This post is written by Bill Mefford
In Henri Nouwen’s excellent book, In the Name of Jesus, he characterizes the first temptation Jesus faced in the wilderness, to turn stones into bread, as a temptation for relevance. I bristle when I read this because I want the church to be relevant! But I realize after some reflection that what Nouwen is describing is a choice we must make between relevance and faithfulness. I think this applies to our struggle to defend the rights of immigrants today.
In the book Nouwen writes that irrelevance is our “divine vocation that allows [us] to enter into deep solidarity” with those experiencing suffering and vulnerability. Incarnating ourselves among immigrants who are repeatedly marginalized by our society, made to feel invisible or even demonized by current conversations about the issue of immigration, and oppressed even by those who claim to be friends with immigrants (note the record number of deportations by President Obama), will make us irrelevant. We will be tempted to become more relevant in current policy discussions, but the price we pay for relevance will be further disconnection from our calling to incarnation. I have found that too often in policy discussions in Washington DC, immigrants remain invisible, not listened too or entirely removed from the discussion, and so, continually marginalized. This is true even among advocacy organizations working for positive immigration reform.
How is this happening? This happens whenever immigration is defined as a border security and economic improvement debate, rather than a human rights issue.
Unfortunately, state compacts, which began in Utah, and are currently spreading to other states by some of the leading organizations in the immigrants-rights movement, represent a temptation to faith communities to become relevant in the policy debates. But relevance in this case comes at a price: unfaithfulness.
The compacts are focused on conservatives, but all too often faith groups are included to ease their conscience. If we sign on, or so the thinking goes, we can dull the harsh edge found in some of these statements. Practically speaking, the statements contained in the compacts call for a continued militarization of the border (and filling the pockets of defense contractors who thrive off of the money being poured into these failed projects) and the protection of businesses that exploit immigrants without accountability. It furthers the delusion that too many in the movement have that says we can have “comprehensive immigration reform” by convincing [tricking] a few moderate members of Congress into believing that the reforms we ask for are fairly mild and will actually result in greater security and economic benefit, particularly for businesses. Of course, the mild reforms will never truly solve the challenges immigrants face and certainly cannot be called “comprehensive.”
Those of us who have incarnated ourselves among immigrants know that the oppression of our friends, neighbors, family members and fellow church members will not be stopped by smoke and mirrors and DC parlor tricks. The oppression will be stopped by a transformation of our current politics and policies. And transformation does not happen through poll-tested messages and carefully selected catch-phrases, or through convincing (or tricking) a few moderates to vote for something they don’t read or understand.
Social transformation from a biblical perspective happens as we incarnate ourselves among the vulnerable and marginalized and redemptively utilize our access to resources to gain that same access to those same resources for those whose access has been restricted or denied. This is the essence of what Jesus has done for us and what he calls us to do for others.
The language of the state compacts, which define immigrants in free-market terms and how low of a threat they are to U.S. national security, is simply not faith-driven language. I am tired of signing on to statements that do not accentuate my voice as a follow of Jesus and someone who cares passionately about this issue. I just won’t sign these kinds of statements any more, not any longer.
I admit I have signed onto statements like this in the past believing people supposedly far smarter than me that this is the only way forward. I have ignored the glaring reality that these statements do not hold my values that this issue is first and foremost a human rights issue. But as the politics in DC grow more toxic and the reality of actually moving meaningful legislation forward becomes more unrealistic, I am tired of my voice not being heard in its truest form. Why should I try and sound like the gutless politicians in DC if they aren’t going to do anything meaningful in the first place? Why should I agree to statements such as these compacts when they haggle the most effective tool we yield as people of faith: our moral voice?
I won’t sell my birthright for a mess of pottage any more. I will not sign or endorse the state compacts, and I will strongly encourage others to not sign or endorse them either. It is time for our voice to be our own.
The truth is that as followers of Jesus we must advocate for policies that treat immigrants as children of God, with inherit value regardless of their function in the marketplace or the threat level that the Department of Homeland Security deems them. Thus, we need policy which protects their basic rights, which allows them to remain with their families, does not require them to pay outrageous fines or wait endless waits in order to begin any pathway to legal status. We need policies that do not separate immigrants from their families, that does not infringe on their privacy and their right to work, or to collectively bargain and gain better working conditions. We want policy that treats immigrants the same that citizens expect to be treated.
The language of the state compacts fits nicely into today’s current broken political atmosphere because it allows business as usual. It allows the current discussion to continue to be about protecting the borders and protecting U.S. business interests.
By keeping the discussion centered on border security, private prison corporations – raking in billions off of the harsh enforcement policies of the Obama administration – will continue to rake in billions because there is no inherit challenge to the continued practice of mass incarceration of people of color. Instead, the compact enhances the need for even more border security.
By keeping the discussion centered on border security, corporations like Boeing and Halliburton to name a couple – raking in hundreds of millions from building the wall and militarizing the border – will continue to rake in hundreds of millions because the language actually endorses this kind of corporate welfare through further emphasizing border security.
