A Loud Voice in Ramah

A voice was heard in Ramah,

wailing and loud lamentation,

Rachel weeping for her children;

she refused to be consoled,

because they are no more.

-Matthew 2: 18

Being a kid is tough.

I'm not talking about the usual, school, homework, cliques, adolescent angst kind of stuff either.  Children are symbols of our hope as human beings, and they are also the victims of some of our worst violence.  In evaluating and ranking tragedies we immediately put one that involves large quantities of children.

The Taliban just killed 130 people, most of whom were children, at a school in Pakistan.  Almost 200 young girls are still missing in Nigeria at the hands of Boko Haram.  You have all too common school shootings, not to mention the horrendously under-reported business of human trafficking where many of the victims are children and teenagers.

Children are victims in every arena of adult evil: human trafficking, drug trafficking, terrorism, war mongering, and perhaps over-arching all of those things: economic injustice.  They are vulnerable and often they have no one to speak for them, and all too often all we can do is weep loudly for them, because they are no more.

Rachel must be a wreck by now.

This use and abuse of children makes an appearance in the Gospel.  The occasion of Jesus' birth and the arrival of strange visitors from the east precipitates the violence of Herod. The killing of babies and toddlers on the whim of a king.  A peculiar thing is that, outside of the Gospel account, there is no mention of this event in the annals of history.

Some would say a historical lacuna like this reveals a fabrication, a dramatic device meant to bolster the importance and the peril of the birth of Christ.

I happen to believe it happened, and that the reason why it's not recorded is because it was all too common.  Histories record important things, like who is king and how they came to be king, and the sorts of battles they won against large armies.  The royal historian does not record the savagery of slaughtering babies, it's not news that anyone needs to remember.

But it needs to become a part of God's story, it needs to get this little remark, this small, but powerful quotation about a loud voice in Ramah.  Someone needs to remember those children and their parents, someone needs to speak for the victims.

A while back a young Pakistani girl was shot in the face by the Taliban for daring to say publicly that girls ought to be educated.  A few weeks ago, this young girl, Malala Yousafzai, was given the Nobel Peace Prize, at seventeen years old.  Sometimes a child survives our evil and breaks the darkness.  Isn't that actually the story of Jesus too?

In a season where we pay so much attention to the birth of a child, and in a season where so much of our celebration is centered around the joy of children, we NEED to refuse to be consoled, not just about our children, but about all children.  Because their story is important, because it needs to be remembered, because it involves far too much wailing and loud lamentation.

I think this is why this sort of thing makes the news, so to speak, in the Gospel.  Because someone needs to remember, because we need to see and hear and feel how great the darkness really is, so that, in turn, we will truly appreciate the light.  One baby that survived, and escaped, and changed the world.  It happens, because God finds a way.