Sacrificing Children

News coverage has calmed a bit in recent days about the current battle over abortion in America. I’m not really sure why there is such a debate since ‘both sides’ claim to care about children. Children are often the pawns in the war against evil. They are often the ones sacrificed.

Today is the commemoration of Saint Kyricos, the three-year-old child martyred because he would not cozy up to the pagan leader. In anger he was thrown down the stairs and his head crushed. His mother, soon after was beheaded. Why? Because in the early centuries of the Church refusing to deny Christ was reason enough to kill children. Not much has changed.

The pro-abortion activists would rather kill their children than praise God, but abortion is not the only way we sacrifice our children to evil. Children suffer abuse, neglect, starvation, forced labor, and those are just the physical abuses they endure. Children are witness to sexual perversion, violence and even ridicule, and that does not include the many ways society removes God from their lives. A life devoid of God isn’t life at all.

BRETHREN, when I was a child, I spoke like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child; when I became a man, I gave up childish ways. For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall understand fully, even as I have been fully understood. So faith, hope, love abide, these three; but the greatest of these is love. Make love your aim, and earnestly desire the spiritual gifts, especially that you may prophesy. For one who speaks in a tongue speaks not to men but to God; for no one understands him, but he utters mysteries in the Spirit. On the other hand, he who prophesies speaks to men for their upbuilding and encouragement and consolation. He who speaks in a tongue edifies himself, but he who prophesies edifies the church. Now I want you all to speak in tongues, but even more to prophesy. He who prophesies is greater than he who speaks in tongues, unless some one interprets, so that the church may be edified.

1st Corinthians 13.11-14, 14.1-5

The prophetic voice, as it is known in the Church, isn’t about telling the future. The prophetic voice is about calling society to repentance to avoid the pain of judgment. I have been known to use my prophetic voice, maybe too often, but today it seems appropriate. If our society does not stop sacrificing children for our own pleasure, we will suffer greatly.

Saint Paul presumes we give up our childish ways when we become adults, but I’m not sure that is the case with today’s society. Turn on the nightly news and watch for yourself. Tantrums, screaming self-righteousness, even pouting are the tactics of ‘the adults’ who don’t get their way. If children do not learn to love others more than themselves, our society will continue down the path to destruction.

We cannot survive sacrificing our children to evil. Bring your children to Church as often as you can. Live the Orthodox life as a family as much as you can. By whatever means possible, teach your children to love God and others more than themselves. Love is enough to stop abuse. Love is enough to cure broken souls. Love is enough to teach the world there is a better way, and that way is the Orthodox Way.