By keeping the discussion centered on economic growth for the already economically comfortable, which matches the messaging of supposed leaders like Newt Gingrich, we allow immigrants to be treated like objects, viewed positively only as long as they provide some economic benefit. But even if they bring our country economic benefit and uphold the “free-market philosophy,” they are not deported, but rather, given permanent second class citizenry, which has been suggested by Gingrich and others, because “we in the United States are humane.”
Since when is second class citizenship humane you may ask? Since we allowed the discussion to be centered on national security and economic benefit for businesses, which the state compacts only serve to reinforce.
The choice before us is relevance – signing on to statements like these compacts – or faithfulness. However, even if we opt for relevance, let me ask how smart is it, with national legislation nowhere in sight, to barter away our values and our moral positioning, adopt the language and policies of economic and border security from our opponents, before we are even asked to begin the real negotiations that will happen when the legislation is actually introduced and begins to move through the process? Why are we caving in to demands long before those demands are even formally made? It makes no sense!
As President Obama has found out the hard way, if you give the opposition your foot, your opposition is not going to be happy with the foot you have already given and be moved to compromise and not ask for anything more. How naïve! No, the truth is, if your starting point involves handing them your foot, then be ready to lose your entire leg and probably parts of other limbs as well. The anti-immigrant forces have not proven to be good comprimisers so where you start will largely determine where you end. I shudder to think where we could end up if our starting point is these state compacts. They are not my starting points any longer. I choose faithfulness and reject relevance.
We, as people of faith, as followers of Jesus, need to think through our purpose in this struggle. When we are asked to endorse something like this I know our first inclination is to join in any thing we think might be helpful. We are tired of the stalemate and so we are ready to sign anything that doesn’t sound absolutely horrible, even though parts of these compacts come pretty close.
I urge you to not follow this inclination though. I urge you to consider first what exactly is our role and our purpose in this struggle as followers of Jesus. We should ask, of any statement, does this language capture the essence of our mission among immigrant communities? Is asking for more border security and framing the contributions of immigrants solely in an economic framework convey what we want the world to know of our mission and passion for the rights of immigrants? Would the immigrant communities we are incarnated among be proud of what we are signing on to?
For me, the state compacts answer no to all of these questions, therefore, for me to be faithful, I cannot endorse them unless the language is radically altered. I want to be faithful to the people who are directly impacted by this issue – the people with whom Jesus has incarnated himself and who he calls you and I to incarnate ourselves among as well. More than we want to be politically relevant, we know we first must be faithful. I hope and pray our voice will be lifted up and that the policies directed towards immigrants will be transformed. And that transformation will only come as we faithfully work towards that end, political relevance be damned.
Thinking and reflecting on God's call to the Church to faithfully follow the Migrant Christ and to love his immigrant sisters and brothers.
Showing posts with label demonization of immigrants. Show all posts
Showing posts with label demonization of immigrants. Show all posts
Sunday, December 4, 2011
Thursday, November 17, 2011
The Spread of Toxic Immigration Laws
Chris Liu-Beers is Program Associate with the North Carolina Council of Churches. You can download a new Bible Study on Immigration at http://www.nccouncilofchurches.org/immigration-curriculum
Over the past several months I’ve been shaking my head at my computer screen, reading headlines from across the Southeast about new state immigration laws. This crop of new laws, enacted in Alabama, Georgia and South Carolina, and modeled after Arizona’s now infamous immigration law, threatens the safety and well-being of communities across the South. And North Carolina legislators are seriously considering whether to follow in these draconian footsteps.
I can certainly understand that the nation is clearly frustrated with Congress’ dysfunction, partisan gridlock, and seeming inability to deal rationally with the many major policy issues facing our communities. I am too. And immigration reform is now seen as one of the most challenging political battlegrounds, thanks in large part to partisan wrangling. Now a handful of conservative legislators are using fear and misinformation to position immigration as a political wedge issue, cashing in on Washington’s inaction and the down economy to pursue a fierce anti-immigrant agenda.
Even though prominent Republican leaders have expressed public reservations about
using a strategy so clearly designed to alienate Latinos and other large voting blocks, and even though all evidence from Arizona suggests that this approach is harmful economically, these anti-immigration hard-liners are undeterred.
