Children and the Light

The texts from the Roman Catholic Lectionary today resonate with the care and concern we have for children who are the hope for our future.

Our Light and Hope

The reading from the First Letter of John declares God Is Light and Christ is Our Advocate.

* [1:5–7] Light is to be understood here as truth and goodness; darkness here is error and depravity (cf. Jn 3:19–21; 17:17; Eph 5:8). To walk in light or darkness is to live according to truth or error, not merely intellectual but moral as well. Fellowship with God and with one another consists in a life according to the truth as found in God and in Christ.

* [1:8–10] Denial of the condition of sin is self-deception and even contradictory of divine revelation; there is also the continual possibility of sin’s recurrence. Forgiveness and deliverance from sin through Christ are assured through acknowledgment of them and repentance.

* [2:1] Children: like the term “beloved,” this is an expression of pastoral love (cf. Jn 13:33; 21:5; 1 Cor 4:14). Advocate: for the use of the term, see Jn 14:16. Forgiveness of sin is assured through Christ’s intercession and expiation or “offering”; the death of Christ effected the removal of sin. (1 John, CHAPTER 2 | USCCB, n.d.)

Psalm 124 offers Thanksgiving for Israel’s Deliverance.

* [Psalm 124] A thanksgiving which teaches that Israel’s very existence is owed to God who rescues them. In the first part Israel’s enemies are compared to the mythic sea dragon (Ps 124:2b–3a; cf. Jer 51:34) and Flood (Ps 124:3b–5; cf. Is 51:9–10). The Psalm heightens the malice of human enemies by linking them to the primordial enemies of God’s creation. Israel is a bird freed from the trapper’s snare (Ps 124:6–8)—freed originally from Pharaoh and now from the current danger. (Psalms, PSALM 124 | USCCB, n.d.)

The Gospel of Matthew relates the Escape to Egypt and the Massacre of the Infants.

* [2:13] Flee to Egypt: Egypt was a traditional place of refuge for those fleeing from danger in Palestine (see 1 Kgs 11:40; Jer 26:21), but the main reason why the child is to be taken to Egypt is that he may relive the Exodus experience of Israel.

* [2:15] The fulfillment citation is taken from Hos 11:1. Israel, God’s son, was called out of Egypt at the time of the Exodus; Jesus, the Son of God, will similarly be called out of that land in a new exodus. The father-son relationship between God and the nation is set in a higher key. Here the son is not a group adopted as “son of God,” but the child who, as conceived by the holy Spirit, stands in unique relation to God. He is son of David and of Abraham, of Mary and of Joseph, but, above all, of God.

* [2:18] Jer 31:15 portrays Rachel, wife of the patriarch Jacob, weeping for her children taken into exile at the time of the Assyrian invasion of the northern kingdom (722–21 B.C.). Bethlehem was traditionally identified with Ephrath, the place near which Rachel was buried (see Gn 35:19; 48:7), and the mourning of Rachel is here applied to her lost children of a later age. Ramah: about six miles north of Jerusalem. The lamentation of Rachel is so great as to be heard at a far distance. (Matthew, CHAPTER 2 | USCCB, n.d.)

Angela Maynard comments that in this situation the powerful king is the one calling for the murder of all baby boys.  How do simple people like Mary and Joseph protect their beloved baby boy? Sadly, this is an experience of many around the globe today.  Children of all genders are at risk of all sorts of dangers.  What can we do to offer protection to our children?

Let us ask the Holy Innocents and deceased children for their intercession for our own children, grandchildren, nieces, nephews, neighbors, and for all children who are growing up in this wicked world of ours. Let us pray for those who hate, those who experience violence, and parents who have lost children Let us pray for those who feel helpless.  The youngest among us need all the grace and assistance they can get to retain and grow in the faith. Let us lend them a helping hand and invite the deceased children to lend a hand, as well. (Maynard, n.d.)

Don Schwager quotes “The first martyrs of Christ,” by Chromatius (died 406 AD).

"In Bethlehem therefore all the babies were slain. These innocents who died then on Christ's behalf became the first martyrs of Christ. David refers to them when he says, 'From the mouths of nursing babies you have perfected praise because of your enemies, that you might bring ruin to the enemy' (Psalm 8:2). ... For in this persecution even tiny infants and nursing babies were killed on Christ's behalf and attained to the consummate praise of martyrs. Meanwhile the wicked king Herod was destroyed, he who had usurped the realm to defend himself against the king of the heavens. Thus it is that those blessed babes have deservedly lasted beyond others. They were the first who were worthy to die on Christ's behalf."(excerpt from TRACTATE ON MATTHEW 6.2) [Note: Chromatius was an early Christian scholar and bishop of Aquileia, Italy. He was a close friend of John Chrysostom and Jerome. He died in 406 AD. Jerome described him as a "most learned and most holy man."] (Schwager, n.d.)

