Tag: immigration

A friend of Hispanic descent shared with me after New Wine, New Wineskins’ recent conference on immigration reform that someone seated near her said, “I hate parasites.” My friend said that the person in question—presumably a Christian given the Christian setting of the conference—was questioning the value of undocumented people living here in the U.S. I have a hard time not devaluing the statement and perspective of the unidentified person to whom my friend referred. There are several reasons why I find the statement troubling and worthy of critique.

Certainly, undocumented people benefit in a wide variety of ways from living in America.  But as they pay a variety of taxes, they are benefiting our system, even as they may not benefit from those tax dollars to the extent that we do. In some ways, citizens and other documented people may be benefiting disproportionately from the undocumented, as with such tax dollars and in the purchasing of produce that would quite possibly be priced higher if citizens and other documented people were working the fields where such produce is harvested by those without legal status. By the way, if Americans benefit from lower prices for food products harvested by the undocumented, does that not make American consumers accomplices in illegal activity, knowingly or unknowingly? (By the way, New Wine will address this subject at our spring 2014 conference on the multi-faceted phenomenon of food). Regardless of one’s response to that question, America benefits from the work, purchasing power, and taxes paid by the undocumented.

Having said all this, for those who are still concerned about undocumented people benefiting from the American system, the best way to keep undocumented people from benefiting inappropriately from the system is to put in place a path to citizenship, while allowing them to remain and work as they pursue legal status. In keeping with the Evangelical Immigration Table’s call for immigration reform, it is in the best interest of all parties that we as a country establish “a path toward legal status and/or citizenship for those who qualify and who wish to become permanent residents.”

Even so, beyond all the talk of benefits, we should never view another human being as a parasite, regardless of their legal status. All people are created in the image of God and have inherent dignity and worth. Or as Elie Wiesel has been quoted as saying, “You who are so-called illegal aliens must know that no human being is illegal. That is a contradiction in terms. Human beings can be beautiful or more beautiful, they can be fat or skinny, they can be right or wrong, but illegal? How can a human being be illegal?”

We must not allow categories like “illegal” or for that matter “parasite” to be imposed on people, for such terms suck the life and dignity from them. We must not allow such devaluing words as “parasite” to replace God’s concern for the stranger (regardless of legal status) set forth in Scripture: “When a foreigner resides among you in your land, do not mistreat them. The foreigner residing among you must be treated as your native-born. Love them as yourself, for you were foreigners in Egypt. I am the Lord your God.” (Leviticus 19:33-34) As I have written elsewhere, dehumanizing words like “parasites” matter: sticks and stones do break bones, and words often lead there. Such faulty thinking and language constructs like “parasites” as applied here should not be allowed to benefit from what is taken to be “civilized” or “biblical,” but taken to be alien and parasitical impositions on what is to be conceived as humane and Judeo-Christian.

This piece is cross-posted at Patheos and The Christian Post. Comments made here are not monitored. To join the conversation, please comment on this post at Patheos.

Holding firmly to biblical truth makes us more relevant as Christians, not less so, as we become more open handed, not closed fisted. My friend, Brian Considine of  the Mission America Coalition (See www.EthnicEmbraceUSA.net), reminded me of this truth when he recently wrote, “As a conservative Biblical Centerist I grow weary of the unthinking nature of what passes for Conservativism in the US today. If we don’t start to line up our political philosophy with Biblical truth Christianity will only slide more into irrelevance.” Brian was responding to a post I wrote on immigration reform.

We often tend to think that conserving or holding firmly to biblical truth will lead us toward cultural irrelevance. What struck me about Brian’s response was his conviction that holding firmly to biblical truth will make conservative Christianity more relevant. Why is this? No doubt there are many reasons. One reason was noted above: holding firmly to biblical truth causes us to be more open handed rather than closed fisted toward those in need. Being closed fisted closes us off from being engaged in these people’s future, thereby making us irrelevant to them and to God.

Concerning immigration reform, I hope we conservative Christians in America will be known increasingly for building stronger bridges rather building higher walls to sojourners from other lands. In the Old Testament, people like Nehemiah built walls to protect God’s people from harm. In part, such protection was based on God’s focus on Israel as a nation. Even so, Israel was to care for the vulnerable stranger and sojourner in their midst (Leviticus 19:33-34). In the New Testament era, we find that Peter views the church as a holy nation (1 Peter 2:9). The church as God in Christ’s people is a nation without borders. While we should not discount but be mindful and attentive to the concerns of nation states regarding such matters as immigration, the church must guard against seeing itself as a subsidiary of the nation state. Our ultimate allegiance is to Christ and therefore we must call to account nation states when respect of sojourners from other lands’ human dignity is not maintained.

