The Feast of the Holy Innocents

The Reverend Drew von Arx / December 20, 2025

In the season of Christmas, of course we ponder the coming of our Savior. Christmas also reminds us that we live in the time between the coming of our Lord as well as the second, and triumphant coming of our Lord. It is a tension in time between God’s fulfillment of His covenant to the Israelites, and the time in which the New Covenant is fulfilled in the complete, final redemption of the world. Living in this era, we must also hold in tension that Christmas also means reflecting upon Christ’s sacrifice upon the cross.

Commonly known as the first martyrs of the faith, the children killed in the days of Herod remind us of the sacrifice each of us makes for our faith. It does not seem to be too big of a jump to bring up Christ’s words, “I have not come to bring peace, but a sword.”(Matthew 10:34). Though we sing of joy to the world and peace on Earth during Christmas, for the children of Bethlehem, Christ's arrival certainly brought the sword. Christ's humble entrance into the world did not bring joy to all. It brought a threat to the power structure.

Just as Christ would sacrifice himself on the cross, the Holy Innocents were made a sacrifice. But these two sacrificial instances represent polar opposites. Herod’s sacrifice of these holy children was self-serving. Herod’s sacrifice was based on pride and fear. There is good reason to believe that Herod killed his own children when he thought that they were plotting to take his power and his throne. In the murder of the Holy Innocents, Herod attempts to take away the one, said to be the King.

Christ’s sacrifice was self-sacrificing. Christ’s sacrifice was based in love. More importantly, I think, Christ’s sacrifice was based on faith. His faith, even unto death, was not to establish or maintain power, but to fulfill God’s promise to his people. And Christ represents a great irony in this story. The one who gave of himself proved himself to be greatly feared by the “powerful” earthly leader, even as a young child.

The Holy Innocents bring us another promise. In the words of the Collect for Endurance (Friday Morning Prayer), they went not up to joy, but first suffered pain, and entered not into glory before they were killed. We can rest assured that the Holy Innocents will be with their Savior on the last day. The holy ones killed by fear, pride, and the love of power will at the last relish in the true power of God, as partakers in the restored kingdom as children of God. They remind us that we do not merely serve earthly rulers. We do not serve a king who is only interested in self-preservation. We do not serve a king who is only interested in his own power. Rather, we serve the King who gave of himself completely so that we may not remain in our sin.

As chaplains, many of us come face to face with evil, or see the impacts of evil on a regular basis. In his sermons on the Gospel of Matthew, St. John Chrysostom reminds us that, as in the case of the Holy Innocents, though we experience great evil, we can bear such evil with the promise of Christ’s death and resurrection (Sermon ix). We, especially as chaplains, work in this truth every day. When we confront individuals and families in crisis, no matter the situation, we are the representatives of Christ. Though we walk through various evils with those entrusted to our care, we do so with the promise that Christ endured evil for our sake, and that the evils of this life pale in comparison to the great joy of Christ’s coming again in glory.

The collect for the Feast of the Holy Innocents pleads for God to “mortify all evil within us.” Though the Innocents did not have the choice to have faith unto death in this life, we have a faithful witness through their story. Chaplains have the responsibility to continue to be formed by the Holy Spirit, that we would show those who suffer the love of our Lord. This Christmastide, may we together pray that we would glorify Christ’s holy name “by the innocence of our lives, and the constancy of our faith even unto death, through Jesus Christ our Lord, who died for us and now lives with you and the Holy Spirit, world without end. Amen.”

Matthew 2:16-18

Rev. Dcn. Drew von Arx

Chaplain, Transitions Hospice. Pittsburgh, PA.