The Word Among Us Meditation on Matthew 2:13-18 comments that as horrifying as this Gospel story is, however, the sad truth is that children have been victimized throughout history—and they’re still being victimized today.

On this feast day, try to spend some extra time interceding for these children. As you do, perhaps the Lord will inspire you to do something for one of them. You could, for example, volunteer to tutor a young child in a low-income school. You could give financial or emotional support to a pregnant woman in difficult circumstances or a single mom who needs an extra hand. Maybe your parish needs volunteers to teach children about the love of God. Or you might consider donating to charitable organizations that care for the needs of children and their families.

Jesus said, “Whoever receives one child . . . receives me” (Mark 9:37). On this feast day, as we gaze at the divine baby in the manger, let’s pray for hearts that are open to receiving Jesus in the “holy innocents” around us.

“Jesus, give me a generous heart open to helping a child in need.” (Meditation on Matthew 2:13-18, n.d.)

Friar Jude Winkler discusses how the passage from 1 John points out the errors in Gnostic belief about Jesus as only a spiritual being. The Gospel of Matthew connects Joseph to this Hebrew namesake as one who is guided by God through his dreams. Friar Jude reminds us that the few dozen children murdered in Bethlehem were the first martyrs for the Gospel. 

Fr. Richard Rohr, OFM, introduces spiritual companion and writer Leslye Colvin who suggests how we can continue to carry the gift of incarnation beyond the Christmas Season. Colvin asks how do we love and nurture the Christ? This question may be more challenging if we pack away the joy of this season with holiday decorations, or if we discard the awe of the Incarnation with the dried-out Christmas tree.

If we truly desire to celebrate the Incarnation let us consider paths leading us to seek Emmanuel, God is with us, as a way of life. We need not confine our attention to Christmas Day or the Christmas Season. The Christ light is always lit. We are sure to see it as we live the Beatitudes, and encounter our siblings on the margins. When we do, we may be surprised to recognize that all along it was the light of Christ guiding us there. (Rohr, n.d.)

We express our gratitude for the children in our lives who call us to simple love, trust, and joy as we advocate for the best world in which they can grow.

References

Matthew, CHAPTER 2 | USCCB. (n.d.). Daily Readings. Retrieved December 28, 2024, from https://bible.usccb.org/bible/matthew/2?13 

Maynard, A. (n.d.). Daily Reflection Of Creighton University's Online Ministries. Creighton University's Online Ministries. Retrieved December 28, 2024, from https://onlineministries.creighton.edu/CollaborativeMinistry/122824.html 

Meditation on Matthew 2:13-18. (n.d.). The Word Among Us: Homepage. Retrieved December 28, 2024, from https://wau.org/meditations/2024/12/28/1167110/ 

1 John, CHAPTER 2 | USCCB. (n.d.). Daily Readings. Retrieved December 28, 2024, from https://bible.usccb.org/bible/1john/2 

Psalms, PSALM 124 | USCCB. (n.d.). Daily Readings. Retrieved December 28, 2024, from https://bible.usccb.org/bible/psalms/124?2 

Rohr, R. (n.d.). Holy Incarnation: Weekly Summary. Center for Action and Contemplation. Retrieved December 28, 2024, from https://cac.org/daily-meditations/holy-incarnation-weekly-summary/ 

Schwager, D. (n.d.). Daily Scripture Readings and Meditations. Daily Scripture Readings and Meditations – Daily Scripture Readings and Meditations. Retrieved December 28, 2024, from https://www.dailyscripture.net/daily-meditation/?ds_year=2024&date=dec28 

Disaster and Deliverance

The texts from the Roman Catholic Lectionary today resonate with our experience of disaster in our lives and ironically remind us of the situations in which “by the Grace of God” we avoided calamity. 

Grace to the foreground

The reading from the First Letter of John declares God Is Light and Christ is Our Advocate.

* [1:8–10] Denial of the condition of sin is self-deception and even contradictory of divine revelation; there is also the continual possibility of sin’s recurrence. Forgiveness and deliverance from sin through Christ are assured through acknowledgment of them and repentance. (1 John, CHAPTER 1, n.d.)

