LETTER: Jesus was a refugee, according to Gospel of Matthew

Mercury columnist Christine Flowers thinks Christians who characterize the Holy Family as refugees are imposing a political and secular agenda on the Biblical story.

She notes that the nativity story in Luke’s gospel shows Mary and Joseph traveling to Bethlehem to comply with a Roman census — not because of a threat to their safety. Fair enough. But apparently, Ms. Flowers is not aware that Matthew’s gospel tells a different story.

In Matthew, Chapter 2, after Jesus is born, an angel orders Joseph to flee with his family to Egypt because Herod, the King of Judea, intends to murder the child. Subsequently, Herod actually does murder all children under the age of two in and around Bethlehem in an attempt to eliminate the “newborn king.” Mary and Joseph flee to save their child’s life. There might be many words to describe this but certainly “refugees” is one of them

Ms. Flowers is free to choose Luke’s story of Jesus’ birth as the one she likes best, but Matthew’s story, with the bloodthirsty King and the Holy Family’s desperate flight into Egypt, is also holy scripture and Christians, including Ms. Flowers, are obligated to take it seriously and call it what it is.

—Dennis Landon,
Douglassville