Jeffrey B. (Michigan)

Are you suggesting that we should allow ourselves to be overrun in the same manner by which we overran the natives?

Sounds like a not-too-terribly-brilliant idea.

And are you really serious when you say the natives didn’t have immigration laws? They did have such laws - it was called “war.” Time and again, they lost.

Re: your first paragraph, the problem with modern asylum is that the vast economic gap between Third World and First World countries encourages outright fraud. Witness the asylum fraud of Strauss-Kahn’s accuser, or Barack Obama’s aunt. Far too many “refugees” pass up neighboring states where they would fit in culturally, linguistically, and religiously, to make journeys of sometimes thousands of miles seeking refuge in countries which, just coincidentally, happen to be much richer (and have more generous welfare benefits) than the dozen or more countries they have often bypassed.

Thus you get African laborers fleeing Libya headed to Europe rather than returning to their home countries. You get Tamils from Sri Lanka bypassing the Indian state of Tamil Nadu (a mere 70 miles from their shores, where they are an unoppressed ethnic majority), and heading for Australia or even Canada. You get Salvadorans coming to the US rather than Mexico.

In 2005 over 2,000 Sudanese refugees squatted in an Egyptian park demanding resettlement from the UN. Ultimately the Egyptian police killed about 20 in their attempts to evacuate the camp. The kicker was that the “refugees” had all been granted resettlement rights…in Egypt. But as one Sudanese “refugee” griped, they didn’t want to live in Egypt, because life there was “too hard.” They were openly insisting on resettlement in the US or Great Britain.

A wiser asylum policy would insist that “refugees” remain in countries geographically close to, and culturally and economically similar to, their own. This would weed out economic “refugees” and leave us with the people in genuine distress.

But why would the two be remotely similar? Because they happen to be homonyms?

Few people openly question the right of countries to control who *enters* their lands. Even those who effectively support open borders always couch their proclamations in language of border security. They genuflect to the notion of border security while effectively opposing any proposed law that would help secure it. Most open borders zealots understand how extremist they would sound were they to deny the right of the USA to secure itself.

With regard to emigration, however, I doubt many people would disagree with the idea that anyone, sans an accused or convicted felon, should have the right to leave his country. No country has the moral right to deny exit to an innocent man. The right of a man to leave his country, however, does not obligate any particular country to receive him.

Do Americans have a moral imperative to import poverty, and in so doing divert resources and employment opportunities from our most vulnerable citizens? The primary victims of unchecked immigration are Americans with little education and skills, native-born minorities, convicts who have done their time, and the disabled. These are our fellow citizens whom the SBC would consign to dog-eat-dog competition with those who have broken American law. Surely, Dr. Moore, such citizens are among “the least of these”.

I’ve written several responses based on the economic and political ethics of the issues as well as a brief critique of Dr. Moore’s biblical defense of his position.

http://dowblog.blogspot.com/2011/06/rebuttal-to-sbc-on-immigration-and_27.html
http://dowblog.blogspot.com/2011/06/rebuttal-to-sbc-on-immigration-and_23.html
http://dowblog.blogspot.com/2011/06/rebuttal-to-sbc-on-immigration-and.html

It was one of the reasons I left the church 2 years ago. I believe the church has taken an immoral stand that endangers the security of this country.

I try to enlighten as many as my fellow Baptists as possible and hopefully some of have discontinued their participation in the church as a result.

Do you encourage your congregation to learn English and to primarily speak it? When you enter someone’s house, you don’t demand they speak your language. And if I was living in a foreign country, I would learn the language.

/sarcasm

Sorry, that comment was meant for Lee Bean, below.

Actually, we fought you. Arrows aren’t so good against guns. Nevertheless, we had the good sense to fight for our land.

The argument would the this: Herod gave an order and in leaving (emigrating) Joseph and Mary broke Judean law.

The piece is littered with logical fallacies but I’ll merely touch on one: the notion that Jesus was an illegal immigrant.

First, Jesus and His family simply moved from one Roman imperial province to another. Sure there were legal, cultural and linguistic differences, but the modern equivalent might be moving from Rhode Island to Eastern Kentucky (actually the distance to Egypt would have been considerably less than sojourning across parts of Texas, New Mexico, Arizona and California). Second, the nation-state is a relatively new conception historically and the 1st Century is much different than the contemporary world. The immigration restrictions enforced by modern states were not as necessary in an agrarian culture and such laws didn’t exist to be broken. Third, Joseph moved his family because of the impending threat to their lives posed by Herod–he wasn’t looking for a work permit. Therefore, it would be more apt to term Christ a refugee rather than an illegal immigrant.

Dr. Moore draws an erroneous equivalence between two completely unrelated circumstances separated by fact as well as 2000 years of history and legal development. As an argument it is ethically troubling, exegetically unsupportable, historically inaccurate, and logically fallacious.

http://thepedestrianchristian.blogspot.com/2011/06/russell-moore-immigration-and-gospel.html

Russell Moore, “Immigration and the Gospel”: A Tale of Chagrining Theology

The intent of sensitivity toward the needy is understandable but the willingness to engage hermeneutic gymnastics are extremely disturbing. Dr. Moore you are, consistently in practice, a thoughtful teacher. Possibly in haste to temper what you perceived to be bad attitudes you permitted certain kinds of indulgences in your biblical interpretation as well as overlooking some valid issues. I hope you rethink your argument on this one.