* [2:3–6] The way we may be sure: to those who claim, “I have known Christ and therefore I know him,” our author insists on not mere intellectual knowledge but obedience to God’s commandments in a life conformed to the example of Christ; this confirms our knowledge of him and is the love of God…perfected. Disparity between moral life and the commandments proves improper belief. (1 John, CHAPTER 2, n.d.)

Psalm 124 is a Thanksgiving for Israel’s Deliverance.

* [Psalm 124] A thanksgiving which teaches that Israel’s very existence is owed to God who rescues them. In the first part Israel’s enemies are compared to the mythic sea dragon (Ps 124:2b–3a; cf. Jer 51:34) and Flood (Ps 124:3b–5; cf. Is 51:9–10). The Psalm heightens the malice of human enemies by linking them to the primordial enemies of God’s creation. Israel is a bird freed from the trapper’s snare (Ps 124:6–8)—freed originally from Pharaoh and now from the current danger. (Psalms, PSALM 124, n.d.)

The Gospel of Matthew describes the escape of the Holy Family to Egypt and the massacre of the infants of Bethlehem.

* [2:13] Flee to Egypt: Egypt was a traditional place of refuge for those fleeing from danger in Palestine (see 1 Kgs 11:40; Jer 26:21), but the main reason why the child is to be taken to Egypt is that he may relive the Exodus experience of Israel.

* [2:15] The fulfillment citation is taken from Hos 11:1. Israel, God’s son, was called out of Egypt at the time of the Exodus; Jesus, the Son of God, will similarly be called out of that land in a new exodus. The father-son relationship between God and the nation is set in a higher key. Here the son is not a group adopted as “son of God,” but the child who, as conceived by the holy Spirit, stands in unique relation to God. He is son of David and of Abraham, of Mary and of Joseph, but, above all, of God.

* [2:18] Jer 31:15 portrays Rachel, wife of the patriarch Jacob, weeping for her children taken into exile at the time of the Assyrian invasion of the northern kingdom (722–21 B.C.). Bethlehem was traditionally identified with Ephrath, the place near which Rachel was buried (see Gn 35:19; 48:7), and the mourning of Rachel is here applied to her lost children of a later age. Ramah: about six miles north of Jerusalem. The lamentation of Rachel is so great as to be heard at a far distance. (Matthew, CHAPTER 2, n.d.)

Eileen Burke-Sullivan asks who are the innocents today?

St. Ignatius of Loyola, in the Spiritual Exercises asks us to ponder this question early in the second week of the Exercises.  In the First week we discovered that it is sin and death that enslave and destroy all creation – the sin of refusing to honor God as God, seeking to be God on our own terms.  Innocents lose their lives by the corruption of humans worshipping the false god of power and control; by those who grasp at or attempt to steal the absolute power of the One who creates out of no-thing.

Ignatius offers us an analogy to consider who and what the innocents of our day are – the meditation is one of his most famous and it invites us to consider two ways to be human under the banners of two opposing realities.  Those who stand under the banner of hatred and death; of power and security; of possession and destruction are those who are not innocent.  They choose lying and stealing, murder and mayhem, chaos, and violence over life itself.  For such persons there is only the power of “control over”  and they despise the “weakness of mercy and compassion.” 

But submission to the limits of being human – even to death itself – means to stand under the banner of the God who so loved us that He sent his only begotten Son into our company to show us how to be authentically human.  We are not secure in ourselves, our talents and our power or money, we are secure only in the hands and will of the One who Loves us more than we can possibly love ourselves. (Burke, 2021)

Don Schwager quotes “The first martyrs of Christ,” by Chromatius (died 406 AD).

"In Bethlehem therefore all the babies were slain. These innocents who died then on Christ's behalf became the first martyrs of Christ. David refers to them when he says, 'From the mouths of nursing babies you have perfected praise because of your enemies, that you might bring ruin to the enemy' (Psalm 8:2). ... For in this persecution even tiny infants and nursing babies were killed on Christ's behalf and attained to the consummate praise of martyrs. Meanwhile the wicked king Herod was destroyed, he who had usurped the realm to defend himself against the king of the heavens. Thus it is that those blessed babes have deservedly lasted beyond others. They were the first who were worthy to die on Christ's behalf."(excerpt from TRACTATE ON MATTHEW 6.2) [Note: Chromatius was an early Christian scholar and bishop of Aquileia, Italy. He was a close friend of John Chrysostom and Jerome. He died in 406 AD. Jerome describead him as a "most learned and most holy man."] (Schwager, n.d.)

The Word Among Us Meditation on 1 John 1:5–2:2 comments that God is reminding us that not even the worst sinner is too far off from the mercy of God. What does that mean for those of us who live in Christ? It means that even on our worst days, there is hope. As Pope St. John Paul II once said, “We are not the sum of our weaknesses and failures; we are the sum of the Father’s love for us and our real capacity to become the image of his Son” (Homily, July 28, 2002).

