GOD’S WORD

December 28, 2016 (Wednesday) Feast of the Holy Innocents, Martyrs

1st Reading: 1 Jn 1:5–2:2

We heard his message, from him, and announce it to you: God is light and there is no darkness in him.

If we say we are in fellowship with him, while we walk in darkness, we lie, instead of being in truth. But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we are in fellowship with one another; and the blood of Jesus, the Son of God, purifies us from all sin.

If we say, “We have no sin,” we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, he, who is faithful and just, will forgive us our sins, and cleanse us from all wickedness.

If we say that we do not sin, we make God a liar, his word is not in us.

My little children, I write to you, that you may not sin. But if anyone sins, we have an intercessor with the Father, Jesus Christ, the Just One. He is the sacrificial victim, for our sins, and the sins of the whole world. Gospel: Mt 2:13-18

After the wise men had left, an angel of the Lord appeared in a dream to Joseph and said, “Get up, take the child and his mother and flee to Egypt, and stay there until I tell you, for Herod will soon be looking for the child in order to kill him.”

Joseph got up, took the child and his mother, and left that night for Egypt, where he stayed until the death of Herod. In this way, what the Lord had said through the prophet was fulfilled: I called my son out of Egypt.

When Herod found out that he had been tricked by the wise men, he was furious. He gave orders to kill all the boys in Beth- lehem and its neighborhood who were two years old or under. This was done, according to what he had learned from the wise men about the time when the star appeared.

In this way, what the prophet Jeremiah had said was fulfilled: A cry is heard in Ramah, wailing and loud lamentation: Rachel weeps for her children. She refuses to be comforted, for they are no more.

Reflection:

We are remembering today a group of babies killed by King Herod the Great shortly after the birth of Jesus in the circumstances described in today’s gospel reading.

This massacre of babies is not recorded by any pagan author, but knowing what kind of man Herod was, we are not surprised by it. For Herod killed his wife Mariamme, her two sons, her mother and grandfather. He also killed his first-born son, Antipater. He strangled with his own hands his brotherin-law Aristobulus, and had his own sons Aristobulus and Alexander, murdered on his orders. On one occasion he had 40 young men burned alive as living torches. And so, dispatching 20 or 25 babies (the estimated number of victims according to experts in demography) was for Herod totally in character.

In our times, too, children suffer many forms of violence. Millions are murdered in their mother’s womb and with their mother’s consent. Millions are victims of war, starved, abused by pornographers, forced to live on the streets. Yes indeed, children still have plenty of Herods to fear.

Let us work together and find ways and means to protect today’s children from violence, abuse, exploitation, neglect.

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