“It’s called Grace.”

It’s called lawlessness, Debbie! Christ after all did not come so that the law might be voided but that it would be fulfilled.

Dr. Moore then argues that compassion requires us to make illegal immigrants into citizens. This undermines the rule of law and is therefore un-Christian. If making impoverished people around the world American Citizens is an appropriate way to address poverty, then we should let in more than a billion people around the world into the U.S. Such a solution is ridiculous, so to argue that making illegal immigrants citizens is ministry to those in poverty is equally ridiculous.

Mercy for the lawbreaker is appropriate at times. Yet to reward lawbreaking is insane. Hasn’t welfare taught us that if we reward mothers for having children out of wedlock the results are more babies born to unwed mothers? Rewards encourage certain behaviors. Making illegal immigrants citizens rewards law breaking and creates more illegal immigrants.

Dr. Moore has a very nice salary and lives in a nice, white neighborhood. I grew up in Texas and had to deal with Mexican gangs at school. Many of these children belonged to illegal immigrants. I would argue that Dr. Moore is very out of touch. He and his family is safe. A teenager who lived down the street from me shot and killed two people. These are the fruits of illegal immigration. Has he not read about the violence on the southern U.S. border? Lawbreakers make for poor citizens. Who can rebut the simple logic of the last sentence?

A lawless society is not Christian. The resolution that passed was more than unfortunate, it shows that our leadership is out of touch. Too many books, too little understanding of normal people, and an ERLC leader who has been in Washington too long create this kind of mess. From such conditions come elite leadership and then. . . wait for it. . . liberalism.

Thanks for your article, something I don’t understand from our churches supporting missionaries financially to go over seas and break the law in that particular country to share the gospel.

What is the difference??? You are not allowed to preach or plant churches in the middle east, but you are sending money every year?

People would said they are not going as missionaries because they have a work visa or student visa, but you and I know that’s not the real purpose for them to be there.

I admire these missionaries to leave everything behind, but what’s the difference???

Thanks

In this context - the over-bearing Catholicism in Mexico does act as a hindrance to people coming to faith; it can’t do otherwise. If Mexicans, legal or otherwise, are in the United States, then, from a Kingdom perspective, it is an /opportunity/, not a problem. In the UK, where I am, of the two million or so Muslims, some two to three thousand have come to Christ; they would not have done so had they remained in their ‘home’ cultures.

We are now in a situation where, instead of going to the mission field, the mission field has come to us. This should be kept in mind when discussing illegal immigration from a Kingdom perspective.

I’m very familiar with the violence along the Rio Grande, especially on the Mexican side. My wife is from Reynosa (across the border from McAllen, TX). Her parents’ home (in a middle-class neighborhood) has been broken into, they’ve had people (probably from the narco gangs) climbing over their fence and coming through their carport hunting for someone.

My wife, as a naturalized citizen, can apply for residency for her parents, and they would be in class A, meaning an immigrant visa would be immediately available. With all the paperwork, they could come live in the U.S. within about 18 months. But her sister (being over 18 years old) would be in class D, and the waiting time to get an immigrant visa for someone in Mexico in class D is 10+ years. It is because of things like this that otherwise law-abiding people “cut in line” — by the time your “turn” comes, you could be dead.

I believe I understand where you are coming from, but I wonder if your categories would be so neat and clean if, hypothetically, you had to rush your infant child to the emergency room. I know that if my young son was bleeding to death I would not hesitate to break the speed limit in order to save his life. If you were a policeman who saw me speeding, would you pull me over and write me a ticket because I was “breaking the law, period,” and then make sure I traveled under the speed limit the rest of the way? Or, once you saw my bleeding son, woud you show compassion and escort us to the hospital?

I realize immigration is not always a matter of life and death, but the logic is the same: there are some cases where mercy and grace are needed. Such cases doesn’t necessarily rule out justice, but they do present tough challenges. I believe Dr. Moore is simply encouraging his readers to remember the grace of our lord, Jesus, in light of the challenges immigration.

-Jonathan

“Would Jesus have told the illegals to go back home and do it the right way”

He possibly would have, but I am sure that he would have also gladly fed him. I don’t think Moore was suggesting that breaking the law is OK and neither do I, I think the point is to have compassion as we seek a solution.

@ John Moody
” Do you know about all the violence along the US/Mexico border?”

Of course I do, and I understand the concerns you have and we all should have, but I don’t see anywhere in my post where I was condoning illegals. Again the point was merely to not be so hasty in condemning illegals, but seek to understand and have compassion. As to your last comment, most of the european immigration laws stem from xenophobia and nationalistic agendas.

There is a difference between being a sojourner in a different land legally and being a sojourner in a different land illegally. Surely that difference is not hard to understand.

Very well said. I agree with nearly all of your points. I also agree with the overall tenor of Dr. Moore’s post.

However, re: pt.5, if you don’t see any bigotry in the evangelical community, you must not be looking very hard. I see it everywhere.