THE WORD
1 Jn 1: 5–2: 2 / Mt 2: 13–18
When the magi had departed, behold, the angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream and said, “Rise, take the child and his mother, flee to Egypt, and stay there until I tell you. Herod is going to search for the child to destroy him.”
Joseph rose and took the child and his mother by night and departed for Egypt. He stayed there until the death of Herod, that what the Lord had said through the prophet might be fulfilled, “Out of Egypt I called my son.”
When Herod realized that he had been deceived by the magi, he became furious. He ordered the massacre of all the boys in Bethlehem and its vicinity two years old and under, in accordance with the time he had ascertained from the magi.
Then was fulfilled what had been said through Jeremiah the prophet: “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.”
IN OTHER WORDS
We all love the underdog. That is why Ginebra is our national Barangay and Fernando Poe Jr. is the King. God too loves the underdog. He sided with Israel, that tiny, slave nation whose little children were massacred in Egypt.
But God took it a bit farther though. He did not just side with the underdog; He Himself became the underdog. In the Gospel today, Matthew presents Jesus as like Moses of old, who escaped from the wrath and madness of the strong and powerful by the skin of his teeth.
Moses ran. Jesus ran…and hid. But it’s fine. Everybody knows that Moses is going to raise his staff and divide the Red Sea. You and I are one hundred percent certain that after three days the Tomb will be empty. And so we shout G-I-N-E-B-R-A with all our hearts, stick FPJ posters in our rooms, watch Ten Commandments over and over again, and cry and praise, worship and raise our hands through, with and in Jesus.
But how can we cheer for the Holy Innocents? They will not be splitting any sea or resurrect on the third day. The Gospel presents a power struggle between God, the force of good, and Herod, the power of the world. God, in the baby Jesus, would be the underdog. But like FPJ we know He will win in the end. The Holy Innocents though were a totally different story. They were caught in the crossfire. They had no idea what was going on. They were not given a chance.
We might be fighting the Evil Incarnate…let us proceed slowly though, for we might step on the weak and the voiceless. And repeat the same massacre.
- Fr. Dante Barril, SVD (Rome, Italy)
The Word in other words 2015
An annual project of Logos Publications, The WORD in Other Words Bible Diary contains daily scripture readings and reflections written by priest, brothers, and sisters of the three congregations founded by St. Arnold Janssen (the SVD, SSpS, and SSpSAP). It hopes to serve as a daily companion to readers who continually seek the correlation of the Word of God and human experience.
