A Marianist Approach to Bring Justice to the Immigration Crisis of the USA
PDF version of this document available for download at the bottom of the page.
We the members of the Marianist Social Justice Collaborative Racial and Immigrant Justice Team write to all our fellow Marianists and friends to share some guidelines from our Charism on Obeying Unjust Immigration Laws. We also encourage you all personally to understand, speak out forcefully and help where you are able to bring about help for immigrants and refugees and a just solution to the immigration and refugee situation.
Do we obey unjust laws?
Do we have to obey laws that we deem unjust regarding immigration? The methods of Gandhi and Martin Luther King, Jr give us clear wise answers to this question. Gandhi and King brought about change of unjust situations by their actions and their speaking out. Gandhi knew that the British Laws depriving the Indian People from the salt production were unjust. He said that the salt came from their land and they had a right to it. He led them not to pay the salt taxes the British were imposing. King knew the Southern Segregation Laws were unjust and he led his followers to disobey them.
Our Marianist Charism and Scripture and Church Tradition
Our Marianist charism in the System of Virtues Purification Virtues guides us to act where there is doubt. First, for a situation in doubt, we find all the information we can, examine our motives and then seek counsel. Second, we make a decision the best we can. Thirdly, we rely on the Providence God that our decision will be blessed. This is not a simple process but demands careful discernment.
It is not wise to say publicly that we are going to disobey the law which puts us in a position of opposing civil authority which basically we support. Rather we can act in obeying the call of the Gospel,
Our teaching from the Scripture and the Church are clear regarding care for immigrants and refugees. The Book of Leviticus 19:33-34 states
“When a stranger sojourns with you in your land, you shall not do him wrong. You shall treat the stranger who sojourns with you as the native among you, and you shall love him as yourself, for you were strangers in the land of Egypt: I am the Lord your God. "
Pope Francis
In July 2013, Pope Francis said “We pray for a heart which will embrace immigrants. God will judge us upon how we have treated the most needy.”
He celebrated a Mass that same month on the Sicilian island of Lampedusa, known for African migrants seeking passage to Europe, where many have died attempting to cross the sea. "We have become used to other people's suffering, it doesn't concern us, it doesn't interest us, it's none of our business!" the pope said during his homily.
Les Misérables by Victor Hugo and its adaption on Broadway give us a good example what it means to live under unjust laws. The bishop who gave Valjean more silver candle sticks when he knew that Valjean was a thief acted with the wisdom of someone practicing the Marianist virtue of discernment. Yet Valjean had to dodge for the rest of his life the policeman Javert who was acting by the letter of the law .
We have the gift of our charism to guide us to discernment. We also have the call to put justice into our lives.
Educating ourselves
In terms of educating ourselves, it is necessary to remember that refugees and immigrants are by and large here for essentially the same reason. It is often stated as ‘seeking a better life’ but this is in fact a trite way of stating what all too often more is a matter of ‘life or death.’ No one takes their family, babies included, out across a treacherous sea in an overcrowded inflated rubber boat with essentially little else but hope to get you through unless you are literally fleeing for your life, as from Syria today.
The Story of Refugees
This, to greater or less extent, is the story of refugees. And no one, gives up all they have and know, and sets out with their children, or sends their children with some stranger to whom they have given their entire savings, on foot across a desert or the jungle unless their lives depend on it. This is the case with immigrants seeking asylum (by US law it is necessary to actually be in the country to seek asylum here). As just as the life of one’s hungry child may justify breaking the law to steal some bread, or to shelter one who has done so; so too does sheltering or finding alternatives for those who flee for their lives andlack alternate recourse.
The issues involved
Admittedly this is a dramatic illustration but it nonetheless lays out precisely the essential issues involved. Are we obliged to assist those struggling for their lives despite laws and policies that may impede them? This is the informed decision we are obliged to make. What we cannot morally do is ignore or evade it.
This then of course can lead to a paralysis based on-but what I can do.
Well as King and Ghandi, as well as Chaminade, have shown time and time again, there is always something one can do.
Sanctuary
Based on personal experience, there are specific alternatives that one can do that go beyond accepting the status quo. One which seems a most direct response to sending persecuted persons back to where they may be in mortal danger is the idea of ‘sanctuary.’ This is a resistance action wherein, for instance, churches members organize and make their facilities available to shelter persons who are seeking to avoid potential deportation. The MSJC team has over time shared resources and information about this. In one specific example, a church in Central New Jersey has previously taken in a number of undocumented Indonesian refugees who were threatened with deportation and allowed them to remain within the confines of the church for over year while church members and sympathetic legislators tried in various ways to change the long term situation. In fact, in this case, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), whose own policy has at least till now been not to conduct deportation activities on the grounds of religious institutions, ultimately came to the conclusion that these persons were not a danger or a problem, and decided to suspend their deportations provided they returned regularly to update their status. This same response can and should be considered by faith based congregations i.e. groups or organizations of Marianists around the country.
Other Alternatives
The situation has now reached another level with this particular community and this has brought forth another concrete alternative. That is to strive to change the existing laws at least as they apply to this group. These Indonesians are persons who left the land of their birth some 20 years ago to avoid deadly religious persecution. They have built lives, businesses, and families here and have most fully in every way become productive members of the community. In fact, when they were living in church sanctuary and otherwise not able to be productive they began to gather and pack donations, and provide food and shelter for disaster volunteers in the aftermath of Hurricane Sandy, and have continued these types of efforts ever since. Despite being Christian and still subject to persecution in their countries of origin, and despite some having worked assisting at Ground Zero after 9/11, because Indonesia was considered a Muslim country, they were required to register which they dutifully did. And it is for that very reason that they are deported when they now report for their required status visits to ICE. In response, legislation has been proposed to establish a permanent exclusion of such persons from current deportation policies and religious communities throughout the country can and should be contacting their members of Congress to support such a humanitarian effort.
Our Marianist Tradition and Tools
We have the example of our Founders, who strongly resisted the governments of the revolutionaries and Napoleon, and later on struggled with the worldliness, greed and restrictions of the government of King Louis-Philippe (1830-48). We have the example of the first vowed Marianists in the Use and the thousands of immigrants who founded schools and communities.
We have our strength of prayerful meditation and the five silences and recollection for helping us discover what is right in the situations we are confronted with. We Americans are being purified in this crisis. The System of Virtues work of purification, with its emphasis on recourse to guidance and on long-suffering, patience, recourse to prayer, renewal of intention, overcoming external irritations is our guide. Key in this struggle are our virtues of consummation--self-denial” and “renunciation of the world’ All of this comes into play as we try to deal with the complex issues of immigration and refugees.