Here is a quick look at some of these new laws:
South Carolina (SB 20), enacted June 27, 2011
* Requires that all law enforcement officers must demand proof of citizenship if they have a “reasonable suspicion” that someone is not in the U.S. legally
* Creates its own immigration enforcement agency (i.e. “South Carolina Border Patrol”)
* Requires employers to use E-Verify federal immigration database to determine the immigration status of new hires
Georgia (HB 87), enacted May 13, 2011
* Requires that all law enforcement officers must demand proof of citizenship if they have a “reasonable suspicion” that someone is not in the U.S. legally
* Establishes a seven-member Immigration Enforcement Review Board to investigate complaints about local and state government officials not enforcing state immigration-related laws
* Makes it a crime to knowingly harbor or transport undocumented immigrants
* Imposes harsh penalties for providing false papers to an undocumented immigrant
* Requires employers to use E-Verify federal immigration database to determine the immigration status of new hires
Alabama (HB 56), enacted June 9, 2011
* Requires that all law enforcement officers must demand proof of citizenship if they have a “reasonable suspicion” that someone is not in the U.S. legally
* Makes it a crime to knowingly harbor or transport undocumented immigrants
* Makes it a crime to rent property to undocumented immigrants
* Imposes harsh penalties for providing false papers to an undocumented immigrant
* Requires employers to use E-Verify federal immigration database to determine the immigration status of new hires
* Requires that public schools confirm students’ legal residency status through birth certificates or sworn affidavits
* Bans undocumented students from attending state colleges
This impractical, punitive approach does nothing to move us closer to immigration reform, but it does undermine our deepest values and creates chaos and fear in our communities.
Farm labor shortages have made headlines all summer, as a largely undocumented workforce has been criminalized. While politicians claimed that these immigration laws would create jobs (a claim made right now by almost all politicians about almost all bills), new jobs have failed to materialize. Instead, in these economies driven by agriculture, crops have rotted in the fields, and family farmers have been devastated by losses.
One of the most controversial sections of Alabama’s new state law is the requirement that children show proof of citizenship when registering to attend public school. Proponents of the new law have said that no child will be turned away from school, but that they do want to track state spending on undocumented students. In reality, this “papers, please” approach is creating a climate of fear that is keeping children out of school.
According to Frank Sharry, Executive Director of America’s Voice: “The restrictionist vision for immigration ‘reform’ is playing out in Alabama today, with all of its ugly effects. Crops are rotting in the fields, children are afraid to go to school, and the state is reviving memories of its awful civil rights history. All that, and the Alabama law won’t fix one thing that’s broken about our immigration system. Is this really the type of country we want to be?”
Every day more and more Americans are realizing the devastating effects of this approach in their own communities. Faith communities in particular have helped people in the pews see how we cannot afford to scapegoat immigrants if we want to move forward as a nation.
In Alabama, for example, some denominations sued the state because they believed the new law would undermine their ability to be faithful to the Gospel.
Here’s an excerpt from a recent NPR story:
At First United Methodist Church in downtown Birmingham, clergy from around the city take turns leading a prayer service called in response to the new immigration law. Episcopal priest Herman Afanador, Baptist pastor Amanda Duckworth, and Methodist minister Melissa Self Patrick are part of a growing chorus of critics who say the Alabama law goes too far, criminalizing all kinds of contact with undocumented residents. It’s illegal, for example, to knowingly enter into a contract with, to rent to, to harbor or to transport illegal immigrants.
The state’s United Methodist, Episcopal and Roman Catholic churches have sued, arguing it violates their religious freedom.
Patrick, who runs the inner-city ministry of the United Methodist church in Birmingham, says being a good Samaritan could now be illegal. “This new legislation goes against the tenets of our Christian faith — to welcome the stranger, to offer hospitality to anyone,” she says.
Some here see the issue through the lens of Alabama’s history, including Lawton Higgs, 71, a retired Methodist minister. “And I’m a recovering racist, transformed by the great fruits of the civil rights movement in this city,” he says. Higgs says he and his church were on the wrong side of that moral battle in the ’60s, so he is pleased to see the churches entering the fray now. He likens Alabama’s immigration law to Jim Crow — legislating second-class status for illegal immigrants. “This is an expression of the same — what was called the white Southern redeemers,” he says.
These kinds of public faith witnesses against the new law have received a lot of media coverage, as people of faith have held vigils, marched in Birmingham, and filed lawsuits. While a federal judge recently allowed parts of the Alabama law to stand, congregations are making the connections between their faith and how their immigrant neighbors are treated. More than 150 clergy signed a letter opposing the law that was authored by Rev. R. G. Lyons, a United Methodist minister at Birmingham’s Community Church Without Walls. Clergy and laypeople alike are getting involved in new ways, and it’s making a difference.
Bringing it Home
Will North Carolina be next in line for passing regressive, anti-immigrant legislation? We’ve already seen an Arizona-style bill introduced last session, and there is strong interest from local anti-immigrant organizations in getting one passed. Supporters of mass-deportation are well-aware and seem quite comfortable with the range of negative effects wrought by such measures. As we’re seeing over the last month, these negative effects extend far beyond the targeted undocumented immigrant population and reach young school children, business owners and farmers, state taxpayers, legal immigrants, and the state’s reputation as a force in today’s global economy. Even many conservative legislators realize that this is the wrong approach for North Carolina.
We need serious, responsible solutions from politicians, not more-of-the-same scapegoating and fear-mongering. It’s time for state leaders to reject the politics of fear and to embrace the policies of immigrant integration. It’s time for Washington to enact the DREAM Act and real comprehensive immigration reform that brings people out of the shadows. And it’s time for faith communities of every tradition and denomination to stand with our immigrant sisters and brothers to say “Not in our state. Not in our name.”
