Opening Doors To All People

A Pastor's Thoughts on Immigration
Rev. Taka Ishii

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It seems that we want it both ways. We want undocumented immigrants to continue coming, continue working in our grape fields and orange groves, continue caring for our children, continue paying taxes, but we want to deny a vote and government services to those workers and those taxpayers.

One of the proposed immigration provisions from the House will require churches and other social organizations to ask immigrants for documentation before providing them assistance. Churches and other institutions that fail to comply could be penalized – up to five years in prison and seizure of assets. Are the churches to become immigration enforcers in the name of “national security”? Do I have to ask my parishners and clients of the soup kitchen to show me their immigration papers, and if I were to serve undocumented immigrants, am I going to face a jail sentence and would my church’s assets be seized? We Christians are called to serve the poor and needy regardless of who they are! We do not ask people how much they contribute to the church nor do we ask about their immigration status when they come to us for help. Can you imagine how awful it would be if pastors had to ask people’s immigration status when they come forward to receive communion and receive anointing during the healing service? How awful it would be for us to ask the immigration status of people who come for the soup kitchen!

I could not help but wonder what Jesus must think of this proposed immigration law. What must Jesus think of the Congress that decides to wield the power of the majority vote to put down people who cannot vote? What must Jesus think of people who encourage workers to come to this county, undocumented, but who want them to leave their families across the border. What will Jesus think of this proposed immigration law?

Pilate may have assumed that Jesus was before him, because he had gone too far in pressing the boundaries of his power. If so, Pilate was wrong. Jesus was before Pilate, precisely because he knew no boundaries. He ate with sinners; he healed outsiders; he ignored the privileged positions of the Pharisees and Sadducees. Jesus offended people, because he failed to recognize the boundaries between the entitled and the unentitled. This was the nature of God’s Reign, a reign that does not belong to the world, but which most certainly belongs in the world.

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