Readings: Feast of the Holy Innocents|USCCB 

The Feast of the Holy Innocents profoundly interrupts the exuberance of Christmas, as children die because of Herod’s fear and we witness the first martyrs for Christ. We have only a few days of unalloyed celebration before some of the most unsettling implications of the incarnation begin to come into view. 

Despite how incongruous these events are with Christmas joy, it is arguably appropriate to emphasize them at this point in the liturgical life of the Church. After all, they foreshadow the fact that, although Christ will ultimately prevail over suffering, evil, and death, he and those associated with him will enter into the darkness before it is defeated. In a manner similar to icons that allude to the cross as they depict the infant Christ, today’s gospel signals that the God of Christianity is not one who simply beholds the travails of the world from a comfortable distance. Instead, God is in our very midst, having taken on the human condition in all of its complexity, and indeed having taken it on until the bitter end. The method through which God has elected to save the world, then, involves joining with the world, entering into it as deeply as can be imagined, in order to transform it.  

The good news in all of this is that, by the end of Christ’s ministry, no feature of the human condition will have been untouched by God. No matter how dark the world is, through the life and death of Christ, God progressively takes on one element of suffering humanity after another, holding nothing back as God joins with the world, in so doing suffusing that which had been bereft of God’s presence with divine life to save it. 

For that salvation to occur, moreover, the world cannot stay the same. Christ makes Herod afraid for good reason. He is Lord; Herod is not. The incarnation turns the world upside down, and in so doing sets it aright. Those in positions of power are made profoundly uncomfortable by Christ’s arrival. As we celebrate Christmas, then, we are called upon to embrace the discomfort provoked by Christ beginning to transform the world, and to let that discomfort lead us as we discern the role we have to play in God’s saving work. 

Dr. Mark McInroy, Associate Chair and Professor of Theology 

The Campus Ministry Seasonal Reflections are offered during the liturgical seasons of Advent/Christmas and Lent/Easter. We bring a variety of voices from Students, Faculty and Staff. The perspectives expressed in these reflections are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect those of Campus Ministry.