Of course, Christians in America need to be attentive to the need for safe and secure national borders as citizens of this nation state. Certainly, we need to be concerned for fair and equitable policies for taxpayers. To be sure, we need to be concerned for the rule of just laws. But we should never allow these concerns to overshadow the God-given dignity of every person and preservation of the immediate family regardless of their nation state identity. Rather than keep these people out, we should put in place an accessible and functioning system that makes possible a path to permanent residence and citizenship.

It is encouraging to know that many Evangelical leaders are calling for such a comprehensive approach to the topic of immigration reform. The Evangelical Immigration Table has called for “a bipartisan solution on immigration” which accounts for these values:

• Respects the God-given dignity of every person
• Protects the unity of the immediate family
• Respects the rule of law
• Guarantees secure national borders
• Ensures fairness to taxpayers
• Establishes a path toward legal status and/or citizenship for those who qualify and who wish to become permanent residents

Instead of holding firmly to our rights as Americans at the expense of others, I hope we Christians in America will be far more concerned for embracing those without rights and with empty hands in an equitable and just manner. We might even find that the more we conservative Christians press for liberalizing immigration reform for those without rights and empty hands the more our lives will be filled with new friends from faraway places who work with us as new citizens of this country to build and prosper America. The fruit of our open and equitable labor of love will also bear witness to our citizenship in Christ’s kingdom and its relevance for all nations and sojourners from other lands.

This piece is cross-posted at Patheos and The Christian Post. Comments made here are not monitored. To join the conversation, please comment on this post at Patheos.

This piece was originally published on March 19, 2013 at Patheos.

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American Evangelicals place a great deal of emphasis on protecting the nuclear family. One would think Evangelicals would also concern themselves with keeping families together in America, where one of the spouses is not here legally. While not all Evangelicals make this connection, many  do.

I appreciate the Evangelical Immigration Table’s emphasis on “protecting the unity of the immediate family” and its call for a bi-partisan solution to the situation of immigration reform that “establishes a path toward legal status and/or citizenship for those who qualify and who wish to become permanent residents.”

Some will argue that failure to deport an undocumented individual who is married to an American or a legal resident is condoning disobedience. Actually, I am condoning and promoting compassion. I cannot do anything about the choices such a couple made to this point, but I can advocate for the government to make the right choice and help them stay together and raise their family in a nurturing environment where both parents are present legally.

This is no ivory tower issue that I engage as a seminary professor. A Hispanic pastor came to my office and presented to me the challenge he faces as an Evangelical to support an American father who is raising his baby alone now that his wife has been deported. The pastor told me how during a pastoral visit the father shared his angst about trying to work and care for the crying baby in his arms.

We cannot wash our hands of this situation or those countless other stories similar to it. Either we need to help raise the child or we are condoning separating families. People can say all they want about such couples needing to suffer the consequences of their past acts of disobedience alone. Where do they get the justification for that claim biblically? It is so calloused. I am thankful Jesus didn’t operate that way. He suffered the consequences of our actions for us and in our place, dying for our sins. Christians are called to a radical obedience of solidarity with offenders of the law no matter the consequences. Otherwise, from God’s vantage point, we’re not legally Christian.

This piece was originally published at Patheos on March 12, 2013.

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Did you know I have been living here illegally for some time? In fact, you may be here illegally, too, and you might not even know it. If First Nations people had borders in place like we do today, we would not be having this conversation! Good thing for those of you like me, a US citizen, who does not happen to be an indigenous person.

Some of you may say that the First Nations people themselves immigrated from other shores. Even if that is true, they still had/have squatters’ rights. At least they should have them. “Finders keepers, losers weepers” doesn’t even apply here because they never lost the land. It was stolen from them.

Why am I saying all this? Because the conversation on immigration reformation needs to expand and become more complex. In my conversations with First Nations people on immigration reform, they remind me of what has happened to them and how many Anglo Americans’ understanding of nation states and borders does not reflect how our Euro-Anglo ancestors approached border crossings and also promises made that were never kept (See the late U.S. Senator Daniel K. Inouye’s foreword to Documents of American Indian Diplomacy: Legal History of North America Series #4. There Senator Inouye writes that the more than 800 treaties made with indigenous peoples over our nation’s history were broken or never ratified).

At The Institute for the Theology of Culture: New Wine, New Wineskins’ conference “Immigration Reformation”, we hope to engage in open conversations which are honest and truthful and that complexify the conversation on immigration reform.