Seeing yourself as a sinner who has been redeemed can help you be more open to God’s life-changing grace. Today’s first reading shows us just how high a price God has paid for that redemption: “the Blood of his Son Jesus” (1 John 1:7). Don’t discount the all-encompassing power of that blood to cleanse you and to change your heart! Don’t discount the wideness of God’s mercy to welcome you back when you have strayed. That mercy runs deeper than any sin that you—or anyone else—could commit. Even Herod.

Jesus is faithful to forgive all your sins.

“Father, thank you for cleansing all my sins in Jesus’ blood and calling me your beloved child.” (Meditation on 1 John 1:5–2:2, n.d.)

Friar Jude Winkler notes that the teaching on sin in 1 John connects to the assertion of the Docetists that spiritual creatures are not associated with the material world. The number of sins enumerated and the emphasis on keeping the Commandments in 1 John is different theology than the one sin of refusing to accept Jesus in the Gospel of John. Friar Jude reminds us that a paranoid megalomaniac like Herod deals in death to many people.

Fr. Richard Rohr, OFM, introduces Catholic spirituality author Judy Cannato who writes that our freedom, gifts, and interdependence bring us to a holy obligation. 

Connectedness is fundamental to our reality. No matter which sphere of life we observe, from the physical to the spiritual, we are connected to others. . . . Many of the social and ecological problems that confront us today stem from our delusion that we are separate from, better, or more significant than, other members of creation—from other groups of people we encounter to the air we breathe. Our lack of openness to all may very well mean our demise.

If we are to expand our hearts to include all creation we need to embrace our capacity for communion. . . . Relationship is something that all life requires, even inorganic life. Our vitality depends upon the connections we establish and the communion we share. [1]

Minister and faith leader Jen Bailey writes to encourage the “misfits,” those on society’s edges, to see themselves as essential to a healthy, sustaining, and interdependent future.

All around us things are shifting, systems are collapsing, and institutions are failing. This should not surprise us. Around the world, elders across cultures and peoples were predicting this time would come. It is a time of great uncovering in which Mother Earth and Father Sky are pushing us into a divine reckoning about what it means to be in right relationship with one another and all sentient beings in the twenty-first century and beyond. It is clear to me that the actions we take now will have deep and irreversible consequences for the generations to come.

The good news is that this time is made for misfits.

When you are at the center of a circle, it is impossible to see what is at the perimeter—if you are even aware that there is a perimeter. As misfits who were pushed to the edges and in-between places, we are able to see what is on the horizon and collectively discern what is needed to meet the challenges ahead. We are called to be the gardeners who will compost and tend to the soil upon which future generations will sow seeds that will one day blossom. . . . (Cannato & Untener, 2022)

We journey on a path following the Light that continues to shine even when we cannot find it in the depths of disaster, when we wait in trust for the embrace of the Good Shepherd.

References

Burke, E. (2021, December 28). Creighton U. Daily Reflection. Online Ministries. Retrieved December 28, 2022, from https://onlineministries.creighton.edu/CollaborativeMinistry/122821.html 

Cannato, J., & Untener, K. (2022, December 28). A Capacity for Communion — Center for Action and Contemplation. Center for Action and Contemplation. Retrieved December 28, 2022, from https://cac.org/daily-meditations/a-capacity-for-communion-2022-12-28/ 

Matthew, CHAPTER 2. (n.d.). USCCB. Retrieved December 28, 2022, from https://bible.usccb.org/bible/matthew/2?13 

Meditation on 1 John 1:5–2:2. (n.d.). The Word Among Us: Homepage. Retrieved December 28, 2022, from https://wau.org/meditations/2022/12/28/568801/ 

1 John, CHAPTER 1. (n.d.). USCCB. Retrieved December 28, 2022, from https://bible.usccb.org/bible/1john/1?5 

1 John, CHAPTER 2. (n.d.). USCCB. Retrieved December 28, 2022, from https://bible.usccb.org/bible/1john/2 

Psalms, PSALM 124. (n.d.). USCCB. Retrieved December 28, 2022, from https://bible.usccb.org/bible/psalms/124?2 

Schwager, D. (n.d.). Rachel Weeping for Her Children. Daily Scripture Readings and Meditations – Daily Scripture Readings and Meditations. Retrieved December 28, 2022, from https://www.dailyscripture.net/daily-meditation/?ds_year=2022&date=dec28