The Church celebrates the memory of the small children of the neighborhood of Bethlehem who were put to death by King Herod. Herod felt threatened by the birth of a child whom he perceived to be a rival king. The result was mass murder. These innocent lives bear witness to Christ, Who was persecuted from the time of His birth by a world that would not receive Him.

Our Christmas joy is tempered by a feeling of sadness that the killing of innocents has not ceased, even 2000 years later. The world is still not willing to receive Christ. Our own country has participated in the massive destruction of tens, perahps hundreds, of thousands of Iraqi innoncents - all because of a perceived threat. It has allowed the slaughter of 45 million babies because of a higher value placed on a right to privacy. Let us look to the glory of these children, these innocent victims, who have now entered into the Kingdom of Heaven.

"Blessed are you, Bethlehem in the land of Judah! You suffered the inhumanity of King Herod in the murder of your babes and thereby have become worthy to offer to the Lord a pure host of infants. In full right do we celebrate the heavenly birthday of these children whom the world caused to be born unto an eternally blessed life rather than that from their mothers' womb, for they attained the grace of everlasting life before the enjoyment of the present. The precious death of any martyr deserves high praise because of his heroic confession; the death of these children is precious in the sight of God because of the beatitude they gained so quickly. For already at the beginning of their lives they pass on. The end of the present life is for them the beginning of glory. These then, whom Herod's cruelty tore as sucklings from their mothers' bosom, are justly hailed as "infant martyr flowers"; they were the Church's first blossoms, matured by the frost of persecution during the cold winter of unbelief.