{"id":7016,"date":"2025-04-03T04:03:51","date_gmt":"2025-04-03T04:03:51","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/africanamericanvoice.net\/?p=7016"},"modified":"2025-04-16T05:02:23","modified_gmt":"2025-04-16T05:02:23","slug":"religious-leaders-condemn-trumps-treatment-of-immigrants","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/africanamericanvoice.net\/?p=7016","title":{"rendered":"Religious Leaders Condemn Trump\u2019s Treatment of Immigrants"},"content":{"rendered":"

By<\/span>Pilar Marrero<\/a><\/p>\n

Even as Donald Trump presents himself as a \u201cdefender of the Christian faith,\u201d a growing number of church leaders are denouncing his policies, including on immigration. Many are also taking aim at the Christian nationalist ideology underpinning them.<\/p>\n

Critics say Trump\u2019s approach threatens the First Amendment\u2019s protections on freedom of religion and violates sacred tenets of the faith, namely welcoming the stranger.<\/p>\n

\u201cFor me, as a pastor, this is not a partisan issue,\u201d said the Reverend Gabriel Salguero during a recent call with media. A registered independent, Salguero is president of the National Latino Evangelical Coalition. \u201cIt is a moral and pastoral issue.\u201d<\/p>\n

He added, \u201cWe are called by Jesus in our tradition, by the Torah and other sacred writings in other traditions, to look out for the least, the last, and the most vulnerable.\u201d<\/p>\n

Evangelicals, Latinos among them, form an important part of Trump\u2019s base and played a key role in his election victory, according to\u00a0an analysis of exit polling by<\/a>\u00a0Edison National Election Pool.<\/p>\n

Other religious denominations\u2014including\u00a0leaders in the Jewish community<\/a>, as well as\u00a0Black Protestant congregations<\/a>, among others\u2014have similarly denounced Trump\u2019s harsh anti-immigrant crackdown.<\/p>\n

Policies violate freedom of religion<\/h2>\n

Now, some are taking a hard look at Trump\u2019s first month in office, including the Department of Homeland Security\u2019s (DHS) decision rescinding its \u201csensitive locations<\/a>\u201d policy, which green lighted the interruption of religious services to arrest immigrants. That, they argue, represents a direct attack on religious liberties.<\/p>\n

\u201cEnforcement actions at places of worship interfere with religious activities and the ability of people of faith to fulfill their religious mandates,\u201d said Jim Simpson, executive director of the Center on Faith and Justice at Georgetown University.<\/p>\n

In mid-February, over two dozen Christian and Jewish religious denominations and associations\u00a0filed a lawsuit<\/a>\u00a0against lifting the \u201csensitive locations\u201d policy.<\/p>\n

\u201cCollectively, the plaintiffs represent millions of Americans and tens of thousands of houses of worship. It is truly historic in its scope and breadth,\u201d said Simpson.<\/p>\n

A unified Catholic message on migrants<\/h2>\n

Trump\u2019s policies have also helped narrow what had been a\u00a0widening ideological divide<\/a>\u00a0within the Catholic Church between its more liberal wing, represented by Pope Francis, and conservative leaders in the US.<\/p>\n

Despite its rightward tilt in recent years, the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB), which represents the highest levels of Church leadership in the country, \u201ccontinues to stand up for immigrants, lobbying for generous policies to respect the right to migrate,\u201d explained journalist and author Mary Jo McConahay, whose book,\u00a0Playing God: American Catholic Bishops and The Far Right<\/a>,\u00a0<\/em>details the US Church\u2019s political transformation.<\/p>\n

According to McConahay, there is a consensus at the top of the Catholic institutional hierarchy that Trump\u2019s immigration policies run afoul of the church\u2019s core beliefs. \u201cThe Catholic Church in the United States describes itself as a \u2018church of immigrants\u2019,\u201d she noted, adding US Bishops continue to \u201cstand up for immigrants, lobbying for generous policies that respect the right to migrate.\u201d<\/p>\n

