NCC Yearbook: more religious groups favor immigration reform

["Philip Jenks" <pjenks@ncccusa.org>]

>More faith groups favor immigration reform,
>but just how many Americans are listening?

New York, February 28, 2011 -- The editor of the 2011 Yearbook of American & 
Canadian Churches reports a growing consensus among religious leaders that 
immigration reform is urgently needed.

But the Rev. Dr. Eileen W. Lindner also notes that religious groups disagree 
on what kind of reform is necessary, and she questions whether significant 
numbers of Americans are influenced by what religious leaders say.

Lindner's essay in the 79th edition of The Yearbook is part two of a theme  
chapter that appeared in the 2010 Yearbook. The earlier essay explored the  
profound impact on religious communities of a new wave of immigration since  
1965. The current editorial examines the role of American churches in 
advocating immigration reform, and tells how U.S. religious bodies are now 
engaged in ministry to immigrant communities.

Traditionally, evangelical churches in the U.S. tended to oppose a relaxation 
of immigration enforcement laws, and resisted amnesty proposals for undocumented 
aliens already living in the U.S.

More recently, evangelicals, like Protestant Catholic and Jewish groups, have 
begun to call for comprehensive immigration reform. Major religious bodies 
voicing support are the National Association of Evangelicals, the Southern 
Baptist Convention and Mormons.

Just how closely Americans are listening to their religious leaders' voices is 
another matter, Lindner said.

Lindner cites a 2010 report from the Pew Research Center: "Few Say Religion
Shapes Immigration, Environment Views," drawn from Pew's 2010 Annual
Religion and Public Life Survey."

Lindner writes: "According to the Pew study, only seven percent of 
Americans identify religious leaders as a source for their own thinking about
immigration policy ... When contrasted with the role of religious leadership in  
forming public opinion on other matters of public affairs even such early 
findings are a cause for sober reflection."

But even as religious groups come closer to agreement on the need for 
immigration reform, other factors -- including the aftermath of the 
September 11, 2001 terror attacks -- complicate the debate. Since 9/11, 
Americans tend to see immigration reform "in a wider context of 
national security."

In addition, Arizona's controversial 2010 immigration law, enacted in response 
to fears of drug trafficking and terrorism, attracted national attention. 
"In such a climate of threat, resources to inform rational, calm, and
morally defensible policy may be in short supply," writes Lindner.

Too, the continuing economic downturn, which has seriously reduced revenues to 
religious institutions, has diminished immigrations policy to just another 
item on a larger list of issues of church concerns, including health care, 
education, housing and income support, Lindner says. "The leadership within 
religious bodies will be tested in balancing the theological demand to extend 
hospitality to the alien with attention to the self-preservation instincts of 
their members to assure safety and security within their homes."

Ultimately, the type of mission and ministry religious bodies undertake 
effects the policy stance they take on immigration, Lindner writes.

"Those who work in educational programs are likely to wish to see
strengthened education provisions in new immigration policy. Those who work 
with exploited immigrant workers are likely to provide strong support for the 
inclusion of worker safeguards in immigration legislation," she writes.

Lindner offers four observations for future research and study:

o Given the growing political, economic and environmental instability globally 
the next quarter century is likely to be characterized by increasing pressure 
leading to greater numbers of migrant peoples worldwide. Such wide-scale 
social upheaval is likely to create the need for continuous policy debate 
within and among the nations.

o The effectiveness of religious advocacy for immigration reform and the nature 
of that advocacy will provide a practical means for assessing the role of 
religious communities in these debates and must be closely observed and  
analyzed as a measure of contemporary religious moral authority.

o Ministries and mission with and for immigrant communities within the U.S.  
may well become a prominent expression of domestic mission for decades to  
come. As church-sponsored "settlement houses" proliferated at the 
close of the 19th century and beginning of the 20th, so too will immigrant
ministries shape domestic mission endeavors in the 21st century. The nature 
of these ministries and the measure of their effectiveness in achieving their
respective aims will be important, and should be appropriately documented.

o American religious bodies and their advocacy for immigration reform will be 
carefully scrutinized by both ecumenical and interfaith organizations throughout 
the world. In an era of instantaneous communication and heightened  
religious sensitivity the role of immigration reform activities and its 
consequences for deepening such relationships may provide new opportunities for 
collaboration.

>Also see:

www.yearbookofchurches.org

http://www.ncccusa.org/news/110210yearbook2011.html
http://www.ncccusa.org/pdfs/IMMIGRATIONREFORM.pdf
http://www.ncccusa.org/NCCpolicies/immigrationsresolution08.htm
http://www.ncccusa.org/immigration/immigmain.html

Since its founding in 1950, the National Council of the Churches of Christ in 
the USA has been the leading force for shared ecumenical witness among 
Christians in the United States. The NCC's 37 member communions -- from a wide 
spectrum of Protestant, Anglican, Orthodox, Evangelical, historic African 
American and Living Peace churches -- include 45 million persons in more than 
100,000 local congregations in communities across the nation.

NCC News contact:  Philip E. Jenks, 212-870-2228 (office), 
646-853-4212 (cell), pjenks@ncccusa.org