Over the past several months I’ve been shaking my head at my computer screen, reading headlines from across the Southeast about new state immigration laws. This crop of new laws, enacted in Alabama, Georgia and South Carolina, and modeled after Arizona’s now infamous immigration law, threatens the safety and well-being of communities across the South. And North Carolina legislators are seriously considering whether to follow in these draconian footsteps.
I can certainly understand that the nation is clearly frustrated with Congress’ dysfunction, partisan gridlock, and seeming inability to deal rationally with the many major policy issues facing our communities. I am too. And immigration reform is now seen as one of the most challenging political battlegrounds, thanks in large part to partisan wrangling. Now a handful of conservative legislators are using fear and misinformation to position immigration as a political wedge issue, cashing in on Washington’s inaction and the down economy to pursue a fierce anti-immigrant agenda.
Even though prominent Republican leaders have expressed public reservations about
using a strategy so clearly designed to alienate Latinos and other large voting blocks, and even though all evidence from Arizona suggests that this approach is harmful economically, these anti-immigration hard-liners are undeterred.
Here is a quick look at some of these new laws:
South Carolina (SB 20), enacted June 27, 2011
* Requires that all law enforcement officers must demand proof of citizenship if they have a “reasonable suspicion” that someone is not in the U.S. legally
* Creates its own immigration enforcement agency (i.e. “South Carolina Border Patrol”)
* Requires employers to use E-Verify federal immigration database to determine the immigration status of new hires
Georgia (HB 87), enacted May 13, 2011
* Requires that all law enforcement officers must demand proof of citizenship if they have a “reasonable suspicion” that someone is not in the U.S. legally
* Establishes a seven-member Immigration Enforcement Review Board to investigate complaints about local and state government officials not enforcing state immigration-related laws
* Makes it a crime to knowingly harbor or transport undocumented immigrants
* Imposes harsh penalties for providing false papers to an undocumented immigrant
* Requires employers to use E-Verify federal immigration database to determine the immigration status of new hires
Alabama (HB 56), enacted June 9, 2011
* Requires that all law enforcement officers must demand proof of citizenship if they have a “reasonable suspicion” that someone is not in the U.S. legally
* Makes it a crime to knowingly harbor or transport undocumented immigrants
* Makes it a crime to rent property to undocumented immigrants
* Imposes harsh penalties for providing false papers to an undocumented immigrant
* Requires employers to use E-Verify federal immigration database to determine the immigration status of new hires
* Requires that public schools confirm students’ legal residency status through birth certificates or sworn affidavits
* Bans undocumented students from attending state colleges
This impractical, punitive approach does nothing to move us closer to immigration reform, but it does undermine our deepest values and creates chaos and fear in our communities.
Farm labor shortages have made headlines all summer, as a largely undocumented workforce has been criminalized. While politicians claimed that these immigration laws would create jobs (a claim made right now by almost all politicians about almost all bills), new jobs have failed to materialize. Instead, in these economies driven by agriculture, crops have rotted in the fields, and family farmers have been devastated by losses.
One of the most controversial sections of Alabama’s new state law is the requirement that children show proof of citizenship when registering to attend public school. Proponents of the new law have said that no child will be turned away from school, but that they do want to track state spending on undocumented students. In reality, this “papers, please” approach is creating a climate of fear that is keeping children out of school.
According to Frank Sharry, Executive Director of America’s Voice: “The restrictionist vision for immigration ‘reform’ is playing out in Alabama today, with all of its ugly effects. Crops are rotting in the fields, children are afraid to go to school, and the state is reviving memories of its awful civil rights history. All that, and the Alabama law won’t fix one thing that’s broken about our immigration system. Is this really the type of country we want to be?”
Every day more and more Americans are realizing the devastating effects of this approach in their own communities. Faith communities in particular have helped people in the pews see how we cannot afford to scapegoat immigrants if we want to move forward as a nation.
In Alabama, for example, some denominations sued the state because they believed the new law would undermine their ability to be faithful to the Gospel.
Here’s an excerpt from a recent NPR story:
At First United Methodist Church in downtown Birmingham, clergy from around the city take turns leading a prayer service called in response to the new immigration law. Episcopal priest Herman Afanador, Baptist pastor Amanda Duckworth, and Methodist minister Melissa Self Patrick are part of a growing chorus of critics who say the Alabama law goes too far, criminalizing all kinds of contact with undocumented residents. It’s illegal, for example, to knowingly enter into a contract with, to rent to, to harbor or to transport illegal immigrants.
The state’s United Methodist, Episcopal and Roman Catholic churches have sued, arguing it violates their religious freedom.
Patrick, who runs the inner-city ministry of the United Methodist church in Birmingham, says being a good Samaritan could now be illegal. “This new legislation goes against the tenets of our Christian faith — to welcome the stranger, to offer hospitality to anyone,” she says.
