Massacre of the Innocents

Pieter Bruegel the Elder, nicknamed ‘Peasant Bruegel’ was probably the most significant and exciting painter in the Northern Europe during the middle part of the sixteenth century. His nickname “Peasant Bruegel” indicates to his subjects: peasant life, proverbs and genre scenes, the New Testament topics set among common folks of contemporary Flanders.

Matthew 2:16-18: "When Herod saw how the astologers [three Wise Men] had tricked him [by not reporting back to him the child's location] he fell into a passion, and gave orders for the massacre of all children in Bethlehem and its neighborhood, of the age of two years and younger, which was the time he had been given by the astrologers [for the birth of the child who was to become king of the Jews.] So the words spoken through the prophet Jeremiah were fulfilled: 'A voice was heard in Rama, wailing and loudly lamenting; it was Rachel weeping for her children, and refusing all consolation, because they were no more.'"

Vividly and gruesomely depicted:Pieter Bruegel the Elder. The Massacre of the Innocents. 1565-7. Oil on panel. Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna, Austria.

The contemporary equivalent of this New Testament incident is the slaughter of the innocents conceived in the wombs of their mothers by the process of abortion. The liberal political intelligentsia that so reviles the idea of the execution of vicious murderers after a fair trial nevertheless favour so actively the killing of innocent children without trial by abortion. In the UK a 100 teenage girls a week are going in for what are called "repeat" abortions. They have conceived under the age of consent but few are prosecuted for the illegal crime of sexual intercourse with them. Abortion is now taken to be an acceptable form of contraception. The truth is that it is nearer to infanticide. The full figures are enormous.

One Christian organisation which campaigns tirelessly to oppose this situation and provide positive alternatives in the Society for the Protection of Unborn Children (www.spuc.org.uk).

Aims of the Society
To affirm, defend and promote the existence and value of human life from the moment of conception, and to defend and protect human life generally.
To reassert the principle laid down in the United Nations 1959 Declaration of the Rights of the Child that the child "needs special safeguards and care, including appropriate legal protection, before as well as after birth."
To defend, assist and promote the life and welfare of mothers during pregnancy and of their children from the time of conception up to, during and after birth.
To examine existing or proposed laws, legislation or regulations relating to abortion and to support or oppose such as appropriate.

In this work they deserve the prayers of the church and the support of all Christians.