Symbols

The vesture associated with the bishop’s office and its emblems speak of continuity and the preservation of the timeless message of the Church.

The bishop’s staff speaks of his or her oversight of the diocese. Like a shepherd’s staff, it refers to Jesus, who is the Good Shepherd.

The Archbishop was the first of the Finnish bishops to use a staff. This happened in 1931. The first staff was used by Archbishop Lauri Ingman.

The Archbishop’s staff was made by the jeweller K. S. Sahlstedt. An engraving of a bishop’s staff on the sarcophagus of Bishop Henry served as a model. The handle of the staff is overlaid with dark red velvet and gold-plated silver chain. Embedded in the handle of precious metal are 16 reddish-brown carnelians. Carnelians belong to the quartz group of stones.

On a bishop’s appointment he or she is also given a cross.

King Gustav IV Adolf introduced the bishop’s cross in its current form to Sweden and Finland in 1805, a large Latin cross with a gold chain. The king himself presented Archbishop J. A. Lindblom a cross emblazoned with a halo, distinguishing it from the crosses of the other bishops.

The Archbishop’s gold cross was made by the Turku jeweller W. Pettersson in 1896.

The Archdiocese of Turku’s coat of arms constitutes the coat of arms of the Archbishop’s office. It has a red St George’s cross on a gold field, the Archbishop’s mitre and two bishop’s staffs, one with a cross-head as the symbol of the Archbishop’s office and the other as the symbol of the Bishop of Turku’s office. Lilies are symbols of the city of Turku.

The coat of arms is based on the medieval coat of arms of Turku Cathedral. The coat of arms appears, among other places, on the frontispiece of the Missale Aboense (1488) and on the ends of the choir stalls of Kalanti church (built in the 1470s).

The coat of arms was designed by the artist Tapio Vallioja in 1985.

Further information on the topic may be found in the book Suomen hiippakuntien piispankaavut, hiipat ja sauvat: Ornatus Episcorum (Copes, Mitres and Staffs of the Finnish Dioceses: Ornatus Episcorum [the liturgical vesture of bishops]) (Gummerus Kirjapaino Oy. Jyväskylä 2000).