Dom Prosper Gueranger:
The feast of the beloved Disciple is followed by that of the Holy Innocents. The crib of Jesus, where we have already met and venerated the Prince of Martyrs and the Eagle of Patmos, has today standing round it a lovely choir of little children clad in snow-white robes and holding green branches in their hands. The Divine Babe smiles upon them. He is their King, and these Innocents are smiling upon the Church of God. Courage and fidelity first led us to the crib. Innocence now comes and bids us tarry there.
Herod intended to include the Son of God among the murdered babes of Bethlehem. The Daughters of Rachel wept over their little ones and the land streamed with blood, but the tyrant’s policy can do no more: it cannot reach Jesus, and its whole plot ends in recruiting an immense army of Martyrs for Heaven. These children were not capable of knowing what an honour it was for them to be made victims for the sake of the Saviour of the world. But the very first instant after their immolation and all was revealed to them: they had gone through this world without knowing it, and now that they know it, they possess an infinitely better. God showed here the riches of His mercy. He asks of them but a momentary suffering, and that over, they wake up in Abraham’s bosom: no further trial awaits them, they are in spotless innocence, and the glory due to a soldier who died to save the life of his Prince, belongs eternally to them.
They died for Jesus’ sake. Therefore, their death was a real Martyrdom, and the Church calls them by the beautiful name of The Flowers of the Martyrs, because of their tender age and their innocence. Justly, then, does the Ecclesiastical Cycle bring them before us today, immediately after the two valiant champions of Christ, Stephen and John. The connection of these three Feasts is thus admirably explained by Saint Bernard:
“In Saint Stephen we have both the act and the desire of Martyrdom. In Saint John we have but the desire. In the Holy Innocents we have but the act. Will anyone doubt whether a crown was given to these Innocents? If you ask me what merit could they have that God should crown them? Let me ask you what was the fault for which Herod slew them? What is the mercy of Jesus less than the cruelty of Herod? And while Herod could put these babes to death who had done him no injury, Jesus may not crown them for dying for Him? Stephen, therefore, is a Martyr, by a Martyrdom of which men can judge, for he gave this evident proof of his sufferings being felt and accepted that, at the very moment of his death, his solicitude both for his own soul and for those of his persecutors increased. The pangs of his bodily passion were less intense than the affection of his soul’s compassion which made him weep more for their sins than for his own wounds. John was a Martyr by a Martyrdom which only Angels could see, for the proofs of his sacrifice being spiritual, only spiritual creatures could see them. But the Innocents were Martyrs to none other eye save yours, O God! Man could find no merit. Angel could find no merit: the extraordinary prerogative of your grace is the more boldly brought out. From the mouth of the infants and the sucklings you have perfected praise (Psalm viii. 3). The praise the Angels give you is: Glory be to God in the highest, and peace on Earth to men of good will (Luke ii. 14). It is a magnificent praise, but I make bold to say, that it is not perfect till He comes who will say: Suffer little children to come to me, for of such is the kingdom of Heaven (Matthew xix. 14), and in the mystery of my mercy, there will be peace to men that cannot even use their will” (Sermon for the Feast of the Holy Innocents.)
Yes, God did for these Innocents, who were immolated on His Son’s account, what He is doing every moment now by the sacrament of regeneration in the case of children who die before coming to the use of reason. We, who have been baptised by water, should be all the more ready to honour these little ones who were baptised in their own blood and thereby associated to all the mysteries of the Divine Infancy. We ought, together with the Church, to congratulate them, for that a glorious and premature death secured them their innocence. They have lived upon our Earth, and yet it defiled them not! Truly these tender Lambs deserve to be forever with the Lamb of God! May this same Earth of ours, grown old in wickedness, draw down the divine mercy on itself by the love and honour it gives each year, to these sweet children of Bethlehem who, like the Dove of Noah’s Ark, could not find where to rest their feet.