Before being hospitalized in February for double pneumonia, Pope Francis, who is 88, penned a\u00a0scathing letter<\/a>\u00a0to US bishops decrying the \u201cmajor crisis\u201d triggered by Trump\u2019s deportation policies and imploring them to stand for the rights of migrants<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat is built on the basis of force and not on the truth about the equal dignity of every human being, begins badly and will end badly,\u201d he wrote.<\/p>\n

Francis also took issue with the US\u2019s perceived retreat from democracy under the Trump administration and what he called its \u201cmyopic, extremist, resentful and aggressive nationalism.\u201d<\/p>\n

Francis then offered a few words for Vice President JD Vance, a Catholic convert, who in past remarks has described the\u00a0notion of Christian love<\/a>\u00a0as being primarily centered on family and nation. \u201cChristian love is not a concentric expansion of interests,\u201d wrote Francis in response, arguing instead for a \u201clove that builds a fraternity open to all, without exception.\u201d<\/p>\n

Last week a federal judge and Trump appointee rejected a lawsuit by the Conference of Bishops seeking to compel the Trump administration to reinstate funds for the Church\u2019s refugee resettlement program. Those funds were frozen in January alongside all foreign aid. The USCCB is\u00a0appealing the ruling<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Appeals to white supremacy<\/h2>\n

A petition is being circulated, meanwhile, by the group Christians Against Christian Nationalism that accuses proponents, including many in the MAGA movement, of using Christian theology as a \u201ccover for white supremacy and racial subjugation.\u201d<\/p>\n

It reads, \u201cWe reject this damaging political ideology and invite our fellow Christians to join us in opposing this threat to our faith and our nation.\u201d<\/p>\n

Still, Trump continues to enjoy support from others in the faith community.<\/p>\n

Reverend Samuel Rodriguez with the National Hispanic Christian Leadership Conference said he doesn\u2019t believe the Trump Administration will target \u201ca man who is working, whose family was raised here, kids were born here and has never received even a parking ticket\u2026 I don\u2019t believe that person will be targeted for deportation.\u201d<\/p>\n

Reports have shown numerous cases of individuals without prior convictions having been detained and\/or deported by immigration officials in recent weeks.<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t know any pastor, bishop, rabbi, or any religious leader who\u2019s trying to harbor violent criminals,\u201d Salguero responded, ticking off moves by the administration, from challenging birthright citizenship to ending Temporary Protected Status, that target all immigrant communities.<\/p>\n

Bishop Mark Seitz of El Paso, Texas, did not mince words regarding the administration\u2019s intentions.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn the span of just weeks\u2026. we\u2019ve seen language criminalizing our parishioners and neighbors and immigration enforcement actions that risk normalizing a lack of respect for core constitutional, legal, and due process protections,\u201d he said. \u201cWe have learned that being an admitted racist is forgivable, but fleeing across the border is not.\u201d<\/p>\n

African American Churches are also speaking out.<\/p>\n

\u201cThough my people did not immigrate here but were violently taken, it is for us to always show the hospitality that we have not received,\u201d said Pastor William Lamar IV of the historic Metropolitan AME Church in Washington DC. \u201cOur work is to make sure that this land is hospitable for all.\u201d<\/p>\n

Source: Published without changes from Ethnic Media Services<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

ByPilar Marrero Even as Donald Trump presents himself as a \u201cdefender of the Christian faith,\u201d a growing number<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":7017,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[255,24],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7016","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-america-under-attack","category-regular-column"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/africanamericanvoice.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7016","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/africanamericanvoice.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/africanamericanvoice.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/africanamericanvoice.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/africanamericanvoice.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=7016"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/africanamericanvoice.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7016\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7018,"href":"https:\/\/africanamericanvoice.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7016\/revisions\/7018"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/africanamericanvoice.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/7017"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/africanamericanvoice.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=7016"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/africanamericanvoice.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=7016"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/africanamericanvoice.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=7016"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}