The coercive power of the state is found from the start of the story of our salvation; it’s in the Nativity story itself and the feasts that punctuate the 12 Days of Christmas. It was to comply with a decree by the pagan Roman Emperor Augustus that Joseph and the pregnant Mary travelled from Nazareth to be registered in Bethlehem. The birth of a son to a carpenter in a cowshed might have gone unnoticed by the authorities had not the three “wise men” from the east told the ruthless King Herod, who ruled Israel on behalf of Augustus, that they had seen a star in the firmament signifying the birth of the King of the Jews. When they failed to return by way of Jerusalem and tell Herod where this infant king was to be found, Herod ordered the slaughter of all male children born in the region at the time. The Holy Innocents are commemorated on 28 December.