06023
Jan. 19, 2006

U.S. evangelicals ducking
immigration-reform issue

Right sees more risk than reward
in debate over illegal border-crossers

by G. Jeffrey Macdonald
Religion News Service

WASHINGTON — Volunteers and employees at World Relief, the humanitarian arm of the National Association of Evangelicals, usually expect warm greetings from evangelical groups that wield clout in the halls of Congress.

        But this year they’re getting a downright chilly reception from evangelicals on one of their priorities: immigration reform.

        As Congress grapples with legislation affecting an estimated 11 million undocumented immigrants, the nation’s most powerful conservative Christian organizations have watched from the sidelines — despite decades of evangelical initiatives to make America a hospitable haven for religious and political refugees.

        How to explain the silence?

        For starters, the Christian right says it has other, more important issues at the moment, such as the confirmation of conservative federal judges and the battle against same-sex marriage. Some evangelicals apparently don’t want to appear soft on lawbreakers of any kind. And some admit that they’re struggling to decide what’s the right thing to do.

        Among Southern Baptists, for instance, “there’s no consensus about what to do about (illegal immigrants) who are already here, or about how we would allow legal immigration,” said Richard Land, president of the Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission, which articulates public-policy positions for the 16 million-member Southern Baptist Convention.

        Southern Baptists “see a basic distinction between people who are refugees, who are in fear of losing their life and home ... and those who are coming over primarily for economic reasons and are not abiding by the immigration laws,” Land said.

        Because mass deportation “isn’t realistic,” Land added, the denomination hasn’t decided what to do.

        Evangelicals on the “front lines” of immigration say time is running out.

        Near Tucson, AZ, Maryada Vallet travels the desert in a pickup truck, stopping to feed undocumented border crossers and wash their blistered feet. It’s a gesture from Biblical accounts of what Jesus did for his disciples.

        Such inspired volunteer work, warned Amy Bliss, a staff attorney for World Relief, could lead to federal prosecution if a bill passed in December by the U.S. House of Representatives becomes law.

        “Anyone who believes” in the Bible story of the Gentile who stopped to help a wounded man, Vallet says, “should be outraged that ... the government is making it a crime to be a Good Samaritan."

        Soon the U.S. Senate will review the House-passed bill in committee. Liberal religious activists say evangelical participation could make the difference between success and failure.

        “To have the evangelical voice there has been particularly important to this administration, which listens to them,” said C. Richard Parkins, director of Episcopal Migration Ministries for the Episcopal Church U.S.A., a mainline Protestant denomination with a liberal bent. “They have access to leadership that we've not had access to.”

        But despite appeals from evangelicals at Baltimore-based World Relief and Arlington, VA-based Jubilee Campaign, the faith’s political heavy hitters have kept mum on immigration.

        Amber Hildebrand, a spokesperson for the Washington-based Family Research Council, explained: “It’s not that we don’t think (immigration policy) is important. There have just been other issues the FRC has chosen to focus on.”

        Gwen Stein, a spokeswoman for Colorado-based Focus on the Family, gave the same reason for her group’s reticence.

        The National Association of Evangelicals hasn’t taken a position on immigration since 1985, when President Reagan was promoting what was in effect an amnesty program for illegal aliens. At that time the NAE pledged “to eliminate the spirit of racism in any of our responses” and to “show personal and corporate hospitality to those who seek a new life in our nation.”

        Led by World Relief organizers, 42 national religious groups and 69 local ones signed a statement last October calling for a process permitting undocumented immigrants apply for legal status. The signatories ranged from the Union for Reform Judaism to the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops.

        In Congress, the debate hinges largely on whether immigrants who pay a fine and other penalties should be able then to seek legal status. A bill proposed by Sens. John McCain, R-AZ, and Edward Kennedy, D-MA, would create such a process. President Bush’s guest-worker proposal would require undocumented aliens to leave after a designated period. Whether family members should be separated or kept together also looms large as an issue.

        Observers say the evangelicals’ hesitancy has as much to do with political as moral reservations. Evangelicals might be inclined to sympathize with fellow Christians from south of the border who take on grave personal risk in order “to support their families back at home,” Bliss said, but that sympathy can’t survive in public discourse.

        “The rhetoric is considered a liberal issue,” Bliss said. “Fear of looking weak or too liberal permeates a lot of the discussion. I think that’s the concern.”

        Evangelical groups could appear tough on illegal immigration by endorsing the House-approved bill, which provides for a fence along 700 miles of the 2,000-mile U.S.-Mexican border but doesn’t address the question of what to do with undocumented immigrants already in the country.

        Evangelicals who seem unsympathetic toward immigrants run other political risks. They could alienate political allies in industries that employ thousands of undocumented workers, or run afoul of a growing foreign-born constituency, said Manuel A. Vasquez, associate professor of religion at the University of Florida, an expert on religion and immigration.

        “In many ways, conservatives see immigrants from Latin America are bringing values that they would like to regain: values of family, gender roles that are very well defined, an ethic of hard work,” Vasquez said. “Immigrants have values that can convert America and return America to the values of thrift and hard work.”

        Faced with the specter of political risk no matter where they come down on immigration, leading evangelical groups are opting to avoid getting involved. That may mean that resolving the fates of 11 million mostly Christian immigrants to the United States will involve minimal input from the evangelical conscience. For Christian outreach workers, that’s distressing.