In the midst of the joy which at this holy time fills both Heaven and Earth, the Holy Church of Rome forgets not the lamentations of the mothers who beheld their children cruelly butchered by Herod’s soldiers. She hears the wailing of Rachel and condoles with her and, unless it be a Sunday, she suspends on this Feast some of the manifestations of the joy which inundates her soul during the Octave of her Jesus’ birth. The red vestments of a Martyr’s Day would be too expressive of that stream of infant blood which forbids the mothers to be comforted, and joyous white would ill suit their poignant grief. She, therefore vests in purple, the symbol of mournfulness. The Gloria in excelsis, the Hymn she loves so passionately during these days, when Angels come down from Heaven to sing it — even that must be hushed today. And in the Holy-Sacrifice she sings no Alleluia. In this, as in everything she does, the Church acts with an exquisite delicacy of feeling. Her Liturgy is a school of refined Christian considerateness.Lesson – Apocalypse xiv. 1‒5
In those days I beheld the Lamb standing on mount Sion, and with him a hundred forty-four thousand having His name, and the name of His Father, written on their foreheads. And I heard a voice from Heaven, as the noise of many waters, and as the voice of great thunder. And the voice which I heard was as the voice of harpers harping on their harps. And they sung as it were a new canticle before the throne and before the four living creatures and the ancients. And no man could say the canticle, but those hundred forty-four thousand who were purchased from the earth. These are they who were not defiled with women: for they are virgins. These follow the Lamb wherever he goes. These were purchased from among men, the first-fruits to God and to the Lamb: And in their mouth there was found no lie, for they are without spot before the throne of God.Thanks be to God.
Dom Prosper Guéranger:
The Church shows us, by her choice of this mysterious passage of the Apocalypse, how great a value she sets on innocence, and what our own esteem of it ought to be. The Holy Innocents follow the Lamb because they are pure. Personal merits on Earth they could not have, but they went rapidly through this world, and its defilements never reached them. Their purity was not tried, as was Saint John’s, but it is beautified by the blood they shed for the Divine Lamb, and He is pleased with it and makes them His companions. Let the Christian, therefore, be ambitious for this innocence which is thus singularly honoured. If he has preserved it, let him keep and guard it as his most precious treasure. If he has lost it, let him repair the loss by repentance, and having done so, let him say with the Spouse in the Canticle: “I have washed my feet: how shall I defile them?” (Canticles v. 3).Gospel – Matthew ii. 13‒18
At that time An Angel of the Lord appeared in sleep to Joseph, saying: “Arise, and take the child and his mother, and fly into Egypt: and be there until I will tell you. For it will come to pass that Herod will seek the child to destroy him.” Who arose, and took the child and his mother by night, and retired into Egypt: and he was there until the death of Herod: that it might be fulfilled which the Lord spoke by the prophet, saying: “Out of Egypt have I called my son.” Then Herod perceiving that he was deluded by the wise men, was exceeding angry, and sending killed all the men children that were in Bethlehem, and in all the borders thereof, from two years old and under, according to the time which he had diligently inquired of the wise men. Then was fulfilled that which was spoken by Jeremias the prophet, saying: “A voice in Rama was heard, lamentation and great mourning. Rachel bewailing her children, and would not be comforted, because they are not.”Praise be to you, O Christ.
Dom Prosper Guéranger:
Thus does the Gospel in its sublime simplicity relate the Martyrdom of the Innocents. “Herod, sending, killed all the children!” The Earth paid no attention to the fell tyranny, which made so rich a harvest for Heaven: there was heard a voice in Rama, Rachel wailing her little ones. It went up to Heaven, and Bethlehem was still again, as though nothing had happened. But these favoured victims had been accepted by God, and they were to be the companions of His Son. Jesus looked at them from His crib and blessed them. Mary compassionated with them and their mothers. The Church, which Jesus had come to form, would for all future ages glorify these youthful Martyrs and place the greatest confidence in the patronage of these children, for she knows how powerful their intercession is with her heavenly Spouse.
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Blessed Babes! We celebrate your triumph and we congratulate you in your having been chosen as the companions of Jesus when in His crib. What a glad waking was yours from the darkness of unconscious infancy to the precious light of Abraham’s bosom where were congregated all the elect! How dear to you the sword that thus transformed you! What gratitude had you not for the God who thus chose you, out of millions of other children, to do honour to the birth of His Son by this sacrifice of your blood and lives! Too young to fight the battle, but did you win the crown. The martyr’s palm waved in those tiny hands which had not strength to pluck it. God would give proof of His munificence: He would teach us that he is Master of His gifts. And was it not fitting that the birth of the Son of this great King should be commemorated by largess such as this! Sweet Infant Martyrs! We give praise to our God for His having thus favoured you, and, with the whole Church, we rejoice in the privileges you have received.
