[ad_1]
(RNS) — Quite a lot of faith-based organizations and congregations are pleading with the Biden administration, in a letter despatched Monday (Jan. 23) to President Joe Biden and different leaders, to not enact new immigration restrictions.
The letter — signed by 165 faith-based native, nationwide and worldwide organizations and congregations — expresses “grave concern” with insurance policies Biden introduced earlier this month.
Whereas these insurance policies increase a program providing humanitarian parole to Venezuelans to incorporate people from Nicaragua, Haiti and Cuba, additionally they embrace a proposal to bar individuals from in search of asylum in the event that they enter the U.S. with out inspection or don’t search safety in different international locations alongside the best way, the letter mentioned.
The administration has mentioned it plans to launch an app that people can use to schedule an appointment for inspection as a substitute of coming on to a U.S. port of entry to be able to cut back wait occasions and crowds on the border.
RELATED: What Biden’s new deal for Venezuelans means for different refugees
The letter urges the Biden administration to not transfer ahead with what it calls an “asylum ban,” calling it “dangerous, inhumane and lethal for essentially the most susceptible.”
“Throughout religion traditions and practices, the message is evident: We’re referred to as by our sacred texts and religion ideas to method each other with love—not concern,” the letter reads.
“Our various religion traditions compel us to like our neighbor, accompany the susceptible, and welcome the sojourner—no matter hometown, faith, or ethnicity. Importantly, our faiths additionally urge us to boldly resist and dismantle techniques of oppression.”
Parole isn’t any substitute for entry to asylum, in accordance with the letter.
Signers embrace three of the six faith-based companies that companion with the U.S. authorities to resettle refugees: Church World Service, HIAS (previously the Hebrew Immigrant Help Society) and Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Service.
![Krish O'Mara Vignarajah. Photo courtesy of Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Service](https://religionnews.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/02/webRNS-Krish-Vignarajah2-021819-277x369.jpg)
Krish O’Mara Vignarajah. Photograph courtesy of Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Service
A number of denominations additionally signed on to the letter, together with the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, Presbyterian Church (USA) and United Church of Christ. Different signers are the American Mates Service Committee; Normal Board of International Ministries and Normal Board of Church and Society of the United Methodist Church; Hindus for Human Rights; Anti-Defamation League; Christian Reformed Church Workplace of Social Justice; Mennonite Central Committee U.S.; Nationwide Council of Church buildings; NETWORK Foyer for Catholic Social Justice; Union for Reform Judaism; and Unitarian Universalists for Social Justice.
On a name hosted Monday morning by the Interfaith Immigration Coalition and #WelcomeWithDignity Marketing campaign, Krish O’Mara Vignarajah, president and CEO of LIRS, shared quite a few misconceptions individuals have about these in search of humanitarian assist.
Not all have legitimate passports, entry to a cellular phone, dependable Wi-Fi or a prepared sponsor within the U.S. to be able to reap the benefits of pathways to enter the nation, Vignarajah mentioned. For a lot of, their most suitable choice is to make an usually harmful journey to the U.S. border to hunt asylum.
“That may be a excessive hurdle to clear — one which borders on a wealth check for a few of the most susceptible youngsters and households dealing with quick hazard,” she mentioned.
![HIAS CEO Mark Hetfield. Photo by Ralph Alswang](https://religionnews.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/10/webRNS-HIAS-Mark-Hetfield-277x369.jpg)
HIAS CEO Mark Hetfield. Photograph by Ralph Alswang
Mark Hetfield, president and CEO of HIAS, mentioned his group is sufficiently old to recollect a time earlier than the U.S. had legal guidelines permitting individuals to hunt asylum within the nation. Hetfield pointed to 1939, when he mentioned the Franklin D. Roosevelt administration refused to permit a ship carrying 900 Jewish passengers who had been fleeing Nazi Germany to dock in Florida. It returned to Europe, the place 254 of these passengers perished within the Holocaust.
That’s why the United Nations established — and the U.S. adopted — the Refugee Conference, he mentioned, “asserting that by no means once more, would individuals be trapped inside their nation of persecution.”
The Biden administration’s proposal would place the asylum legal guidelines the U.S. now has “out of attain” for a lot of, Hetfield mentioned, which he referred to as “unlawful” and “immoral.”
And that “hits residence” for a lot of faith-based organizations, “who’ve been serving a few of the most susceptible for many years,” Vignarajah added.
“This isn’t charity for us. That is how our supporters dwell out their religion and reply that larger name to welcome the stranger in want.”
RELATED: Religion leaders prep for border adjustments amid stress, hope
[ad_2]
Source link