Tag: immigration

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The Way We Treat Jesus

So when those friends of Jesus who had actually lived as friends of Jesus stood before God, they were welcomed into the Kingdom with raucous greeting. They were even taken aback a little by all the exuberance when Jesus threw his arms wide and beamed like he’d just seen his favorite uncle. “Thank you, dear friends, for feeding me and clothing me and welcoming me.”

Those friends, though glad to hear such effusive praise, were more than a little perplexed. “Uhh…thank you, Jesus. We always hoped we were living faithful to your Way, but..ummm…remind us again when exactly we fed you and clothed you and welcomed you?”

“Oh, yes,” Jesus answered, “it’s easy to not know you’re dealing with me in the world, isn’t it…since I’m always there, always present, always showing up in the middle of the life you’re already living and in the people you see every day.”

The friends glanced at one another, hoping someone knew what the heaven Jesus was talking about.Mercifully, Jesus continued. “Well, when I was your hungry neighbor, you filled my belly. When I was shivering without a coat, you handed me a winter parka. And when I stood, trembling and lonely as an immigrant in your country, you greeted me like a friend.”

{a retelling of Matthew 25}

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Immigration is a complicated issue. However, not as complicated as we’re making it. I can not imagine any scenario where this story goes in such a way that our country’s current practice of separating immigrant and refugee children from their mothers and fathers finds Jesus saying to us: “Thank you, friends, for how you treated me.”

Politicos may approach these questions with sterile calculus, but as followers of Jesus, we think and act in an entirely different way. We care for and befriend those at the margins, we come alongside the most vulnerable (children) because Jesus says in so doing, we are caring for and befriending him.

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Speaking Up for My Friends

I have a friend who is in our country illegally. He’s one of the most honest, hard-working, resourceful men I know. He came here years ago in a desperate attempt to care for his family. Upon arrival, he applied for an IRS ID number so he could pay his taxes — think about that for a second. And my friend pays a fair bit of taxes because he works crazy hard, much harder than many of us who were born here. “He should have immigrated the right way,” we say. Sure, fair enough. But he didn’t. And he didn’t because he was trying to care for his family – what would I be willing to do if I needed to provide for Miska and the boys? And my friend’s been in our community for years now, made a life with us, become a neighbor. He’s the guy who’s helping out others who need a job, making our community a better place.

And yet under the current system (which they say is going to be getting even more difficult), there’s no viable way for him to make his citizenship right that wouldn’t decimate them. Whatever one thinks about the need for immigration reform (and I’m certain we can do better), if our reform doesn’t include compassion (not to mention gratitude, for crying out loud) for people like my friend, then it’s beneath the American ideal I know and love.

And now one of my friend’s daughters is starting another year of school and continues to tear up the soccer pitch. She’s got a foot that can launch a rocket. Most days, she lives in a low-grade anxiety that her dad is going to get pulled over on the way to one of his jobs and be deported. I can’t imagine what it is to live with that constant drip of fear on top of managing the fact that you know lots of people don’t want you here and on top of wading through all the normal school angst of boys and geometry and looking the right way and all the everyday stuff that makes it so hard to be a kid these days. But here she is, and she’s been here most of her life. By any standard that should matter, she’s American. And now, she has to go to bed at night knowing that DACA might be revoked, that even though she was only a child following her parents and even though the good ol’ USA is the only home she knows, we may very well come looking for her to send her packing.

Whatever immigration reform we envision, if it does not have a wide open door and massive amounts of love and compassion for my friend’s rocket-launching daughter who’s trying to wrangle her class schedule and get to soccer practice on time, then it’s beneath the American ideal I know and love. And what’s crazy is this: what I’m asking for used to be, as recent as the Bush years, a moderate position. How did things get so toxic? Senator Graham (R) who’s been working with Senator Durbin (D) on a bipartisan bill (imagine that!) said, “Who are we? What do we believe? The moment of reckoning is coming. When they write the history of these times, I’m going to be with these kids.”

Me too. I’m going to be with these kids.

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