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Feast of the Holy Innocents, martyrs
December 28, 2019
Holy Innocents
Franciscan Media
Image: The Massacre of the Innocents | Angelo Visconti
Holy Innocents
Saint of the Day for December 28
The Story of the Holy Innocents
Herod “the Great,” king of Judea, was unpopular with his people because of his connections with the Romans and his religious indifference. Hence he was insecure and fearful of any threat to his throne. He was a master politician and a tyrant capable of extreme brutality. He killed his wife, his brother, and his sister’s two husbands, to name only a few.
Matthew 2:1-18 tells this story: Herod was “greatly troubled” when astrologers from the east came asking the whereabouts of “the newborn king of the Jews,” whose star they had seen. They were told that the Jewish Scriptures named Bethlehem as the place where the Messiah would be born. Herod cunningly told them to report back to him so that he could also “do him homage.” They found Jesus, offered him their gifts, and warned by an angel, avoided Herod on their way home. Jesus escaped to Egypt.
Herod became furious and “ordered the massacre of all the boys in Bethlehem and its vicinity two years old and under.” The horror of the massacre and the devastation of the mothers and fathers led Matthew to quote Jeremiah: “A voice was heard in Ramah, sobbing and loud lamentation; Rachel weeping for her children…” (Matthew 2:18). Rachel was the wife of Jacob (Israel). She is pictured as weeping at the place where the Israelites were herded together by the conquering Assyrians for their march into captivity.
Reflection
The Holy Innocents are few in comparison to the genocide and abortion of our day. But even if there had been only one, we recognize the greatest treasure God put on the earth—a human person, destined for eternity, and graced by Jesus’ death and resurrection.
The Holy Innocents are the Patron Saints of:
Babies
Father Justin Wylie and Holy Innocents
Chuck Colson: The Slaughter of the Innocents – The First Attack on Life
Coventry Carol (In Honor of the Holy Innocents, the First Martyrs for Christ)
The Holy Family vs. The Holy Innocents: A Christmas season reflection [Catholic Caucus]
Holy Innocents (also known as Childermas or Children’s Mass)
The Holy Innocents
King Herod Revisited
THE HOLY INNOCENTS Feast: December 28
Feast of the Holy Innocents – December 28 – 1928 BCP
We remember today the Holy Innocents, First Martyrs
Orthodox Feast of the Holy Innocents, December 29
December 28 – Feast of the Holy Innocents
Ending the Holocaust of the Innocents
Dec. 28 – Feast of The Holy Innocents
Massacre of the Holy Innocents
Alexey Pismenny
2008
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Catholic Culture
Christmas: December 28th
Feast of the Holy Innocents, martyrs

MASS READINGS
December 28, 2017 (Readings on USCCB website)
COLLECT PRAYER
O God, whom the Holy Innocents confessed and proclaimed on this day, not by speaking but by dying, grant, we pray, that the faith in your which we confess with our lips may also speak through our manner of life. Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.
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Recipes (5)
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Activities (4)
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Celebrating the Holy Innocents
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Christmas Play
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Day Four ~ Celebrating the Feast of the Holy Innocents
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Feast of the Holy Innocents — The Youngest’s Day
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Prayers (13)
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Roman Ritual: Blessing of Children
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Blessing of Children on Holy Innocents
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Christmas Morning Prayers
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Christmas Evening Prayers
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Holy Innocents or Childermas Day: Parental Blessing of Children
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Christmas Table Blessing 1
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Christmas Table Blessing 2
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Christmas Table Blessing 3
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Christmas Table Blessing 4
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Book of Blessings: Blessing of Children
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Book of Blessings: Blessing Before and After Meals: Christmas Season (2nd Plan)
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Parental Blessing
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Book of Blessings: Blessing Before and After Meals: Christmas (1st Plan)
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Library (2)
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Bring Back the Creche! | John Phillips
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The Hope of Salvation for Infants Who Die Without Being Baptized | International Theological Commission
» Enjoy our Liturgical Seasons series of e-books!
Old Calendar: The Holy Innocents
During this octave of Christmas the Church celebrates the memory of the small children of the neighborhood of Bethlehem put to death by Herod. Sacrificed by a wicked monarch, these innocent lives bear witness to Christ who was persecuted from the time of His birth by a world which would not receive Him. It is Christ Himself who is at stake in this mass-murder of the children; already the choice, for or against Him, is put clearly before men. But the persecutors are powerless, for Christ came to perform a work of salvation that nothing can prevent; when He fell into the hands of His enemies at the time chosen by God it was to redeem the world by His own Blood.
Our Christmas joy is tempered today by a feeling of sadness. But the Church looks principally to the glory of the children, of these innocent victims, whom she shows us in heaven following the Lamb wherever He goes.
The Fourth Day of Christmas
The Holy Innocents
Today, dearest brethren, we celebrate the birthday of those children who were slaughtered, as the Gospel tells us, by that exceedingly cruel king, Herod. Let the earth, therefore, rejoice and the Church exult — she, the fruitful mother of so many heavenly champions and of such glorious virtues. Never, in fact, would that impious tyrant have been able to benefit these children by the sweetest kindness as much as he has done by his hatred. For as today’s feast reveals, in the measure with which malice in all its fury was poured out upon the holy children, did heaven’s blessing stream down upon them.
“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.
— St. Augustine
Things to Do:
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Read this article by Mgr. Luciano Alimandi on the humility of children.