The Holy Innocents

Matthew 2: 13-18
'The Escape to Egypt'
Now after they had left, an angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream and said, "Get up, take the child and his mother, and flee to Egypt, and remain there until I tell you; for Herod is about to search for the child, to destroy him."  Then Joseph got up took the child and his mother by night and went to Egypt, and remained there until the death of Herod.  This was to fulfill what had been spoken by the Lord through the prophet, "Out of Egypt, I have called my son."

'The Massacre of the Infants'
When Herod saw that he had been tricked by wise men, he was infuriated, and he sent and killed all the children in and around Bethlehem who were two years old or under, according to the time that he had learned from the wise men.  Then was fulfilled what had been spoken through the prophet Jeremiah: "A voice was heard in Ramah, wailing and loud lamentation, Rachel weeping for her children; she refused to be consoled because they are no more."

On the Fourth Day of Christmas, our faith is confronted with a jarringly paradox, the Feast Day of The Holy Innocents.  The joyous peace we find in the birth of the redeeming innocence of the Christ child, to the massacre of innocent children by King Herod the Great.  Herod is notorious for his mania and his cruel and malicious reign as the Roman appointed King of the Jews.  Herod feared that the birth of the Messiah would threaten his role as king.  Power mad, he ordered the ultimate act of evil, infanticide of children under two in the area of Bethlehem.

These children, are considered the first martyrs in the New Testament. They are not standing up in faith for Christ, but were victims of a man in opposition to God.  It is hard to reconcile our knowledge of God and the joy of Christ's birth with this infanticide.  How did a merciful God allow children to be innocently massacred for Christ?  God wept for his children, lamenting for the loss of the innocent lives.  God mourns for all the lost and suffering. 

The massacre of children, is stark reminder throughout all generations that innocent by the evil actions of others. Suffering does not come from God, although he may test us, building our faith through resiliency, guiding us through the fire of life, God does not harm his creatures.  Suffering is a result of sin in the world.  It is merciless and spreads like wildfire and a plague.  No clearer example of this is the killing of innocent children, particularly when the motive is worldly power. 

It parallels to Exodus, Chapter 1, where Pharaoh, afraid that the growing Hebrew population might usurp his power, ordered that all baby boys be killed.  Of course Moses is saved, but countless lives were lost. 

God is all good and his encompassing love is limitless, yet God works through the human condition to achieve his eternal purposes.  Suffering on this plane is hard and tests our faith, yet God never abandons us.  The eternal is hard to comprehend in the bloodshed of innocent, yet it is the eternal goodness of God that can combat the darkness of the temporal world.

Compare to Stephen, who was martyred for actively standing up for Christ. Stephen made the conscious choice to stand up and die a martyr  The Holy Innocents died as martyrs, but not by active faith in Christ, but being at the wrong place at the wrong time.  They did not know Christ and yet sacrificed their lives so that his might be protected. They suffered death as martyrs for Christ, because evil opposes God and while God is all good, evil of the world works to destroy the light with darkness, no matter who gets hurt in the process.  Herod was full of darkness and malice, his sin caused the most innocent to suffer.  Yet Christ, though spared from the massacre, did not live in the world without trouble.  God is always aware of our sufferings, weeping for us and tending his sheep.  He protects us, working at all times to bring light into dark places.  In Christ, God fully divine and fully man, was not immune to suffering, but took it on boldly, dying on the Cross, so that our souls may have eternal life.  So while we suffer in this realm, if we keep the light of Christ in our hearts we will find peace, even in turmoil, understanding in confusion, love out of hate.

From a historical standpoint may have questioned when did the massacre and how many died.  During a bible study with Fr. Bruce McNabb at St. James Episcopal in Bozeman, I learned that there is no record of the massacre, but that doesn't mean it did not occur.  Rather it is relevant that massacres of this nature were commonplace under the tyranny of Herod and within the Empire.  Most likely the massacre was around 8-20 children, which might pale compared to other killings and was considered too mundane to account for.  Can you imagine - 20 children, even one child being murdered and it is considered too mundane and run of the mill to account for.  God does account for sins as judge, justice is served for those who do not repent.  That is not a fire and brimstone warning, but a truth that allows us to have peace and reconciliation.  Otherwise how could we not cling to anger and revenge to account for such maliciousness in this world.

 Reflecting on this scripture, I compare it to the story of the innocent massacred under Pharaoh.  In that account the oppressive force was Pharaoh, and Moses eventually is called to lead is people out of Egypt.  The concept of 'out of Egypt,' is one that affects many literary themes I work with, because it speaks to the human condition and our path to God's grace.  The suffering of the innocent, the consequences of our sin, being lost in our desire for the world, even when God's grace and redemption awaits us, we focus on the desert as a cruel place, instead of the sustaining power of God.

In Matthew, Joseph is told by a dream to take Jesus to Egypt, a safe haven until Pharaoh is dead.  Kind of a reversal of circumstances, the Messiah forced out of the Promised Land because the king there was not ready to receive the Savior Christ?  Are we ready to receive God or will we act with hate, fear, anger - allowing that to guide our will - causing others to suffer?  This account is still active today, so many are killed, for no reason.  In Syria, school children bombed, not because of faith, but another's deadly lust for power.  The same can be said in Pakistan or China...even in America where the 'right of choice,' often ends up killing the most innocent because of inconvenience.  The Feast of the Holy Innocents is a call to action.  An understanding that though there is suffering, devastation and hate in the world, Christ is with us and the light of his love in the eternity of the kingdom of heaven has overcome the darkness of this world.  It is also a call to learn from the lesson of innocent lives lost, advocating for the least among us, protecting children and working to prevent any more lives lost. "A voice was heard in Ramah, wailing and loud lamentation, Rachel weeping for her children; she refused to be consoled because they are no more."

Collect for Today:
O God, whom the Holy Innocents confessed and proclaimed on this day, not by speaking but by dying, grant, we pray, that the faith in your which we confess with our lips may also speak through our manner of life. Pour forth, we beseech you, O Lord, your grace into our hearts, that we, to whom the Incarnation of Christ your Son was made known by the message of an Angel, may by his Passion and Cross be brought to the glory of his Resurrection. Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever

Today, dearest brethren, we celebrate the birthday of those children who were slaughtered, as the Gospel tells us, by that exceedingly cruel king, Herod. Let the earth, therefore, rejoice and the Church exult — she, the fruitful mother of so many heavenly champions and of such glorious virtues. Never, in fact, would that impious tyrant have been able to benefit these children by the sweetest kindness as much as he has done by his hatred. For as today's feast reveals, in the measure with which malice in all its fury was poured out upon the holy children, did heaven's blessing stream down upon them.
"Blessed are you, Bethlehem in the land of Judah! You suffered the inhumanity of King Herod in the murder of your babes and thereby have become worthy to offer to the Lord a pure host of infants. In full right do we celebrate the heavenly birthday of these children whom the world caused to be born unto an eternally blessed life rather than that from their mothers' womb, for they attained the grace of everlasting life before the enjoyment of the present. The precious death of any martyr deserves high praise because of his heroic confession; the death of these children is precious in the sight of God because of the beatitude they gained so quickly. For already at the beginning of their lives they pass on. The end of the present life is for them the beginning of glory. These then, whom Herod's cruelty tore as sucklings from their mothers' bosom, are justly hailed as "infant martyr flowers"; they were the Church's first blossoms, matured by the frost of persecution during the cold winter of unbelief. — St. Augustine

http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/07419a.htm  - This is a great article about The Holy Innocents