A People on the Move

Abstract

Christian discipleship requires that the faithful are to be a people who are in this world, but not of this world. As such, we are obligated to either allow economic and political immigration, or provide a local equivalent standard of living that is equal to that in North America. We hold in the Light of God’s Word the complex realities of today’s undocumented migration. With our hearts, minds and might, we desire to walk in the wisdom, witness, and humility of Jesus Christ.

el amor de Dios no tiene fronteras

(The Love of God has no Borders)

A People on the Move

As an Anabaptist-Mennonite Christian, who strongly follows the admonition of Paul when he said “And be not conformed to this world” (Romans 12:2), the strongest stand that I can take is that of prophetic witness to power. In the case of immigration reform, the unified statement from Mennonite Church – USA is the witness I have chosen to support.

Mennonite Church-USA published the following principles on immigration:

1. Ensure a legal pathway to citizenship for immigrants currently living in theUnited States, without requiring unworkable fines or “touchback” provisions.
2. Maintain the current family-based immigration system and increase the number of available family visas, so that families can reunite and immigrate together in a legal and timely way. 
3. Create just and fair guest worker programs, along with appropriate oversight mechanisms, to protect labor rights such as fair wages, employer choice and due process protections. Provide the opportunity for immigrant workers to apply for permanent status and, eventually, citizenship.
4. Ensure access to basic benefits and services for those lawfully present, while avoiding policies that seek to deter access to public health and safety services and lead to a culture of fear and isolation in immigrant communities. 
5. Choose border security strategies that protect community rights, human dignity, and the natural environment while opposing policies that contribute to deaths and increased fear in immigrant communities.
6. Address political instability and economic disparity in migrant’s home countries caused, in part, by U.S. foreign policies and trade agreements. Create incentives for sustainable development.
7. End indiscriminate raids and detention for non-dangerous immigrants, while targeting enforcement efforts on drugs, weapons and people smugglers (Immigration Policy Principles, 2009).

People have migrated from place to place in search of a better life for time immemorial. The issue of immigration has many levels that are not always apparent. They include:

• Refugees – those persons seeking asylum in a new land that have been forced out of their homes by circumstances beyond their control.
• Immigrants – those persons who voluntarily have left home to move elsewhere seeking a better livelihood. This includes those who seek short- or long-term residence through established legal means, as well as those who feel that they are forced to go outside the laws of their destination country.
• Internally displaced persons – this includes persons who are forced from their homes by events outside of their control, as well as those who choose to move, but do not leave the country of which they are citizens.

These “people on the move” have significant impact on their home communities, as well as the community that they move into. When an emigré leaves, the loss includes labor and “brain drain,” as well as causing disruption of families (Carroll, 2010, pp. 1-2).  The disruption of community and family left behind is not the only stress placed on the life of the emigré. As it is stated in “Mennonite Church – USA 's Churchwide Statement on Immigration:”

Millions of people are painfully caught in the web of the structures that comprise the United States’  broken immigration system. Long wait lists keep families separated for years and tempt people to circumvent the system; workplace raids create a culture of fear and harm entire communities; and lax oversight of guest worker programs leaves a system ripe for exploitation and worker abuse. Societal discord on the issue has risen and also polarized people within the Church (pg.1).

Once they arrive here, many immigrants suffer from institutionalized racism. This not only damages the immigrant population, but the community where they have settled.  Marty Troyer (2013, 2014), Pastor of Houston Mennonite Church, identifies this as “racialization,” the acceptance and acquiescence of institutional racism. Troyer wrote in his article “Subverting the Myth” in Sojourners:

The Bible’s overarching narrative calls followers of Christ to become agents of resistance dismantling oppressive and racialized cultural expressions—from its commitment to the dignity of all humans as created in the image of God to God’s liberating action on behalf of the marginalized; from Jesus’ rejection of social discrimination and the creation of a radically inclusive community to Paul revealing the center of Jesus’ work to be “evangelizing peace” by breaking down the walls that divide us (Ephesians 2) and celebrating “oneness” and cultural differences as unequivocal assets to the body of Christ (1 Corinthians 12) (2013).

