Opinion: Evangelicals should speak out for immigration reform

Evangelical Christians need be more involved in seeking immigration reform because values of family, justice and mercy are at stake. Unfortunately, immigration reform has either been on the back burner for most evangelicals, or they mainly focus on closing the borders and deporting undocumented immigrants.

While border control and orderly immigration is important, for evangelicals these other values are also necessary. While the topic is controversial, my experience with the human side of immigration compels me to speak out and ask fellow evangelicals to seek meaningful immigration reform that acknowledges our concern for humanity.

I am not advocating any particular policy here in this space-except that I am concerned that the everevolving proposals currently in congress may only serve to muddy the waters-rather let me offer three values I hope evangelicals can agree upon.

Family

We evangelicals are decidedly pro-family, but some of the proposals being advocated would have a devastating impact on families. A local case in the news this week, of a woman being deported and having to leave her husband and young children here, demonstrates the frequent tragedies of the illdesigned system we have now.

Samuel Rodriguize, the evangelical leader of the National Hispanic Christian Leadership Conference points out, some Hispanic parents who might be deported under current proposals will make the heartbreaking choice to leave their US citizen children behind, rather than taking them back to a poverty-stricken village in their homeland. For me, any immigration reform must uphold my profamily values.

Justice.

For 21 years American society allowed a growing number of undocumented immigrants to become unofficial members of our society. We quietly used these people to meet our demand for low-cost labor. Their children were born here, becoming U.S. citizens who have known no other existence but this. There are an estimated 12 million undocumented immigrants in the US today. This number has been growing for 21 years while we have done nothing significant to resolve it. Now some propose to “round ‘em all up” and deport them to their homeland. No matter that it would be impossible to do so, we must consider what kind of justice this would be? Is it just for America to place all the blame on undocumented immigrants while we have enjoyed the economic benefits of their presence?

Mercy.

Minnesota is home to the second largest Liberian population in America, numbering more than 20,000 today. Many are Christians. The US granted many of them “Temporary Protected Status” which allowed them to live, study and work Page 2 of 2 here while waiting for peace to arrive in Liberia. That waiting time in temporary status turned into 15 years. Now the US has decided that the Temporary Protected Status will end, and thousands of Liberians will be returned to a country devastated by civil war. They will have to resign jobs, take their children out of schools, leave their churches and go back to a country where they no longer have houses, the economy is in shambles, and any surviving family members are often destitute and unable to help these returning refugees.

The absence of mercy in this policy is that the war in Liberia lasted so long that these refugees had no choice but to move on with life in this country. While the status given to many Liberians was always temporary, at a certain point our immigration policies need to exhibit mercy. Many good and faithful followers of Jesus Christ will not agree with each other about what to do to reform our broken immigration system.

This will not be an easy issue to resolve, but then again, Christians have a personal relationship with a creative God, upon whose infinite wisdom we can call when we are faced with insurmountable challenges.

Carl Nelson is the President of the Greater Minnesota Association of Evangelicals, a regional network of nearly 200 churches.