At the far south end of Chicago’s Michigan Avenue, 116 blocks from the Magnificent Mile, Diane Latiker built a stone memorial. The mother of eight, Diane started to stack bricks on which the names of Chicago children killed by gun violence were scribbled in magic marker. One brick for each child. What started as a handful of bricks from Home Depot became more than 600 stones lining an alley shed. The site became holy. People stopped to pray and remember. Diane didn’t know all the children, but she wanted people to remember the slaughter of children.
While the little Lord Jesus was asleep on the hay, children were rousted from their beds, wrenched from their parent’s arms, and executed by Herod’s henchmen. Somewhere amid the cattle lowing and the angels singing is heard the weeping of parents at the murder of their children.
There’s a dark side to the nativity, an unspeakable horror that we don’t quickly tell our children or include in the Christmas pageant. It’s not easily pondered or proclaimed. It’s hard to imagine and hard to accept as part of the mystery of how God came to us in Jesus. Maybe that’s why we read this text in the backwash, after the Christmas crowds have gone home.