Some here see the issue through the lens of Alabama’s history, including Lawton Higgs, 71, a retired Methodist minister. “And I’m a recovering racist, transformed by the great fruits of the civil rights movement in this city,” he says. Higgs says he and his church were on the wrong side of that moral battle in the ’60s, so he is pleased to see the churches entering the fray now. He likens Alabama’s immigration law to Jim Crow — legislating second-class status for illegal immigrants. “This is an expression of the same — what was called the white Southern redeemers,” he says.
These kinds of public faith witnesses against the new law have received a lot of media coverage, as people of faith have held vigils, marched in Birmingham, and filed lawsuits. While a federal judge recently allowed parts of the Alabama law to stand, congregations are making the connections between their faith and how their immigrant neighbors are treated. More than 150 clergy signed a letter opposing the law that was authored by Rev. R. G. Lyons, a United Methodist minister at Birmingham’s Community Church Without Walls. Clergy and laypeople alike are getting involved in new ways, and it’s making a difference.
Bringing it Home
Will North Carolina be next in line for passing regressive, anti-immigrant legislation? We’ve already seen an Arizona-style bill introduced last session, and there is strong interest from local anti-immigrant organizations in getting one passed. Supporters of mass-deportation are well-aware and seem quite comfortable with the range of negative effects wrought by such measures. As we’re seeing over the last month, these negative effects extend far beyond the targeted undocumented immigrant population and reach young school children, business owners and farmers, state taxpayers, legal immigrants, and the state’s reputation as a force in today’s global economy. Even many conservative legislators realize that this is the wrong approach for North Carolina.
We need serious, responsible solutions from politicians, not more-of-the-same scapegoating and fear-mongering. It’s time for state leaders to reject the politics of fear and to embrace the policies of immigrant integration. It’s time for Washington to enact the DREAM Act and real comprehensive immigration reform that brings people out of the shadows. And it’s time for faith communities of every tradition and denomination to stand with our immigrant sisters and brothers to say “Not in our state. Not in our name.”
Thursday, June 2, 2011
You Don't Need Bullets to Terrorize a Community
This was written by David V., a DREAM Act student, as a letter to President Obama.
Mr. Obama, please take the time to examine how militarizing our border affects Latino communities in border cities, wherever border patrol has jurisdiction to wreak havoc in our communities, and stop catering to calls from white landowners in border states!
You must realize that you don't need bullets to terrorize a community.
I'm not talking about relatively unpopulated towns with ranchers spread out here and there. You would go out of your way to ensure their protection and safety of mind. I'm talking about the cities in which your officers terrorize communities with their presence having no discretion because your system deems us all criminals.
I'm talking about the multiple times I've seen strollers left on the side of the road after mothers have gotten picked up by border patrol. People being afraid of visiting their local grocery store because they have become a trap for deportation--where you have to bus people out.
I'm talking from the sad experiences of my mother, my father, my brother, my sister, my cousins, and uncles getting deported. Where is their peace of mind that they can walk down the street without fear of being asked for their papers? Thousands of families are torn apart everyday by your agents, and when one rancher is killed you respond?
You easily crack under the pressure from some rich white folk while our community has been pleading for years for dignity and discretion. You promised reform and you are delivering a record number of deportations. You are militarizing the border, for what? To prove that you took a stance against the cartels but never took a drastic action to address the high drug demand from your drug-duped nation?
But come November you will easily forget that you need the Latino vote to keep your party afloat, then you will seem to care. Your publicity team will try to spin this and sell it to our community but we are fed up! If every time the first lady asked you to do something and you said, "Yes baby I'll do it," and every time you failed she would have left you a long time ago. Your credibility in our community is diminishing, we have hope but your unwillingness to whip your party to move on immigration reform shows us how much you are really willing to do for a community that helped you win key states in 2008 or did you forget that already?
We elected you based on Hope, not that you were going to change anything individually but that you would move forward with a positive honest dialogue on the issue of immigration but I think you have been brainwashed. You honestly think that the immigration system is functioning when you have 12 million people undocumented in the U.S. living as second class citizens. And you think that you are doing the right thing by sending troops to the border? Please! Spare us the trouble and just tell us that you care more about what people say about your buddies at the Democratic National Convention then you do about people with real pain, real suffering, and whose dreams are shattered because your lack of action.
A little honesty is all I ask. The GOP isn't afraid of saying they repudiate us but want our vote. Why don't you own up to it and admit that, at least tactically, you hold to the same premise?
I have never looked at the U.S. as a land of the free, it's more a land of those misguided by media biases and bigoted diatribes of politicians that care about our community showing up to the ballot and checking off their name.
I call on every one who reads this letter to demand accountability of their politicians for our communities, on all issues not just immigration! Remember that people are not fighting for your party's ideals, we are fighting to win our humanity back, to live better lives in coexistence with our brothers and sisters, and to ensure a better future for our youth.
