THE IMMIGRANTS AMONG US.[1]

 INTRODUCTION: Two days ago, this past Friday, in Lauren, Mississippi, our government and its Department of Homeland Security, which includes Immigration and Customs Enforcement, or ICE, launched a massive operation resulting in the arrest of 589 workers at an electric transformer production plant. The purpose of the operation was not to arrest criminals who threaten our safety. It was not to find felons for whom warrants were outstanding – a guise ICE uses frequently, as it has done in Lee County.

No, it was to arrest workers here from other countries. They were guilty of working without documents, or working using fraudulent documents, or their visas had expired and they had not returned to their home country.

What distinguished the operation in Lauren Friday was that it was the largest single set of arrests ever made in our history. Those arrested were handcuffed with chains around their waists and their ankles and bussed to the cattle fairgrounds building.

Until Friday, the largest ICE operation ever was last May 12, in Postville, Iowa. ICE conducted one of its signature raids with helicopters, 400 FBI agents, and hundreds of law enforcement personnel from many different agencies and bureaus. They arrested almost 400 workers at a kosher meatpacking plant, with the potential of another 690 facing arrest.

Ironically, that same day in Postville, Iowa, a 4^th grade teacher and her class from school had gone on a field trip to the courthouse to see how our judicial system works. They discovered that it works so well that she received a call from the school not to return to school because of what our government was doing at the largest employer in Postville. And also, she should keep her students in the courthouse. All roads into and out of Postville were blocked as our government conducted its raid on the kosher meat packing plant in Postville. 

I’m sure you noticed that these operations didn’t take place at the borders in Laredo, Texas, or El Paso, Texas, or San Diego, California, where a great many of the illegal entries occur. Rather, they took place in Lauren, Mississippi and Postville, Iowa. Small towns of 10 to 20,000 where one industry is keeping the community going. It’s not where senators or congresspeople live. It’s not where administration officials or supreme court justices live. It’s safely off the beaten path in Postville, Iowa or Lauren, Mississippi. And as the media report, lives are disrupted, homes broken, and for what: to maintain a broken immigration system.

The problem is that native born Americans do not want to work gutting chickens and pigs for $10 an hour. Nor do they want to work on dairies and get up at 3 a.m., and work all day in the fields.

Further, the global economy we are a part of means none of these companies can compete with the rest of the world if they pay wages high enough to attract American workers, especially union workers, who insist on decent wages, retirement and health benefits. That’s why so much American manufacturing has been moved overseas or outsourced.

So while our government is spending millions upon millions on absolutely worthless enforcement and bragging as though we are really bagging the bad guys, we are really ignoring the reality that we simply do not have the resources nor the political will to deport 12 million residents! And if we did, go to Postville and see what it would be like in most places, it would resemble a ghost town. Restaurants closed, businesses crippled, and a once thriving economy on life support.

But hey! We are not here to solve the immigration problem. Rather, we are here as people of faith to ask hard questions: Is any of this our business? Should we be concerned when families are broken, women and men imprisoned for wanting to work?

Let me put that another way: In Nazi Germany during the 1930s and into the 1940s, who were the most vulnerable people in Germany? Who were singled out and arrested, herded into cattle cars and put into concentration camps? For the crime of their ethnicity! They were Jews, and Jews, Der Fuehrer said, were the cause of all of Germany’s economic problems.

So as we sit here in Paradise, Florida, can you believe that at a time when across America, houses are being foreclosed on, jobs are being lost, and families by the hundreds of thousands are without health care, we gave Homeland Security a multimillion dollar increase in their budget so they could arrest more people guilty of working, that is, working in jobs no one else will do, for wages no one else could live on. And in so doing, we are virtually closing down small businesses, and impacting the economy of town after small town. How can that be happening…in America…in 2008?

And can you really scare all those undocumented persons working all across America at $10 an hour at packing plants, or dairies or electrical transformer plants into going back home where they will be lucky to find jobs for $10 a day, much less an hour!

Last Friday, August 22, a week ago, the government ended one of its own multimillion dollar programs, whose stated purpose was to entice undocumented workers to voluntarily turn themselves in and leave without penalty. Despite having offices in San Diego, Chicago, Phoenix, Charlotte, N.C. and Santa Anna, California, guess how many actually turned themselves in: 8! Millions of dollars for squat!

So the question today is: what does faith have to say about all of this? Or is this outside the realm of faith? Is it a national, governmental issue that faith has no right to speak to? When the government rounds up people by the thousands, transports them to unknown places, keeps them in substandard holding areas, and denies medical treatment, some of whom die in prison because of the absence of medical care…does faith sit by waving the flag, sucking our thumbs and saying isn’t America the greatest! Nations are great when the promises the government and the people make to each other are honored. Arresting the poorest among us…arresting the most vulnerable…is not the mantle of greatness. So what does faith have to say?

SCRIPTURE.

Last Sunday night, I went to First Assembly to hear what had been billed as a dialogue or debate between a local Muslim imam, Muhammad al-Darsani, and a supposed Muslim scholar from Tulsa, Oklahoma, who had converted 26 years ago.

It was embarrassing for me to sit still and to hear the convert, as it was for most of the audience. (Some of you may have seen one of the members of First Assembly’s apology in the “Letters to the Editor” of the News-Press.) The convert charged the prophet Muhammad with the most heinous of crimes, while seemingly oblivious to all that could be found similarly in Jewish scripture or Christian history.

