This fall, before the election, presbyteries will be encouraged to set up task forces on immigration — so Presbyterians can be ready to respond the next time a push is made for comprehensive immigration reform. Whether the Republicans or the Democrats win in November, the demography of the country is changing. People are streaming into the United States from all corners of the globe, and the implications of immigration for public policy and for communities and congregations are tremendous.
“People who want change in our immigration laws are being beaten by the 15 percent of the country who don’t,” said Julia A. Thorne, a lawyer who is manager of immigration issues and immigration counsel for the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.). “Unless the church rises up and starts to say something about this, it’s going to stay the same, or get worse,” Thorne said during a gathering in September on new immigrant Presbyterian ministries. It’s an intriguing question: To what extent can people of faith agree on what’s needed for comprehensive immigration reform, and mobilize to work for it? The answer is not particularly clear. In some communities, people of faith have been galvanized by legislation or attempts to round up illegal workers, such as the raid in May 2008 at a meatpacking plant in Postville, Iowa, in which nearly 400 immigrants, many of them from Guatemala, were arrested. There, St. Briget’s Catholic Church has become a gathering place — a refuge — for the families of the men arrested, and Jews and Christians have come from Minnesota, Illinois, Wisconsin, and Michigan to protest what happened and to sound the call for changes in federal immigration policy. At the grassroots, congregations are involved in roll-up-your-sleeves outreach as much as political advocacy: teaching English as a Second Language; providing food, clothing, tutoring, and legal assistance. And America’s Voice, an immigration reform group, is mobilizing faith groups nationwide on a fall “Tour of the Faithful” to speak out for “the need for immigration reform that reflects our best values.” Eighteen events were to be held from mid-Sept. through Oct. 19, including public forums and rallies; prayer services and a festival; and events in Colorado and Kentucky to announce campaigns for people to sign faith pledges involving immigration. Supporters of the tour say they’re being driven by seeing the needs in their own towns, and by a conviction that immigration reform ought to be a key issue in this presidential election. But they also acknowledge that people of faith don’t always hold the same views on immigration — that some are more concerned about national security, and others about justice. “The issue of immigration reform is receiving little attention in the presidential debate and negative attention in the media,” said Bishop John C. Wester of the Archdiocese of Salt Lake City and chair of the Committee on Migration and Refugee Services of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops. Faith communities have the responsibility to protect human rights and dignity for all, Wester said during a conference call to announce details of the tour. “As a nation — a nation of immigrants, I might add — we cannot continue to accept the labor of immigrants while also undermining their basic human dignity. We cannot have it both ways.” For Hispanic immigrants afraid of being deported, “there is an incredible amount of angst, trepidation, and the spirit of fear,” said Samuel Rodriguez, president of the National Hispanic Christian Leadership Conference. He called for people of faith to build a “moral firewall” against rhetoric that is “anti-immigrant, anti-Hispanic, anti-stranger.” For immigrants themselves, this is anything but mundane political rhetoric. “They are groaning, they are crying for help,” said one pastor at the new immigrant ministries convocation, held in Louisville Sept. 11-13. Many immigrants “really live in fear,” looking over their shoulders, afraid of when they will be asked to produce documents they don’t have, said another pastor. “Among our members there are so many of them who have these immigration issues, so many who put up joyful faces, but in their hearts, they are not” happy. “Some people have not been able to go home for years” to visit their families, because if they leave the United States they will not be allowed to return. How can churches listen and begin to care for those frightened people, the pastor asked, so they can start “seeing themselves as children of God?” Thorne described for those attending the convocation the work she does — which includes trying to educate congregations and presbyteries about the theology of immigration. “I’m trying to remind the Presbyterian church that immigration in the Bible is more than welcoming the stranger,” Thorne said. “There’s a whole lot more in the Bible than welcoming the stranger.” Some examples she gave: When Abraham and Sarah didn’t have food, they crossed the border and lied to the government, saying they were brother and sister, so that they could stay in the country. Then Pharaoh kicked them out, and “that’s deportation.” Ruth got married because she had no official status. Joseph was a victim of trafficking. And the New Testament shows the vision of “all people of all tribes and nations gathered before the throne,” Thorne said. As she travels the country – on the road much of the year – Thorne encourages congregations to see connections between their mission work and what’s happening in their own communities. Many Presbyterians go to Africa or Central America, she said, where they “build houses and they set up water tanks and they heal diseases,” buy local products and take photographs. “Then they come back home and they show the pictures.” And in those presentations, “I always hear this: ‘They were poor, but they were happy.’ ” But Thorne asks: “What about those who were poor and unhappy,” who left their homes and came to the United States, seeking greater opportunity? Some people in the U.S. resent them, saying “They’re taking our health care or they’re living too many in a house” or breaking the law. “We shouldn’t do mission out of our convenience or our abundance,” Thorne said. “We need to remember that the same people we might be meeting on our mission fields are in our neighborhoods” already, and in our presbyteries. What about teaming with immigrants themselves, she suggested, to join in the mission work they are doing in their own communities? Part of Thorne’s work involves helping immigrant pastors and those in seminary, training to become pastors, to navigate the legal waters involving their own immigration status. She also works to develop and provide resources to congregations — including developing a packet of materials called a Family Care Plan that can be used to assist undocumented immigrants. Sometimes children are being separated from their parents in immigration raids or when the adults are arrested or detained. The packet includes a document that parents can fill out in advance and file in a safe place, to indicate who should take the children if they are picked up in a raid, and a power-of-attorney form so an authorized person could sell the immigrant’s car or take care of banking needs. Thorne also is working on a packet for churches including Bible study and background materials on immigration, and a pledge declaring the congregation to be a welcoming community for immigrants. And some congregations are taking action themselves. Some are organizing health fairs for immigrants or, following a program the Methodists have developed called “Justice for Our Neighbors,” are holding legal clinics where trained volunteers help immigrants get a start with paperwork and connect them with immigration lawyers who travel from site to site to assist. In San Francisco, a man collapsed during a worship service at an immigrant church, Thorne said. He was an undocumented worker. and, afraid that immigration authorities might be notified, the man refused to allow anyone to call 911. The church responded by joining forces with another congregation and recruiting doctors, nurses, and other health care professionals to volunteer their time for a day to hold a health event. And they sought commitments from clinics to agree to see patients who the screenings indicated needed more help. “These were poor churches — these were not big wealthy churches that had a lot of money,” Thorne said. “These were the immigrant churches themselves.” She also warns that in many places, immigration is becoming a local issue – sometimes with little warning. State legislatures are debating and sometimes passing strict new immigration laws, causing local communities to wrestle with what’s fair and what’s wise. A Presbyterian from Illinois, Ann Kelson, spoke during the convocation of how the rural town of Rushville, where she has served a church, now has about 350 immigrants from Togo living in a town of 3,200. “That was my introduction to new immigrant ministry, knowing nothing about immigration, knowing nothing about Togo,” Kelson said. “I had to look it up on the map.” Many of the Togolese in Rushville work in a nearby meatpacking plant, working long hours at physically demanding jobs. Another 600 Togolese live in a nearby town. Some are Presbyterian and worship in local churches. “They are exhausted, absolutely exhausted,” Kelson said of these workers. She found her ministry transformed by dealing with immigration concerns and depression, “mothers who had to leave their babies back home, navigating what happens if you get a traffic ticket and why did I get it, all those sorts of things.” Kelson now is helping Great Rivers Presbytery in its work with new immigrant ministries. And Thorne warned there could be more trouble ahead. She said she’s spoken with another minister from the area, and thinks “you are a raid waiting to happen. You are going to have a raid, probably in the next year and a half. You need to do raid preparation right now.” And “when that raid happens, it’s going to tear apart Rushville, Illinois,” Thorne said. “It’s happened in Mississippi and it’s happened in Postville, Iowa. … That should be your first priority, is getting ready for a raid. Unless a new administration says, ‘We’re going to stop raids,’ that’s a reality and it’s going to be devastating.”
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