The slaughter of the innocents

Matthew 2:16-18
The Massacre of the Infants
When Herod saw that he had been tricked by the 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.”

Survivor's Guilt
Warned in a dream
to escape the wrath of a king
who saw his evil tyranny endangered
his fragile tenure of power threatened
Gods son was bundled up
and smuggled to safety.
But as he grew
surely he and his family
must have encountered
other families
whose homes held a space
that could never be filled
whose hearts nursed a wound
that could never be healed.
Mothers glancing enviously
perhaps even resentfully
at a family complete,
not torn asunder
as was theirs.
Was that another sorrow
for the mother of God to bear?
The knowledge that the child she carried
and delivered into a hostile world
was the cause of searing loss
for others.
And did he learn, as a child,
that his infant body
should have been dashed on a rock?
And when he, too,
child of his mother's womb
endured the agony of a cross
did those families feel avenged?
Or did they know
that justice can never reign
while humans seek power
and while love is bartered
and sold for a pittance?
That the incomprehensible
wrongs of this world
can only be healed
by a divine love
beyond our imagining
Snatched from a manger
and hung on a cross.



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