Faith Leaders Bring Moral Clarity As They Stand In Solidarity With Immigrants

“In Scripture and in my faith tradition, it says the two greatest commandments are to love the Lord your God with all your heart and to love your neighbor as yourself."

San Diego Bishop-elect Michael Pham, a former refugee who recently became Pope Leo XIV’s first bishop appointment, was among faith leaders to bear witness and support immigrants at their immigration court hearings on World Refugee Day last Friday, compelled by their values and the unprecedented surge in arrests of individuals just trying to follow the rules by attending their court dates. Masked mass deportation agents “have apprehended so many people showing up for routine appointments this month that the facilities appear to be overcrowded,” The New York Times reports. 

But emerging from the Edward J. Schwartz Federal Building in downtown San Diego later that Friday, faith leaders told reporters that deportation agents actually fled after spotting them in the hallways. As a result, no one was abducted.

Initially, deportation agents were “standing there covered with masks as we walked toward the courtroom,” Bishop-elect Pham said. “Eventually the … agents kind of scattered and went away. No wonder people come in fear.” It’s hugely significant when past abductions literally stain the federal building. Journalist Ken Stone reported that boot markings were streaked on the hallway walls from deportation agents “who rested their feet during earlier assignments.” 

But on this day, individuals following the rules by going to their court dates walked back out and returned home to their families after their appointments concluded. There’s no disputing that the moral courage of faith leaders and advocates had everything to do with it.

“‘Like the story of Moses and Exodus, the Red Sea parted,’ said observer Scott Reid of the immigrant-aiding San Diego Organizing Project,” Stone reported at Times of San Diego. “Said another: ‘We’ve never seen the hallways cleared out so quickly.’” Faith leaders standing in solidarity with immigrants at the federal building also included Imam Taha Hassane of the Islamic Center of San Diego, Bishop Susan Brown Snook of the Episcopal Diocese of San Diego, San Diego Auxiliary Bishops Ramón Bejarano and Felipe Pulido, and Jesuit Father Scott Santarosa, who coordinated the visit with San Diego Organizing Project Executive Director Dinora Reyna-Gutierrez.

During a homily delivered at St. Joseph Cathedral ahead of the courthouse visit, Bishop-elect Pham “denounced the policy and tactics being employed” by the federal government “and shared his own story,” Jesuit magazine America reported.

“Today, I stand as a leader of the Catholic Church thanks to these opportunities that allowed me to contribute to society,” Bishop-elect Pham said. “I believe most refugees, immigrants, and migrants over the years, whether documented or undocumented, come to the United States seeking opportunities for a better life and success …I believe most people like me strive to be good.” Bishop-elect Pham said it was “concerning” to see the brutal tactics of the federal government, which has been abducting Dreamers, loved ones of U.S. military service members, and other long-settled immigrants. “When I was 10 years old, living in Vietnam, I witnessed this situation,” he continued. “It involved seeing people being taken away without an obvious reason.”

All across the nation, leaders from many faiths have mobilized interfaith actions to protect their congregations and communities, in particular in L.A., where the federal government has used peaceful public pushback to the abduction of neighbors and community members as an excuse to illegally deploy California National Guard against Americans.

“Since federal immigration officers descended on Los Angeles on 6 June, dozens of faith leaders from across southern California – clergy in their long robes, Quakers in black felt hats, laymen and rabbis – have marched in demonstrations against workplace raids and mobilized to provide services to undocumented immigrants,” The Guardian reports. “Many spoke of their faith as a guiding force in their activism and devotion to help the most vulnerable.” Eddie Anderson, Senior Pastor at McCarty Memorial Christian Church, told the outlet that “to not speak out is to be complicit in saying that some of us are disposable.”

“Rabbi Susan Goldberg said she was defending ‘the deepest values of the Jewish community,’ including ‘compassion,’ ‘love’ and ‘care and support for the most vulnerable,’” KTLA reports. “It’s the most-repeated command inside our Torah to take care of the widow, the orphan and the stranger, and to treat them as family and to take care of them,” Rabbi Goldberg continued.

In the Washington, D.C. area, Village Church pastor and Washington Interfaith Network member James Tait said that faith leaders were lifting up their voices in “holy protest.”

“We say unequivocally that no child should be snatched from their mothers arms in the name of national security,” Reverend Tait told AFRO. “The Washington Interfaith Network stands in solidarity with immigrant communities across the country, from east of the river in D.C. to Central California’s migrant camps.” Reverend Tait told AFRO that as a Black clergyman, it’s impossible for him to not see the similarities between the mistreatment of Black communities and undocumented communities.

“We see ICE for what it is: a tool of state violence,” Reverend Tait continued. “We see Trump and hear his rhetoric for what it is … the same hate that once haunted our ancestors.”

In Texas, “Amreena Hussain, vice president of the Dallas chapter of the Indian American Muslim Council, said her beliefs compelled her to speak out against the treatment of immigrants,” Baptist News Global reported.

“Our faith does not permit neutrality in the face of injustice, and it certainly does not permit the stripping away of basic due processes, fairness and the dignity of every human being,” Hussain said. “When people are denied the chance to defend themselves and to stay with their families and to live with dignity, it is not just a legal failure, it is a moral and religious failure.”

“Hussain referenced the Islamic principle of Ummah, which refers to unity among Muslims and with humanity,” Baptist News Global continued. “In this case, it means when one part of the community suffers, all parts suffer.

“When families in our cities and neighborhoods are torn apart, we are obligated to feel their pain, and we are obligated to defend their dignity and to stand alongside them,” Hussain told the outlet. “Justice in Islam is a divine obligation.”

Back in L.A., Reverend Stephen “Cue” Jn-Marie called the protesting of inhumane immigration policies a moral obligation.

“In Scripture and in my faith tradition, it says the two greatest commandments are to love the Lord your God with all your heart and to love your neighbor as yourself,” the reverend said. “They can’t be separated; you have to do them together … In order to love God, I have to love you first, because you’re created in the image of God in my faith tradition.”