            The truth is that in a corrupt and brutal society, the prophet Muhammad worked to reform that society. He did such things as put into place requirements that poor people were to be given charity. Slaves were to be treated justly. And interest on loans was outlawed.

In the 7^th century, the Prophet Mohammed and his followers were persecuted in their homeland and forced to flee to Ethiopia, where they were not only granted asylum, but something almost equivalent to full citizenship. They were immigrants, but they were treated with civility. There are those Muslim scholars in America who contend that making undocumented immigration a felony would clash with the obligation of Islam to assist people, like immigrants, when they seek help.

But it’s not only Islam that recognizes our responsibility to immigrants: In the Jewish Torah, there appear many scriptures like these: “When an immigrant sojourns with you in your nation, you shall not do him wrong. The immigrant who sojourns with you shall be to you as the native among you, and you shall love him as yourself; for you were immigrants in the land of Egypt.” (Exodus 19:33).

And for Christians, Jewish scriptures are also their scriptures. But Christian scriptures also underscore the same theme. As I mentioned last Sunday, in Christian mythology, at the great judgment day, one of the criteria for entrance into heaven is having been hospitable to immigrants (Matthew 25:35f).

So whatever the arguments are against undocumented workers, be sure that it does not come from Muslim, Jewish or Christian religion.

ANALYSIS.

So here are some things I would like us to consider:

First, our immigration system is broken. It doesn’t work. We cannot build a wall high enough, deep enough, thick enough, or long enough to keep out the desperately poor neighbors we have to the South. Operations such as those being conducted by ICE don’t even qualify as band-aids on a broken system. Rather, they violate the vision of America as a welcoming community to the peoples of the world:

"Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free….”

Further, we already have 12 million in this country. In this year of 2008, ICE has made 3,900 civil arrests, and more than 1,000 criminal arrests (most of which were not related to crimes against persons or property). This is an 868% increase this year over any other previous year. 868 percent! Here’s what that means:

If ICE continues this pace, and arrests 5,000 every eight months – and Lauren and Postville were the two biggest ever – since there are an estimated 12 million undocumented workers in America, at this rate, it means that it will only take 1,600 years to successfully remove 12 million undocumented workers. Of course, by the time we get around to it, they will have had families, who will have had families, etc., ad infinitum. And what if more than half of those arrested have a wife and two kids, many born in America? Who will take care of them? Certainly not their parents whom we’ve put in prison! Certainly not their relatives in Guatemala, or Mexico, or Columbia! It’s almost as if there is a vengeful intent to wreak as much pain on the immigrant community as possible, before a new administration comes in and reverses this destructive course.

Secondly, what we Americans discover is that those without documents have become part of our communities. They work with us; they pay taxes with us, including Social Security. Their children go to our schools, and when they are born here, they are automatically U.S. citizens, even if their parents are not. They buy our houses, rent our homes, drive our cars, and do all the 101 things that anyone in this country can do.

APPLICATION.

One clear reality is that our immigration laws need to be fixed, but fixed in a humane way, not the brutal, un-American practices of ICE. Further, those who are contributing to our economy with their hard work need to be treated with dignity and respect. They need to be able to come out of the shadows. They need a path to citizenship that’s not a political statement but a humane one.

It seems to me so much more appropriate to discuss the immigrants among us in America as “guests.” That means they are to be treated kindly, but also, not the same as citizens, because they aren’t. 

Undocumented immigrants do not wish to be undocumented or break any laws; rather, they are compelled to do so, because they are faced with this dilemma: If they attempt to regularize their status they will very likely be forced to give up their jobs, and hence will be unable to provide for their families. These are the kind of issues we should be discussing, not the disaster our government is employing.

When we think for a moment, the majority of those immigrating to this country did so either to flee persecution, to escape extreme economic hardship, or to share in the American dream of a better tomorrow. Many risked their lives in the hope of coming to America. Those are motives we should applaud rather than persecute.

Regardless of our political persuasion, or our opinion on immigrants, at the very least we ought to be merciful and compassionate toward those who are taking care of our kids, mowing our lawns, dry-walling our new homes, picking our crops, serving our meals, fighting in Iraq, and worshiping in our churches.

CONCLUSION.

I close with this:

            Among the Aztec Indians, part of their lore tells the story that a long time ago there was a great fire in the forests that covered the Earth. People and animals started to run, trying to escape the fire. Among the animals large and small, including big and little birds, was an owl. As she was flying away, she noticed a small bird flying the opposite way.

            As she watched, she saw the little bird dipping her beak into the lake and filling it with water, then flying back to the fire and dropping it. The owl said, “What are you doing? Your little beaks of water aren’t going to stop the fire!”

            The little bird stopped for a moment, looked at the owl, then said, “I’m doing the best I can, with what I have.”

            The owl shook her head, and started to fly away. Suddenly, she veered in mid-flight and joined the little bird by filling her beak too, and dropping it on the fire. Soon others joined in, then others and others, until together they saved the Earth from a great fire.

            That’s really the story of faith: When we do the best we can, with what we have, no matter how small, it matters; and when we all join in, it makes the difference that matters. For our immigrants, for ourselves and for our nation, let’s do our best.

Shalom, Salaam Aleikum, Amen, and Blessed Be.

We will pause now for 7½ minutes of brief questions as a part of our Conversation Café. The Service and Support Council will provide microphones for you to speak into.