Throughout both the Old and New Testaments, hospitality toward the stranger is a reoccurring theme. A number of Mennonite Theologians have put forth the interpretation that, contrary to popular evangelical desires, the “sin” of Sodom was not sexual misconduct as such, but the mistreatment of the “stranger,” or in today’s terms, the immigrant. The biblical tradition is one that instructs its followers to welcome strangers – as we welcome the stranger, we welcome Jesus. In the parable of separating the sheep and goats, Jesus says, “And the king will answer them,‘Truly I tell you, just as you did it to one of the least of these who are members of my family, you did it to me’” (Matthew 25:40, NRSV). Yet instead of welcoming and supporting today's immigrants, “immigrants to the United States, whether documented or undocumented, often face a culture of unwelcome: suspicion, isolation, militarized borders, workplace raids, and visa backlogs” (Immigration Policy Principles, 2009, p. 1).  Like their spiritual forbearers in European Christendom, many American Christians hold forth practices towards the “stranger” that the “heathens” would find reprehensible.

From early on, Anabaptist thought held fast to the conviction that the “church was composed of committed disciples who were united in a bond of love”(Klassen, 1964, pg. 26). This left no room for individualism, and lead to the conviction that life only has meaning in relationship between God and fellow-man. There was not true discipleship if there was only the theocentric or egocentric; society around them was essential. The welfare of others has always been a compelling interest for the Anabaptists. It is incomprehensible that there would not be a fulfilling of needs of others that had a corresponding spiritual life. Just as there is no “me”in the Lord’s Prayer, there is an implicit “us” which requires care and concern for others.

Menno Simon wrote:

true evangelical faith is of such a nature that it cannot lay dormant; but manifests itself in all righteousness and works of love; it dies unto flesh and blood; destroys all lusts and desires; cordially seeks, serves and fears God; clothes the naked; feeds the hungry; consoles the afflicted; shelters the miserable; aids and consoles the oppressed; returns good for evil; serves those that injure it; prays for those that persecute it; teaches, admonishes and reproves with the Word of the Lord; seeks that which is lost; binds up that which is wounded; heals that which is diseased and saves what is sound. The persecution, suffering and anxiety which befalls it for the sake of the truth of the Lord, is to it a glorious joy and consolation (Simon, 246).

With this we are admonished to care for those in need, no matter who they are, where they are from, or their legal status within any country.

For me, as an Anabaptist-Mennonite, there is no issue with immigration. We are obligated by faithful discipleship to allow those in need to come here and to share in God’s bounty, of which we are but stewards. As Peter James Klassen (1964) wrote of the early Anabaptists, “there could be no compartmentalization of the faithful disciple – his whole being, as well as his possessions, must willingly be placed at God’s disposal” (p. 114). Without this willingness, faith is dead.

References

Carroll R., M. D. (2010). Immigration and the Bible. Elkhart, IN:Mennonite Mission Network.  Retrieved Apr 18, 2014 from http://www.mennonitemission.net/SiteCollectionDocuments/Tools%20for%20Mission/Missio%20Dei/MissioDei19.E.pdf

Churchwide Statement on Immigration. (2014). Elkhart, IN:Mennonite Church– USA. Retrieved Apr 18, 2014 from http://www.mennoniteuse.org/wp-content/uploads/2011/11/Immigration_Statement_2014Feb151.pdf

Immigration Policy Principles. (2009). Washington, D.C.:Mennonite Central Committee.  Retrieved Apr 18, 2014 from http://washington.mcc.org/system/file/immigration_principles.pdf

Klassen, P. J. (1964). The Economics of Anabaptism: 1523-1560. Mouton & Co.:The Hague, NL.

Simon, M. (1983). The Complete Works of Menno Simon. Pathway Publishers:Aylmer, ON, CA.

Troyer, M. (2013). “Subverting the Myth.” Sojourners. Retrieved Apr 26, 2014 from http://sojo.net/magazine/2013/12/subverting-myth

Troyer, M. (2014, Apr 26). “Renaming Racism.” The Peace Pastor. Retrieved Apr 26, 2014 from  http://blog.chron.com/thepeacepastor/2014/04/renaming-racism/