Immigration: Working for Justice, Showing Compassion

Friday, May 11, 2007

It’s hard to deny our nation’s immigration system is broken.

This brokenness is manifest in many ways, but is particularly poignant in the human suffering of undocumented immigrants who struggle with separation from family, backbreaking work for slave wages, and lives in the shadows of society.

In the face of this suffering, people of faith have responded with compassionate actions and calls for justice.

Recently, two new campaigns have launched in response to our nation’s broken immigration system. The New Sanctuary Movement organizes congregations of all faiths to provide shelter and material support for individuals facing deportation. Christians for Comprehensive Immigration Reform, a coalition of Christian leaders and groups, is calling for significant changes to our immigration laws to address the systemic injustices.

As Congress and President Bush face mounting political pressure to “do something” about immigration, the faith witness of groups like these becomes ever more critical.

The bold actions of the New Sanctuary Movement are already grabbing headlines. Wednesday, May 9 marked the official launch of their campaign to organize faith leaders and congregations to provide support for undocumented immigrants. Moved by the injustice our current immigration law creates, congregations in Chicago, New York, and Los Angeles are responding with compassion providing immigrants with food, shelter, legal services, and a place to tell their story.

However, the New Sanctuary Movement goes beyond providing “charity” for undocumented immigrants. By participating in the movement, the immigrants themselves become courageous and compelling public witnesses for justice in immigration legislation.

Christians for Comprehensive Immigration Reform (CCIR) is one group that is addressing immigration on the federal level. The coalition consists of Christian faith leaders as well as ordinary folks “in the pews” motivated by their faith to advocate for comprehensive immigration reform. At their launch press conference Monday, May 8, CCIR presented 50,000 letters from Christian constituents calling for immigration laws which both uphold the rule of law and are consistent with Biblical principles of compassion to the stranger. In addition to the letters, CCIR will spread its message with an ambitious ad buy in political, national, and local media outlets.

This is just a few highlights of the tremendous response of the faith community to this issue. Faith in Public Life’s issue page on immigration shows the diversity of faith traditions concerned with this issue.

This inspiring mobilization of the faith community comes at a critical moment. Reps. Flake (R-Ariz.) and Gutierrez (D-Ill.) have introduced a comprehensive immigration reform bill in the house (HR 1645, the STRIVE Act) which includes provisions to strengthen border security, strengthen family reunification and provide a path the citizenship undocumented people. However, getting a comprehensive bill in the Senate will be much more difficult in the Senate where it could face a filibuster from immigration hardliners.

The National Immigration Forum is an excellent resource for information about immigration legislation.

Headlines:

Congregations to Give Haven to Immigrants

Illegal Immigrant Sanctuaries Set

Giving Shelter from the Storm of Deportation

New Coaltion of Christians Seeks Changes at Borders

Christians Eye Immigration Reform

Evengelicals Launch Immigration Reform Campaign