Immigrants in God’s Land

In Jeremiah 7:5-7 it says: “If you do not oppress the alien…then I will dwell with you in this place…” This is just one of many passages in the Bible that talks about welcoming the stranger. The passage that is most quoted is  Matthew 25:31-46 “…I was a stranger and you welcomed me.” I could go on quoting passages from our sacred book about welcoming and caring for each other. Many passages from other sacred texts say something very similar. Even this week Pope Francis suggested that to not support DACA goes against pro-life principles. He questioned President Trump’s commitment to pro-life values because of his decision to end the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program.

We hear these words, we read the passages, but I wonder how many of us actually believe them. We like to put conditions on our beliefs and actions. We are happy to feed the hungry as long as it is the crumbs off our table, but not if it requires a sacrifice on our part. We will welcome strangers as long as they came here legally, they look and talk like us and they have enough money to take care of themselves. Recently, President trump ended the DACA program. This action has stirred a lot of emotions. The vast majority of people in this country support DACA and are outraged over Trump’s action. They argue that these are children who were brought into the United States by their parents at a very early age. The are work, attend school, serve in the military, attend our churches, and are members of our communities, paying taxes and contributing to the common good. Others argue that they are here illegally, and that is all that should matter.

What is missing in this discussion are the faces, the stories of the DACA young adults and their parents; the stories of the folks who oppose DACA and why. When we make policy we often think about it from the macro level.  We look at data, rules and regulations. We are just numbers on a graph. 800,000 young adults are covered by DACA, 11 million people are here as undocumented, 77% of people favor DACA, 23% oppose. We are all just statistics, numbers on a chart that politicians and media folk can spout. I wonder: is that how God sees us? Every night does God get a report that says today 476,131 people died? Of that number 22% were really good so they get to come to heaven, 57% were okay but not quite there yet, so they are going to purgatory and 21% were bad and they went to hell. 850 million people are going to bed hungry tonight while 4.2 billion got to eat three meals today.

Does God look at these charts and say we need to do something?  Or maybe God thinks well yes, there are people going to bed hungry, but it is their fault. If they only worked harder they would have enough to eat. Of course as people of faith we do not believe this. Jeremiah 1:5 says, “I knew you before I formed you in your mother’s womb .” We believe that God sees each of us as unique individuals. We believe that God loves us even with our faults and idiosyncrasies. As people of faith should we not do the same? Should we not at least pretend we are trying to be like God? If we do not take the time to listen to each others stories how will we ever see each other as brother and sister and not as other?

For 22 days, I spent time with the most amazing group of young people. The National Korean American Service & Education Consortium (NAKASEC) is a grassroots organization whose mission is to organize Korean and Asian Americans to achieve social, economic, and racial justice. In short, they are immigrants working for the American Dream. The Franciscan Action Network joined with NAKASEC in organizing a 22 day 24 hour vigil in front of the White House in support of DACA and TPS (Temporary Protected Status). During this time I got to meet some of the most extraordinary people. I met Jung Woo Kim, a Dreamer who who helped organize the vigil and was there every day for 22 days. I met Serafina, originally from Korea, who now lives in Chicago with her husband. Despite her anxiety and fear about what might happen you could sense her joy and love as she was getting perfect strangers to join each other in dancing in front of the White House. She had so much spirit and energy that when she stopped folks walking by the White House they listened to her story. Serafina even totally embarrassed me by getting me to dance while being live-streamed on Facebook. I met Lual, a young man from South Sudan. He was born in a refugee camp in Uganda. He managed to get an education and become a software developer. He set up his own company to develop video games that promote peace instead of glorifying war. Now he is at risk of being deported. I met a young woman who was brought to America from Mexico when she was three. She is now married with a child. She and her husband, who is also daca-mented, recently saved up enough money to purchase a home. They are parents, homeowners, and taxpayers.

As I heard their stories I began to think about my story. My parents came to America from Ireland in 1950. They came over on a visitors visa and never left.  They came with nothing; no education, no money, no job, just my brother who was two at the time and a dream. When I was born, we were living in a third floor four room apartment. It was my parents, their four children, and various aunts and uncles who followed from Ireland. A few years later, due to their hard work, they managed to save enough to buy their first house. Because of the system in place at the time, after a few years they were able to get a green card and become citizens. Despite coming here with no money and little  education they went on to have 6 children all of whom attended college. Three of their children earned advanced degrees, two with PhD’s. They had 19 grandchildren, four of whom were adopted. They had one grandson who served two tours in Afghanistan. One granddaughter just came home from serving a tour in Iraq and another who did two years in the Peace Corp.

I remember talking to my mom about why she left her family and home to come to America. She said that she had a dream that her children and grandchildren could have a better life. She went on to tell me that she was blessed because she lived to see her dream come true. Later in her life she asked me to imagine what would have happened if, when she and my dad came to America they were turned away. Imagine if we were told, “Go back to where you came from. We do not want your kind here.” You are just here taking jobs away from “real Americans.”  She told me how proud she was of everything her children and grandchildren had accomplished. But if they had been deported, none of that would have happened. She finished by telling me that the Earth or anything in it does not belong to us. It all belongs to God. We are all immigrants in God’s land. If we do not welcome the stranger, the immigrant, into our land why do we think that God will welcome us into his home in heaven?

Peace and All Good