In 2008 my husband, younger daughter and I visited our son Matthew in the northern reaches of Guatemala. He was serving his second year with the Peace Corps in a region ravaged by civil war, drug trafficking, erosion and mud slides. His primary missions were to help replant treacherous slopes and explore possible tourist income tracking birds endemic to that region or leading hikes up Guatemala's highest slopes. While we were there, members of his community joined in serving a feast of welcome: multiple chickens cooked over an open fire, dozens of tortillas made from corn ground just that morning. My daughter and I practiced our very-limited Spanish while we learned to flatten balls of tortilla dough. Matthew and Whitney (my husband) joined others to position tables, gather chairs from nearby homes and keep the fires going.
Over the extended midday meal there were multiple speeches, all translated by our son. Speeches about how happy the village was to have him. Speeches about the honor to host a family like ours, the first gringo family to visit the town in recent memory.
But the speech I remember most was from Matthew's landlord, a respected farmer and community leader He expressed his welcome, as he had in other ways in the days before, but then the speech took a different turn. He noted that he, and others of the town, had spent time in the United States. Sometimes as seasonal guest workers, harvesting crops. Sometimes for longer periods, digging ditches, laboring in construction.
"No one ever invited us to dinner, No one made us a meal. No one made us feel welcome."
Matthew, a gifted translator, matched the energy and expression of his host. The
local listeners were quiet and watchful as the words were said in Spanish, then in English. We nodded, sadly. What else could we do? And the event continued, with more food, more talk, but a note of sadness sitting at the core. I was reminded then, as I am now, of the words of Jesus in Matthew 25:
When the Son of Man comes in his glory with all his angels, he will sit on his royal throne. The people of all nations will be brought before him, and he will separate them, as shepherds separate their sheep from their 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, “My father has blessed you! Come and receive the kingdom that was prepared for you before the world was created. When I was hungry, you gave me something to eat, and when I was thirsty, you gave me something to drink. When I was a stranger, you welcomed me, and when I was naked, you gave me clothes to wear. When I was sick, you took care of me, and when I was in jail, you visited me.”
Then the ones who pleased the Lord will ask, “When did we give you something to eat or drink? When did we welcome you as a stranger or give you clothes to wear or visit you while you were sick or in jail?”
The king will answer, “Whenever you did it for any of my people, no matter how unimportant they seemed, you did it for me.”
Then the king will say to those on his left, “Get away from me! You are under God's curse. Go into the everlasting fire prepared for the devil and his angels! I was hungry, but you did not give me anything to eat, and I was thirsty, but you did not give me anything to drink. I was a stranger, but you did not welcome me, and I was naked, but you did not give me any clothes to wear. I was sick and in jail, but you did not take care of me.”
Then the people will ask, “Lord, when did we fail to help you when you were hungry or thirsty or a stranger or naked or sick or in jail?”
The king will say to them, “Whenever you failed to help any of my people, no matter how unimportant they seemed, you failed to do it for me.”
Then Jesus said, “Those people will be punished forever. But the ones who pleased God will have eternal life.”
I'm not sure that passage should be taken as proof-text for everlasting fire or other spiritual realities, although that's often how it's read. Instead, I think it should be taken as a clear statement by Jesus that his followers can be known by the way they welcome strangers. All strangers. Hungry, naked, thirsty strangers. Sick, imprisoned strangers. That's how we show our love for Jesus himself, the God who himself was hungry, naked, thirsty, and imprisoned.
I'm thankful that I've always been part of churches where immigrants are welcome. My understanding of the Christian faith has been shaped by people from other continents.
The first church Whitney and I joined in our early marriage befriended a network of Hmong refugees, recently arrived from the hill country of Laos and Northern Vietnam. They were part of a wave of asylum seekers who had worked with the US during the Vietnam War. The Refugee Act of 1980, signed by President Jimmy Carter on March 17, 1980, finally allowed families to join the Hmong spies who had escaped as Vietnam fell. Some of those families joined our church in Philadelphia and were an active part of our church life until most relocated to Wisconsin and Minnesota.
During those same years another refugee landed in our church. His name was Hudson. He had escaped the bloody slaughter led by Idi Amin, the Ugandan dictator responsible for the death of over 300,000 of his countrymen. Hudson's family had been killed, but somehow as a teenager he found his way across borders to Philadelphia. We got to know him over Sunday lunches I helped organize every week in the church fellowship hall. When he heard I had a plot at a coop garden blocks from our church, he asked if he could help me dig and plant, and eventually joined us at our home to enjoy dinners made from the harvest.
Hudson and our Hmong friends were about the same age as Whitney and me, young adults in our early twenties. Yet how different our journeys. They chose not to talk of the refugee camps where they'd been held, the dangerous border crossings. They didn't share the painful stories of war and death and loss. Instead, they asked for help on practical things: how to find jobs, apartments, medical care, fabric, tools, special foods.
A decade later I did hear stories from other refugee friends:
Tran, whose daughter was in my Brownie troop, became trained to help lead our Brownie campouts. When the girls were asleep in their tents, she and I sat by the campfire, where she told me stories of life in Vietnam during the war. She was in Saigon the day it fell, then spent years in a refugee camp. She was a practical, matter-of-fact person, but sometimes she would pause in her stories, as if the memories overwhelmed her. As if there was still so much sadness and terror she would need decades more to find courage to tell the full story.
Another mom was from an undisclosed Arab country. Her family had fled under a regime change and established a business in a neighboring country. There, their windows were broken and storefront ransacked because of ethnic prejudice, so they fled again. And again. Her young family had been in refugee camps in several countries before somehow gaining status to relocate to the US. Her daughters were now in school consistently for the first time. They were all finally beginning to feel safe. She was grateful. Grateful that they were welcome. Grateful that my daughter would be friends with hers. Grateful that I would invite her for coffee, and visit her home in return.
There have been times in US history when immigration laws worked well, when refugees had a clear path toward legal status, and when most Americans understood the economic and social benefits of welcome and inclusion.
There have also been ugly times of prejudice, anger and violence toward newcomers, and seasons when our immigration laws defied common sense, our own economic well-being and the international rule of law.
We are in one of those seasons now. Immigration reforms have been blocked for years, caught in partisan accusation. Meanwhile, a steady stream of refugees is turned away in defiance of scripture and international law.
The heartache for me is how many celebrating razor wire on the Texas border and blocking constructive immigration reform are people who claim to follow Jesus.
Of course nations have a right to secure borders. Of course the US can't be the final destination of every troubled person around the troubled globe.
That's where the arguments immediately go.
I'd suggest we start elsewhere: with Jesus' comments in Matthew 25.
And with an informed understanding of what the issues are, who is blocking solutions and a refusal to be exploited by fear or prejudice.
For anyone who wants to do as Jesus asks us, some starting places:
Some earlier posts on immigration:
