Having Faith in Immigration
Religious groups push back against Trump's mass deportation policy
It’s a challenging time in immigration law practice, but the people around me inspire me every day. Lately, I’ve been particularly inspired by community members – church people, nonprofit leaders, business owners, parents. As I told a reporter recently, the biggest change in my daily work in the WVU Immigration Law Clinic so far is my interaction with U.S. citizens like these who are deeply concerned about the Trump administration’s approach to immigration enforcement and how it will affect their families, their businesses, and their communities. I never used to have conversations like these; now I have them almost every day.
Faith Groups Sue DHS over Immigration Policy
Faith groups have begun to file lawsuits challenging DHS’s recission of its longstanding policy against immigration enforcement in “sensitive locations,” including churches, schools, and hospitals.
First, the Quakers came forward, filing a lawsuit in federal court in Maryland. Their grief with DHS policy centers on the unique nature of their religious worship. According to their complaint,
Quaker worship is not led by an individual charged to direct services. Instead, in Quaker worship, people sit together silently and await messages from God. When anyone attending the worship receives a message from God that is meant to be shared with others, they stand and deliver that message to everyone. Quakers believe that every person, no matter their background, can be a conduit for a message from the Divine. Indeed, Quakers believe that those with varied life experiences – including immigrants – can provide unique message from God. Being able to receive those messages is fundamental to Quaker religious exercise.
Because their meetings are co-led by all members, they alleged, any DHS policy that frightens members into staying away violates their religious freedom and freedom of association. They also alleged that the policy violates the Religious Freedom Restoration Act [RFRA], a 1993 statute that abrogated the Supreme Court’s decision in Employment Division v. Smith. RFRA provides that “[g]overnment shall not substantially burden a person’s exercise of religion even if the burden results from a rule of general applicability.” Finally, the Quakers alleged that the government’s summary recission of the policy was arbitrary and capricious and thus violated the Administrative Procedure Act.
This week, a coalition of dozens of Jewish and Christian organizations filed a similar lawsuit in federal court in the District of Columbia. In their complaint, each of the 27 organizational plaintiffs describes its mission and teaching with respect to immigrants. Welcoming the stranger, they alleged, is a central tenet of their Jewish or Christian faith:
The Torah lays out this tenet 36 times, more than any other teaching: “The stranger who resides with you shall be to you as one of your citizens; you shall love them as yourself, for you were strangers in the land of Egypt” (Leviticus 19:34). In the Gospels, Jesus Christ not only echoes this command, but self-identifies with the stranger: “For I was hungry, and you gave me food, I was thirsty, and you gave me drink, I was a stranger, and you welcomed me” (Matthew 25:35).
The Catholic Church has not filed a lawsuit, though one of the 27 plaintiffs, the Latino Christian National Network, includes leaders of Catholic as well as Evangelical, Pentecostal, and “Historic Protestant” groups.
Pope Francis Issues Letter to U.S. Bishops on Immigration
On Monday, however, Pope Francis issued a Letter of the Holy Father Francis to the Bishops of the United States of America. He spoke to the bishops “in these delicate moments that you are living as Pastors of the People of God who walk together in the United States of America.”
“What is built on the basis of force, and not on the truth about the equal dignity of every human being, begins badly and will end badly.”
The letter began by pointing out the “journey from slavery to freedom that the People of Israel traveled,” that Jesus became a refugee as a child, and even that “[t]he Son of God, in becoming man, also chose to live the drama of immigration.”
The letter commented directly on the U.S. immigration policy and the program of mass deportations. The “rightly formed conscience,” he said, “cannot fail to make a critical judgment and express its disagreement with any measure that tacitly or explicitly identifies the illegal status of some migrants with criminality.”
As someone who lived through the control of the military junta in Argentina, Pope Francis had strong words about the rule of law:
[A]n authentic rule of law is verified precisely in the dignified treatment that all people deserve, especially the poorest and most marginalized. The true common good is promoted when society and government, with creativity and strict respect for the rights of all — as I have affirmed on numerous occasions — welcomes, protects, promotes and integrates the most fragile, unprotected and vulnerable. This does not impede the development of a policy that regulates orderly and legal migration. However, this development cannot come about through the privilege of some and the sacrifice of others. What is built on the basis of force, and not on the truth about the equal dignity of every human being, begins badly and will end badly.
The Pope responded to a comment by Vice President J.D. Vance, who had cited the principle of ordo amoris to suggest that people should put love for their fellow citizens ahead of love for migrants. [Theologian Matthew Shadle has a terrific post about the origins and dimensions of ordo amoris here on Substack.] In his letter, Pope Francis rejected Vance’s interpretation:
Christian love is not a concentric expansion of interests that little by little extend to other persons and groups. … The true ordo amoris that must be promoted is that which we discover by meditating constantly on the parable of the “Good Samaritan” (cf. Lk 10:25-37), that is, by meditating on the love that builds a fraternity open to all, without exception.
Who Pays the Bill?
Before Trump’s inauguration, an Italian reporter asked Pope Francis what he thought of the proposal for mass deportation. The Pope responded that such a policy would be a “disgrace, because it would make the poor wretches, who have nothing, pay the bill of the inequalities [in the world]. It doesn’t work. Problems are not resolved this way. That’s not the way to resolve them.”
My sudden conversation with U.S. citizens about immigration policy and enforcement gives me a ray of hope in the current darkness. I pray that the extreme overreaches by the Trump administration will eventually encourage our society to engage in a more thoughtful, problem-solving dialogue. As global change approaches warp speed and migration patterns start to shift, we need comprehensive immigration reform more than ever.
Help Protect the Right to Counsel in Immigration Court
The WVU Immigration Law Clinic is working to help immigrants in West Virginia exercise their constitutional right to be represented by counsel (at no cost to the government) in immigration court. If you’d like to support our efforts, you can make a contribution at this link. In the comments section at the bottom of the link, be sure to direct your contribution to the Immigration Law Clinic.