The Fear of Losing

King Herod could be a perfect icon for fear. It would be an understatement to say that he ruled Israel and Judea with an iron fist - an iron heart would be more appropriate. If you look for the cause for him to spread fear among everybody associated, the reasoning will bring you back to where you started - fear. In fear Herod kept everybody under fear to maintain his power and possessions, and to achieve more. This fear compelled him to murder one of his wives, one brother, several brother-in-laws, and three of his sons. This fear also enabled him to command his soldiers to slaughter all kids two years and younger in and around Bethlehem. The Church today remembers those innocent lives lost as the Feast of the Holy Innocents - the first martyrs in the name of Christ. 


Historians estimate that the population of Bethlehem was about 1,000 people at the time of Jesus' birth, so the number of kids killed by Herod's soldiers could be between 20 and 25. My initial reaction to this number was, "That's it, and somehow that is a big deal?". We live in a society where such a minuscule death toll no longer creates a wave - even if it does, it subsides much faster. We live in a society where we kill innocent lives by the thousands everyday through abortion. In 1973, the US Supreme Court legalized abortions through a landmark decision in Roe vs Wade. Since then the record keepers tell us that we as a country has killed more than 55 million babies in their mother's womb - a place supposed to be the safest place anywhere for the most defenseless among the human beings. It is estimated that on an average 4,383 abortions are performed daily, that is 182 per hour, 3 per minute, or 1 every 20 seconds! 


According to the Guttmacher Institute, the top three reasons for an abortion is as follows: 

1. 75% of the women (and family) say that having a baby would interfere with work, school or other responsibilities.
2. The second reason for abortion is their inability to afford a child.
3. Unwillingness to raise a child as a single parent.

According to National Abortion Federation, only 12% of the women who undergo an abortion is due to a physical problem involving their health. They also report that 1% of the aborting women reported to be survivors of rape. 

King Herod and his iconic fear is alive and well in our society. We are afraid of losing our freedom, comforts, mobility, and conveniences. So we allow innocent lives to be cut up and disposed off in the landfills. The logic oriented, well-educated modern society think of the unborn as nothing more than parasites. We boast that we have the power to choose - a choice that involve slaughtering innocent lives in their mother's wombs. Our politically correct society wholeheartedly supports our decision 'to keep or not to'. And we think we are better than the barbarians and the dictators. I wonder how people would look at our culture of supporting abortion a thousand years from now (that, if we let any of them survive the knives of abortion clinics). 

"Amen, amen, I say to you, you will weep and mourn, while the world rejoices; you will grieve, but your grief will become joy. When a woman is in labor, she is in anguish because her hour has arrived; but when she has given birth to a child, she no longer remembers the pain because of her joy that a child has been born into the world. So you also are now in anguish. But I will see you again, and your hearts will rejoice, and no one will take your joy away from you." (John 16:20-22)