Posted on 12/26/2015 7:37:25 AM PST by SeekAndFind
Leaders of the church-based Sanctuary Movement vowed on Friday to offer their places of worship as refuge for immigrants facing deportation under an Obama administration crackdown on Central American families who entered the United States illegally.
The statement came two days after The Washington Post first reported the U.S. government was planning a series of raids to remove hundreds of undocumented families as early as January in the first such large-scale effort targeting the recent flood of border crossers.
The Department of Homeland Security preparations to intensify deportations of Central American migrants, confirmed by U.S. government sources, drew immediate fire from Democratic presidential candidates and human rights groups.
Leaders of the multi-denominational Sanctuary Movement, which has sheltered at least 10 immigrants from deportation over the past 18 months, joined in the criticism on Friday, alluding to the biblical Nativity story of Mary and Joseph seeking refuge before the birth of Jesus.
"As pastors we know that each and every family is a holy family," said the Rev. Alison Harrington, pastor of Southside Presbyterian Church in Tucson, Arizona. "We open our doors to today's Josephs and Marys. ... The gift we have to offer on Christmas Day is the gift of sanctuary."
The Sanctuary Movement, which Harrington said encompasses about 50 congregations in a dozen U.S. cities, made headlines in January by providing refuge in Philadelphia to a Honduran woman whose two children were born in the United States. She ultimately won a two-year reprieve from deportation.
The Rev. Noel Anderson, a coordinator for the affiliated Church World Service, put the overall number of congregations supporting the sanctuary network at about 300 in more than 20 states nationwide.
(Excerpt) Read more at reuters.com ...
He needs the room for the muslims he wants to bring in to chop your heads off .
These “church people” should be jailed for violating our Immigration Laws!
EVERY one of these church-affiliated subversive political organizations should lose their non-profit status and should be taxed on every damned dollar they collect in donations, or in government contract money (which I bet is one very hefty sum for protecting illegal aliens.)
Yup. Faith based Sanctuary is not some legally binding thing. And would not override immigration laws if there were some esoteric ‘law’ on the books somewhere.
Wait. Isn’t it illegal to harbor a fugitive?
> alluding to the biblical Nativity story of Mary and Joseph
> seeking refuge before the birth of Jesus.
These people have no Biblical literacy whatsoever.
Mary and Joseph were NOT seeking refuge in Bethlehem.
1. Bethlehem was a part of Judea, so it was not a in foreign country. It was in fact the town of Joseph’s birth.
2. Joseph was required to go there by a decree issued from Caesar Augustus that all males should report to the towns of their birth to register for a tax.
In short, Joseph and Mary migrated to Bethlehem IN COMPLIANCE WITH the law, NOT IN DEFIANCE OF IT.
The young family did flee from the murderous Herod, when they learned of his intention to kill all the male children under two years old.
They fled to Egypt to avoid the existential threat posed by Herod. It was not against Egyptian law for Jews to enter and leave at will. No passport or visa was necessary.
Their sojourn in Egypt was TEMPORARY! After the death of Herod, they returned to Judea and settled in Nazareth.
Make them pay taxes.
I believe that harboring Illegals is a FELONY. Hopefully President Trump will start putting those people where they belong, IN JAIL.
A cool think about Trump, as opposed to most other candidates, is that he is VERY UNLIKELY to get rolled by church leaders in stunts like this - whereas Huckabee could almost be counted on to show up and try to protect those same, Illegal, churches.
Are those churches giving me sanctuary if I choose not to pay my taxes to support illegal immigrant?
So it begins. Obama wants to make a spectacle of these attempted deportations to turn out the Hispanic vote and make further deportations impossible. This will be the battle line of the election and the battle line for the fate of our republic. Time for choosing sides- the rule of law and our future freedom or mob rule by invaders.
This is all part of the plan. They have no real intention of deporting anyone. They want to try to gin up sob stories about “poor migrants” along with mobilizing groups to propagandize on behalf of fraudulently documented foreigners.
... then the minute that one leaves the sanctuary, they're scooped up and deported immediately. Let's see how long these churches can stand having hundreds .. if not thousands .. if illegals and their families crammed into their churches. Let them spend THEIR money to maintain them. Even if wealthy libs sponsor/pay for their upkeep, millions of dollars of lib money will be spent maintaining these leeches instead of going toward prog causes and support for the Dem candidates.
I'm not saying a total blockade. Let in all of the food and stuff that they want to send in, but nothing except citizens come out again without being deported ...
They get paid with our tax money to do it.
...alluding to the biblical Nativity story of Mary and Joseph seeking refuge before the birth of Jesus...
Not even similar. They were not illegal invaders. The government required everyone to go to their hometown for a census for tax purposes. They looked for a hotel room, but they were all sold out.
Racketeering.
Attrition through enforcement is proposed by Ted Cruz. The Cruz Immigration Plan is to close every imaginable loophole that allows illegal aliens to obtain work, receive government benefits, or elude being apprehended and deported from the U.S. until life here becomes untenable for anyone in the country illegally.
Besides the obvious first step of securing the border with a wall that works, triple the number of border patrol agents and increased aerial surveillance, the Cruz plan of attrition through enforcement includes:
- strengthen E-Verify and make it widely accessible for employers, social service agencies, rental housing managers, and law enforcement for routine traffic stops, etc.
- end catch-and-release
- end sanctuary jurisdictions
- end birthright citizenship
- finish the already approved biometric tracking system at our nation's ports of entry to detect anyone overstaying a visa
- full cooperation between federal and state agencies to enforce immigration laws
- remove and replace all DHS employees that refuse to abide by the law
The "refuge" that Joseph and Mary sought was shelter from the weather. She needed someplace to give birth. They were not fleeing their government, they were complying with the law that required themm to register in Joeseph's home city.
these "Pastors" are leading their congregations in the wrong direction.
Oddly, this is the one form of sanctuary for illegal immigrants (or other law-breakers) to which I have no objection. It is a customary right as old as Christendom. If a church offers sanctuary to anyone then the church is obliged to provide sustenance for them and they are obliged to stay within the precincts of the church or the civil arm can arrest them and apply the law should they stray from the church grounds.
There would be very little illegal immigration to the U.S. with the exception of refugees whose status as such the Federal government is unwilling to recognize were the only way a person illegally in the U.S. could stay was invoking the ancient right of sanctuary.
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