In advance of President Obama’s and the Democrats’ coming push for immigration reform, support for so-called comprehensive reform that would include a path to citizenship for many illegal immigrants already in the United States is building among a surprising constituency: conservative religious activists.
The effort includes not only socially conservative groups that have partnered with Democrats on other issues in the past—like the National Association of Evangelicals and the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops—but also more staunchly conservative groups and figures closely aligned with the Republican Party.
“There was this rhetoric in the last immigration debate that was, frankly, harsh,” says Mathew Staver, dean of the law school at Liberty University, founded by the late Jerry Falwell. “We need to understand that we are still a nation of immigrants, and we need to bring people out of the shadows and make them legal.”
And that last statement will make some of my fellow religious conservatives go bonkers. But, once you’re done pounding your computer screen in frustration at our “softness” on immigration, let’s have a look at the issue. First off:
“When the Son of Man comes in his glory, and all the angels with him, he will sit upon his glorious throne, and all the nations will be assembled before him. And he will separate them one from another, as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats. He will place the sheep on his right and the goats on his left.
Then the king will say to those on his right, ‘Come, you who are blessed by my Father. Inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world. For I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me drink, a stranger and you welcomed me, naked and you clothed me, ill and you cared for me, in prison and you visited me.’
Then the righteous will answer him and say, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you drink? When did we see you a stranger and welcome you, or naked and clothe you? When did we see you ill or in prison, and visit you?’ And the king will say to them in reply, ‘Amen, I say to you, whatever you did for one of these least brothers of mine, you did for me.’ – Matthew 25:31-40
Its hard to get around that – in a very real sense, for Christians, that illegal who just crossed the border and is no trespassing on someone’s land and looking for a drink of water is Jesus – to refuse to give him what he needs is to refuse to give to God. Not a position a Christian wishes to be in.
Of course, the practical matter is that all 6 billion human beings cannot live within the borders of the United States – and given that everyone can’t live here, the government of the United States has the right and the moral obligation to secure the borders and fairly regulate who can come in, when and for how long. The trouble is, the United States government through gross negligence all but invited the 12 million or so illegals to come here – while an engraved invitation was not sent, the ease of crossing the border and the lack of punishment for being caught illegally in country was just short of that engraved invitation. And don’t think the citizens of the United States are just the hapless victims of government incompetence. First off, we citizens are responsible for ensuring the best government possible. Secondly, its not like we were complaining over much at the inexpensive goods and services the illegals provided.
So, how to bring the two halves together – how to be a proper Christian and be a good citizen? To me, it will take comprehensive immigration reform. Now, when our liberals say “comprehensive” what they really mean is “immediately make everyone here a citizen so they’ll vote for us”. What conservatives really mean when they say it is, “get the illegals out and triple bar the borders”. Both concepts are half right, and thus all wrong. We need both – a path to citizenship for those we de-facto invited to come, and a secure border so that we can henceforward carefully regulate who comes in.
And if you think it over, fellow conservatives, I think you’ll come ’round to my views – after all, the people coming here are almost all hard working, Christian and well behaved. Our liberals want to hook them on welfare and turn them into a permanent underclass dependent upon liberals for sustenance, but we can turn these people in to full-throated, join-a-tea-party conservatives – dedicated to doing for one’s own and fierce in their defense of individual liberty. Its a matter of eventually having Juan, Nguyen and Kamau with you at the NRA meeting. Ya dig? These new arrivals are conservatives in prospect – just as the prior waves of Irish, Italians and Poles were…and it was previous generations of conservatives who signed away all rights to Irish, Italian and Polish votes because of anti-immigrant sentiment. As it turns out, that led to two generations of liberal Democrat domination of the country. You want that, again? If you don’t, then figure out a way to start reaching out to the immigrant community.
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