Wednesday,
December 28, 2016
Holy Innocents, Martyrs
1st Reading: 1 Jn 1:5—2:2
Gospel: Matthew 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 Bethlehem and its neighborhood who were two years old or under. This was done in line with 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.
D@iGITAL-EXPERIENCE
(Daily Gospel in the
Assimilated Life
Experience)
The disparity between King Herod’s position and that of Jesus was readily apparent in their clothes.
Herod was kingly dressed with purple robes bedecked with expensive jewels. The child Jesus was wrapped in swaddling clothes. Yet Herod was so afraid of this poor child. To make sure he is dead Herod ordered the killing of all boys in Bethlehem and its neighborhood who were two years old or under. Herod appeared like the classic mad man who set the house on fire to kill a single mouse.
His fear was baseless. Jesus was not a political liberator who would take over the reins of power.
Power hunger makes people paranoid, finding threats where there is none. Herod’s very little knowledge of Jesus made him order the killing of all boys of Bethlehem. Weren’t we told that a little knowledge is a very dangerous thing? In the mind of the selfish, a little knowledge is not only dangerous but also deadly!
Today, the powerless continues to threaten the powerful. Who is afraid of a third world country like the Philippines? The United States is. Because of our fast growing population we compete with them in the consumption of world resources. This explains the flooding of funds to the country to finance the passage of the Reproductive Health Bill. In the last analysis the US is playing the modern Herod trying to exterminate children even before they are formed in their mothers’ womb. The disparity between the power of the United States and the power of the unborn makes the US appear like the classic mad man who had to burn his whole house down just to kill a pesky mouse – (Atty.) Rev. Fr. Dan Domingo P. delos Angeles, Jr., D.M.
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