Flowers of the Martyrs, we confide in your intercession and beseech you, by the reward so gratuitously conferred on you, to be mindful of us your brethren who are struggling amid the dangers of this sinful world, We, too, desire to receive those same palms and crowns which you have won, but with such innocence and simplicity that the Church says you played with them: whereas we have to fight hard and long for them, and are so often on the point of losing them forever! The God that has glorified you is our last end as truly as He is yours. In Him alone can our hearts find their rest. Pray for us that we may possess Him for all eternity. Pray for us that we may obtain child-like simplicity of heart from which comes that unreserved confidence in God which leads man to the perfect accomplishment of His holy will. May we bear the Cross with patience when He sends it, and desire nothing but His holy will. You gazed on the murderers who broke your gentle sleep, and you found nothing to make you fear. The bright sword they held over your cradle had but the look of a toy you asked to play with. Death stared you in the face and you smiled on him. May we imitate you and be meek and graceful in the trials that come to us, making them our martyrdom by the quiet endurance of our courage, and the conformity of our will with that of our Sovereign Lord and Master who only gives the cross that He may give the crown. May we never object to or hate the instruments He uses with which to try us. May no harshness nor injustice nor pain ever quench the fire of our charity, nor any event ever deprive us of that peace without which our souls live not to God.
And, lastly, O you Innocent Lambs slain for Jesus and following Him wherever He goes, because you are pure, pray for us to the Lamb of God that He will permit us to come to Him in Bethlehem and, like you, fix our dwelling there, for it is the abode of love and innocence. Speak for us to Mary, a Mother more compassionate than Rachel. Tell her that we are her children and your brethren. She that compassionated your momentary sufferings will pity us and help us in our long years of temptation, pain and sorrow.
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Three days have passed since the birth of Jesus. Let us visit Him in the stable and humbly adore our Emmanuel. Let us think on the Mercy which led Him to become a Little Child in order to bring us near to Himself: let us be filled with astonishment at seeing our God thus close to His creatures. “He,” says the holy Abbot Guerric, “He that in Heaven surpasses the sublime intellects of the Angels is here on Earth palpable to the dull sense of men. For, whereas God could not speak to us as spiritual beings — for we are carnal — His Word was made Flesh, that all flesh might not only hear, but might even see Him whom the mouth of the Lord had spoken (Isaias xl. 5). And whereas the world knew not the Wisdom of God in His wisdom, that same wisdom, by an ineffable condescension, made Himself foolishness (1 Corinthians i. 25). I give you praise, O Father, Lord of Heaven and Earth, for that you have hid this Wisdom from the wise and prudent, and hast revealed it to little ones (Matthew xi. 25). The haughtiness of the proud is exceedingly adverse to the humility of this Little One, and that which is high to men is an abomination before God (Luke xvi. 15). This Little One finds sympathy with none save with them that are little in heart, and He takes up His abode with none save with them that are humble and peaceful As, therefore, these little children sin, glorying in Him: A little child is born to us (Isaias viii. 18), so does He say of them: Behold Me and my children whom the Lord has given to me! (Isaias ix. 6). Thus it was that the glory of Martyrdom began with Innocent Babes, for the Father would give to His Son, the Infant Jesus, companions of His own tender age and hereby the Holy Ghost taught us that of such is the Kingdom of Heaven” (Matthew xix. 14).Also on this day according to the ROMAN MARTYROLOGY:
At Ancyra in Galatia, the holy martyrs Eutychius, priest, and Domitian, deacon.
In Africa, the birthday of the holy martyrs Castor, Victor and Rogatian.
At Nicomedia, the holy martyrs Indes, eunuch, Domna, Agapes and Theophila, virgins, and their companions, who, after long combats, attained to the crown of martyrdom by various kinds of death during the persecution of Diocletian.
At Neocaesarea in Pontus, St. Troadius, martyr, in the persecution of Decius. During his combat St. Gregory Thaumaturgus appeared to him in spirit, and encouraged him to undergo martyrdom.
At Arabissus in Lower Armenia, St. Caesarius, a martyr who suffered under Galerius Maximian.
At Lyons in France, the birthday of St. Francis of Sales, bishop of Geneva, ranked among the saints by Pope Alexander VII because of his most ardent zeal for the conversion of heretics. His festival, by order of the same Pontiff, is kept on the twenty-ninth of January, when his sacred body was translated from Lyons to Annecy. Blessed Pius IX confirmed a decree of the Sacred Congregation of Rites, declaring him Doctor of the Universal Church.
At Rome, St. Domnion, priest.
In Egypt, St. Theodore, monk, a disciple of St. Pachomius.
In the monastery of Lerins, St. Anthony, a monk renowned for miracles.
And in other places, many other holy martyrs, confessors and virgins.
Thanks be to God.
