Holy Innocents

Lectionary #698

Our soul has been rescued like a bird from the fowler's snare.
Had not the LORD been with us?
When men rose up against us,
then would they have swallowed us alive,
When their fury was inflamed against us.
Our soul has been rescued like a bird from the fowler's snare.
Then would the waters have overwhelmed us;
The torrent would have swept over us;
over us then would have swept the raging waters.
Our soul has been rescued like a bird from the fowler's snare.
Broken was the snare and we were freed.
Our help is in the name of the LORD,
who made heaven and earth.

Two weeks ago the United States was again thrown into confusion and grief by the massacre of children and adults in a Connecticut school. The story has become familiar to us despite its incomprehensible sadness.

My mother had a stroke which left her mentally disabled during the last four years of her life. I happened to be visiting her shortly after the school shooting in Columbine. Knowing how her mother's heart felt for children, I sat down with her to tell her the sad news. But she asked only one question, "Why?" I could say nothing.

It is evil; there is no explanation for evil. It does not pretend to make sense. Journalists perform autopsies on these stories in their search for meaning but discover nothing of any worth. They fill the airwaves with the story for several days after each incident, providing the public with something to talk about. Their coverage may be a mourning ritual for the nation, but they cannot offer the hope of redemption and promise of eternal life. They cannot offer the usual condolence of a violent death, that the innocent have not died in vain.

Saint Matthew, to emphasize the singular importance of Jesus, placed this all-too-common story of innocents slaughtered in his Gospel. Jesus is the Star of Bethlehem which shines in the bleak darkness of despair. 

His meaning is in his citation from the Book of the Prophet Jeremiah:

A voice was heard in Ramah,
sobbing and loud lamentation;
Rachel weeping for her children,
and she would not be consoled,
since they were no more.

Perhaps he intended his hearers to understand in their hearts and take comfort in Jeremiah's next words:

Thus says the Lord: Keep your voice from weeping, and your eyes from tears; for there is a reward for your work, says the Lord: they shall come back from the land of the enemy; there is hope for your future, says the Lord: your children shall come back to their own country. (Jeremiah 31:15-17)

Even as the Holy Family is fleeing from Bethlehem, Jeremiah's promise of return sounds in their ears.

Personally, when I think of the martyred children of Columbine, Sandy Hook and the Amish children in Pennsylvania, I recall the Book of Revelation:

... I saw underneath the altar the souls of those who had been slaughtered because of the witness they bore to the word of God. They cried out in a loud voice, “How long will it be, holy and true master,before you sit in judgment and avenge our blood on the inhabitants of the earth?”
Each of them was given a white robe, and they were told to be patient a little while longer until the number was filled of their fellow servants and brothers who were going to be killed as they had been. (Revelation 6:9-11)

I also hear the consolation of today's responsorial psalm:

Our soul has been rescued like a bird from the fowler's snare.

The children have not died in vain. They are in God's hands, and nothing will snatch them from the Father:

My sheep hear my voice. I know them, and they follow me. I give them eternal life, and they will never perish. No one will snatch them out of my hand. What my Father has given me is greater than all else, and no one can snatch it out of the Father’s hand. The Father and I are one.’ (John 10: 27-30)

I have a video reflection on this tragedy at our Province website. You may view it at www.FranciscansUSA.org