Lenten Rose

Along with the early daffodils and forsythia, Lenten Rose (Helleborus x hybridus) has been showing its face in the garden for the last several weeks - an early announcement of Lent, of which today is the first Sunday. It blooms every year around this time in the understory shade of larger trees when the days are still a bit too short. I suppose it was given its name in an effort to say that Lent is not all about deprivation and solemnity since flowers are rarely symbols of such ideas.

Botanically, it's not a true rose - you would never mistake it for one if you walked by it growing in the ground. Since the rose is so significant in literary and religious metaphor, it might be interesting to discover why this plant was given such a weighty and familiar name coupled with one of the longest and most puzzling seasons of the church's calendar.

If you have one of these perennials in your garden, make sure it's in a shady spot, wherever you might plant your hostas and ferns. Ours, an inadvertent gift from the previous owner of our home, and probably the previous owner before him, is set in the ground on the south side of our house where I'm guessing it gets scorched every summer like a shirtless Irishman on an LA beach. We'll have to move it to a darker spot when the time is right, but for now, we'll just let it keep blooming until the weather warms up.