Don’t chop down our favourite fir tree, Italian town tells Pope

Critics say the tradition of gifting a tree to the Vatican’s Christmas display is a ‘useless sacrifice’ and is against the pontiff’s morals

An Italian mountain town is trying to stop their favourite tree being cut down and given to Pope Francis for Christmas.
The 200-year-old fir, nicknamed The Green Giant, has been earmarked as a gift to the Vatican where it will form the centrepiece of St Peter’s Square’s festive celebrations.
But almost 40,000 people have signed a petition calling for the beloved 100ft conifer – growing on a hillside near the city of Trento in the northern region of Trentino-South Tyrol – to be spared.
Residents from Trento and surrounding villages say the felling of such an old tree runs counter to Pope Francis’ repeated pleas to protect the environment and combat climate change.
“We’re against this useless sacrifice,” the protesters say in an open letter to the Argentinian pontiff, 87, who has made caring for the environment one of the key motifs of his papacy.
“It doesn’t make sense to talk about the fight against climate change and then perpetuate traditions like this, which require the death of a tree that is so old and symbolic.”
The Alpine locals said the Pope had written several encyclicals – open letters on specific themes – about the importance of protecting the environment.
The Green Giant grows in a forest in Val di Ledro, a valley near Lake Garda.
Each year a tree is given to the Vatican by one of Italy’s 20 regions or another European country. In the past, trees have been gifted by Germany, Slovenia, Austria and Poland.
The protesters have also questioned the cost that will be borne by the local community in chopping down the tree and having it transported to Rome.
The operation will cost €60,000 (£49,000) and they say the money could be better spent on public transport and health services.
They have suggested that the Vatican instead commissions the creation of a “permanent” Christmas tree sculpture made from the timber of trees that have fallen naturally.
The sculpture could be used each year so that living trees do not have to be felled, they argued.
The tradition of placing a Christmas tree in the middle of St Peter’s Square in the weeks leading up to the festive season was established by Pope John Paul II in 1982.
But cutting down huge firs for the Vatican’s festivities has proved controversial on more than one occasion.
Austrian environmentalists objected to one of their trees being donated in 1989 and there was a similar debate over a tree that grew in the forests of Calabria in southern Italy in 2006.
In 2022, environmentalists blocked the felling of a huge 200-year-old fir in a forest on the border between the central Italian regions of Abruzzo and Molise.
They said that the custom of chopping down ancient trees for St Peter’s Square should “sooner or later be brought to an end”.
The Vatican has been approached for comment.