Mr. Obama, please take the time to examine how militarizing our border affects Latino communities in border cities, wherever border patrol has jurisdiction to wreak havoc in our communities, and stop catering to calls from white landowners in border states!
You must realize that you don't need bullets to terrorize a community.
I'm not talking about relatively unpopulated towns with ranchers spread out here and there. You would go out of your way to ensure their protection and safety of mind. I'm talking about the cities in which your officers terrorize communities with their presence having no discretion because your system deems us all criminals.
I'm talking about the multiple times I've seen strollers left on the side of the road after mothers have gotten picked up by border patrol. People being afraid of visiting their local grocery store because they have become a trap for deportation--where you have to bus people out.
I'm talking from the sad experiences of my mother, my father, my brother, my sister, my cousins, and uncles getting deported. Where is their peace of mind that they can walk down the street without fear of being asked for their papers? Thousands of families are torn apart everyday by your agents, and when one rancher is killed you respond?
You easily crack under the pressure from some rich white folk while our community has been pleading for years for dignity and discretion. You promised reform and you are delivering a record number of deportations. You are militarizing the border, for what? To prove that you took a stance against the cartels but never took a drastic action to address the high drug demand from your drug-duped nation?
But come November you will easily forget that you need the Latino vote to keep your party afloat, then you will seem to care. Your publicity team will try to spin this and sell it to our community but we are fed up! If every time the first lady asked you to do something and you said, "Yes baby I'll do it," and every time you failed she would have left you a long time ago. Your credibility in our community is diminishing, we have hope but your unwillingness to whip your party to move on immigration reform shows us how much you are really willing to do for a community that helped you win key states in 2008 or did you forget that already?
We elected you based on Hope, not that you were going to change anything individually but that you would move forward with a positive honest dialogue on the issue of immigration but I think you have been brainwashed. You honestly think that the immigration system is functioning when you have 12 million people undocumented in the U.S. living as second class citizens. And you think that you are doing the right thing by sending troops to the border? Please! Spare us the trouble and just tell us that you care more about what people say about your buddies at the Democratic National Convention then you do about people with real pain, real suffering, and whose dreams are shattered because your lack of action.
A little honesty is all I ask. The GOP isn't afraid of saying they repudiate us but want our vote. Why don't you own up to it and admit that, at least tactically, you hold to the same premise?
I have never looked at the U.S. as a land of the free, it's more a land of those misguided by media biases and bigoted diatribes of politicians that care about our community showing up to the ballot and checking off their name.
I call on every one who reads this letter to demand accountability of their politicians for our communities, on all issues not just immigration! Remember that people are not fighting for your party's ideals, we are fighting to win our humanity back, to live better lives in coexistence with our brothers and sisters, and to ensure a better future for our youth.
Tuesday, March 22, 2011
Undocumented and Unafraid: No Tenemos Miedo
A post by Rev. Yvette Schock
One day in Tucson last summer, as I wove a path through the crowds at a demonstration against SB1070, a young woman approached and held out to me a sign from the stack she had clasped under her arm. On the front was a brightly colored image of another young woman holding a sign that read in bold, block letters, “UNDOCUMENTED, UNAFRAID: NO TENEMOS MIEDO.” I stopped walking, seized by a moment of indecision—I am not an undocumented immigrant, and I do not have to fear the things an undocumented immigrant might, so, I wondered, what did it mean for me to carry this image and these words? Could it be a declaration of solidarity and support for families and students refusing to live in the shadows, and a denunciation of an economic system that requires the existence of an underclass and of a society and political leaders who accept it? Did it honor the courage of immigrant advocates, or was it just a shadow gesture made by someone who risked very little by showing up at a demonstration, in contrast to those who risked a great deal? My moment of indecision didn’t last long; I decided not to overthink it (I’m often guilty of this), held the sign high, and joined in the chanting and singing of the crowd.
But the sign came home from Tucson with me; it sits propped against the wall opposite my desk, and I have had months to reflect on the significance of its message—how it speaks within the context of these times, and what it demands of me in particular. I have begun to reads its words as the kind of defiant, hopeful, confident, David-confronting-Goliath statement of faith we hear again and again in the Psalms. In the face of all kinds of dangers and anxieties, the Psalmists often declared their trust in God and their defiance of any human who might harm them using these words, or something very like them:
In God I trust and am not afraid.
What can mere mortals do to me?
(Psalm 56:4)
It’s not just the Psalmists: very, very often in Scripture, when messengers from God arrive to bring comfort, hope and challenge to people in all kinds of precarious situations, they usually begin the same way: “Do not be afraid.” Maybe it’s because coming face-to-face all of a sudden with a messenger from God is a startling experience, or maybe it’s because God’s messengers so often appear to people with plenty of reason to be afraid, but I think it might also be because of what fear does to us. Fear causes us to shrink, to turn inward, to turn away from God and from others. When God’s messengers arrive, it’s usually not only to comfort and reassure, but also to challenge and move us to action. People who are shrinking in fear are in no state to hear God’s promises, to joyfully dive into the powerful current of God’s vision of life and abundance for our world and allow that current to redirect their lives, to answer God’s call to seek justice, love mercy, and walk humbly with God.
