of the passion story on Palm/Passion Sunday. This aside, in this post I’m more interested in the history of calling Lent 5 “Passion Sunday”. Please add in the comments what you know.