And so, when God’s messengers appear in the stories of our faith, they send up a flare for us: they prepare their listeners (and us, the readers) to hear and receive the promise and challenge that is coming next by reminding them (and us): Do not be afraid. God appears to Abram, elderly and childless, and declares: “Do not be afraid…Look up at the sky and count the stars…so shall your offspring be” (Genesis 15). When Abram’s wife, Sarai, sends her slave, Hagar and her son (by Abram) into the desert to die, God hears their cries and promises: “Hagar, do not be afraid; God has heard the boy crying as he lies there. Lift the boy up and take him by the hand, for I will make him into a great nation.” (Genesis 21) God speaks through the prophet Isaiah, saying to the Hebrew people in exile, “Do not be afraid, for I am with you; I will bring your children from the east and gather you from the west” (Isaiah 43:5). The angel Gabriel appears to Mary to declare, “Do not be afraid, Mary; you have found favor with God. You will conceive and give birth to a son, and you are to call him Jesus. He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High.” (Luke 1:30-32)
Fear, it seems, has no part in God’s vision of justice and wholeness for our world, nor in God’s way of working in the world. But fear has it uses for those who would wield it as their tool—human history is littered with far too many stories about political leaders stirring up fear of a particular group of people to distract from a problem the leader may not be able to address, to disguise their own shortcomings or corruption, to maintain their positions of power. Perhaps this is another reason why “Do not be afraid” is the refrain that begins each telling of God’s promises—to point out the universe of difference between God’s order and the order of empires.
Our society is no exception. It is crowded with voices that aim to stir up fear in immigrant and non-immigrant communities alike—candidates for public office, governors, state representatives, county sheriffs and Members of Congress who do not hesitate to paint immigrants in our communities as enemies, criminals, threats to our country’s security and to our families’ well-being; sponsors of state legislation that aims to make life difficult for undocumented immigrants. ICE agents waiting outside of apartment buildings or trolling in grocery store parking lots, increasing numbers of deportations that begin with a routine traffic stop, the threat of immigrant parents being separated from U.S. citizen children—all of these policies and practices are stirring up fear within immigrant communities, and for some, stirring up fear is the point. Though I don’t think the Obama administration would admit this, current immigration enforcement policy, in the absence of immigration reform, is, in effect, a program of attrition through enforcement—a strategy that banks on creating fear and suffering in immigration communities.
And yet some in those very communities are refusing to turn inward, to shrink in fear. I don’t know when the phrase “Undocumented and unafraid” first came into use in the movement for just immigration reform, but one account points to youth leaders working to pass the DREAM Act as the source, which wouldn’t surprise me. A number of DREAM students walked from Florida to Washington, DC early last year, declaring all the way that they were undocumented and unafraid. I imagine them walking through counties with 287g agreements in operation, and meeting with unsympathetic law enforcement officials or Members of Congress, living the words of the Psalmists:
In God I trust and am not afraid.
What can mere mortals do to me?
They refused to give power to fear, refused to be turned inward, away from their families, their communities, or God.
Perhaps these are messengers from God in our time—they do not come to us encouraging us “Do not be afraid”, but challenge us through their example, their declaration that they are unafraid.
I haven’t answered all of my own questions about the poster from the Tucson demonstration, but I have come to see it as a kind of icon—a living image that reaches out of its frame, grabs my hand, and points me to pay attention to these messengers of our time, to follow the path of the migrant Christ: the One who walks with DREAM students on the way to Washington, D.C., who lives inside apartment buildings where ICE agents wait outside, who sits with school children as they wait for their parents to come home from work, half afraid that they might not arrive; the One who calls us to reject a life shadowed by fear and to seek justice for all people.
One day in Tucson last summer, as I wove a path through the crowds at a demonstration against SB1070, a young woman approached and held out to me a sign from the stack she had clasped under her arm. On the front was a brightly colored image of another young woman holding a sign that read in bold, block letters, “UNDOCUMENTED, UNAFRAID: NO TENEMOS MIEDO.” I stopped walking, seized by a moment of indecision—I am not an undocumented immigrant, and I do not have to fear the things an undocumented immigrant might, so, I wondered, what did it mean for me to carry this image and these words? Could it be a declaration of solidarity and support for families and students refusing to live in the shadows, and a denunciation of an economic system that requires the existence of an underclass and of a society and political leaders who accept it? Did it honor the courage of immigrant advocates, or was it just a shadow gesture made by someone who risked very little by showing up at a demonstration, in contrast to those who risked a great deal? My moment of indecision didn’t last long; I decided not to overthink it (I’m often guilty of this), held the sign high, and joined in the chanting and singing of the crowd.
But the sign came home from Tucson with me; it sits propped against the wall opposite my desk, and I have had months to reflect on the significance of its message—how it speaks within the context of these times, and what it demands of me in particular. I have begun to reads its words as the kind of defiant, hopeful, confident, David-confronting-Goliath statement of faith we hear again and again in the Psalms. In the face of all kinds of dangers and anxieties, the Psalmists often declared their trust in God and their defiance of any human who might harm them using these words, or something very like them:
In God I trust and am not afraid.
What can mere mortals do to me?
(Psalm 56:4)
It’s not just the Psalmists: very, very often in Scripture, when messengers from God arrive to bring comfort, hope and challenge to people in all kinds of precarious situations, they usually begin the same way: “Do not be afraid.” Maybe it’s because coming face-to-face all of a sudden with a messenger from God is a startling experience, or maybe it’s because God’s messengers so often appear to people with plenty of reason to be afraid, but I think it might also be because of what fear does to us. Fear causes us to shrink, to turn inward, to turn away from God and from others. When God’s messengers arrive, it’s usually not only to comfort and reassure, but also to challenge and move us to action. People who are shrinking in fear are in no state to hear God’s promises, to joyfully dive into the powerful current of God’s vision of life and abundance for our world and allow that current to redirect their lives, to answer God’s call to seek justice, love mercy, and walk humbly with God.
And so, when God’s messengers appear in the stories of our faith, they send up a flare for us: they prepare their listeners (and us, the readers) to hear and receive the promise and challenge that is coming next by reminding them (and us): Do not be afraid. God appears to Abram, elderly and childless, and declares: “Do not be afraid…Look up at the sky and count the stars…so shall your offspring be” (Genesis 15). When Abram’s wife, Sarai, sends her slave, Hagar and her son (by Abram) into the desert to die, God hears their cries and promises: “Hagar, do not be afraid; God has heard the boy crying as he lies there. Lift the boy up and take him by the hand, for I will make him into a great nation.” (Genesis 21) God speaks through the prophet Isaiah, saying to the Hebrew people in exile, “Do not be afraid, for I am with you; I will bring your children from the east and gather you from the west” (Isaiah 43:5). The angel Gabriel appears to Mary to declare, “Do not be afraid, Mary; you have found favor with God. You will conceive and give birth to a son, and you are to call him Jesus. He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High.” (Luke 1:30-32)
Fear, it seems, has no part in God’s vision of justice and wholeness for our world, nor in God’s way of working in the world. But fear has it uses for those who would wield it as their tool—human history is littered with far too many stories about political leaders stirring up fear of a particular group of people to distract from a problem the leader may not be able to address, to disguise their own shortcomings or corruption, to maintain their positions of power. Perhaps this is another reason why “Do not be afraid” is the refrain that begins each telling of God’s promises—to point out the universe of difference between God’s order and the order of empires.
Our society is no exception. It is crowded with voices that aim to stir up fear in immigrant and non-immigrant communities alike—candidates for public office, governors, state representatives, county sheriffs and Members of Congress who do not hesitate to paint immigrants in our communities as enemies, criminals, threats to our country’s security and to our families’ well-being; sponsors of state legislation that aims to make life difficult for undocumented immigrants. ICE agents waiting outside of apartment buildings or trolling in grocery store parking lots, increasing numbers of deportations that begin with a routine traffic stop, the threat of immigrant parents being separated from U.S. citizen children—all of these policies and practices are stirring up fear within immigrant communities, and for some, stirring up fear is the point. Though I don’t think the Obama administration would admit this, current immigration enforcement policy, in the absence of immigration reform, is, in effect, a program of attrition through enforcement—a strategy that banks on creating fear and suffering in immigration communities.
And yet some in those very communities are refusing to turn inward, to shrink in fear. I don’t know when the phrase “Undocumented and unafraid” first came into use in the movement for just immigration reform, but one account points to youth leaders working to pass the DREAM Act as the source, which wouldn’t surprise me. A number of DREAM students walked from Florida to Washington, DC early last year, declaring all the way that they were undocumented and unafraid. I imagine them walking through counties with 287g agreements in operation, and meeting with unsympathetic law enforcement officials or Members of Congress, living the words of the Psalmists:
In God I trust and am not afraid.
What can mere mortals do to me?
They refused to give power to fear, refused to be turned inward, away from their families, their communities, or God.
Perhaps these are messengers from God in our time—they do not come to us encouraging us “Do not be afraid”, but challenge us through their example, their declaration that they are unafraid.
I haven’t answered all of my own questions about the poster from the Tucson demonstration, but I have come to see it as a kind of icon—a living image that reaches out of its frame, grabs my hand, and points me to pay attention to these messengers of our time, to follow the path of the migrant Christ: the One who walks with DREAM students on the way to Washington, D.C., who lives inside apartment buildings where ICE agents wait outside, who sits with school children as they wait for their parents to come home from work, half afraid that they might not arrive; the One who calls us to reject a life shadowed by fear and to seek justice for all people.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)