"Immigrants among us" - review and application

 

Assignment: Collect your thoughts and apply them particularly to your congregational experience. How do you see the Holy Bible as a missional handbook?

 

 

The Lutheran Church Missouri Synod CTCR, Immigrants Among Us . November 2012

 

 

The CTCR document deals with questions related to immigration to the US. There are many congregations that are inserted in a reality where immigration rates are on the rise, and they are looking for ways to reach out to them more effectively. However, one of the big issues related to the matter is the topic of legal x illegal immigration. Thousands, perhaps millions of immigrants are living undocumented in the US. How should the Congregation engage in this opportunity and, at the same time, uphold the respect for the law and the authorities?

The document does not offer a closed biblical answer to the question, for this is a theological rather than doctrinal question. The starting point for the Christian Church therefore should de be realizing that

 “Immigrants are, quite simply, neighbours. As neighbours, immigrants fall under the law of God, which calls us to love our neighbour as ourselves.” (p.12) This is the backbone of any missionary action of the Church that can be applied to the outreach effort by the local congregation engaging with immigrants in American Soil. This love for them becomes concrete, among other things, “by attending to basic needs for food and clothing (Dt. 10:18-19), showing fairness in dealings with workers’ wages (Dt. 24:14-15, Mal. 3:5), and being generous with one’s abundance (Dt. 24:19-22)” (p. 17). This reflects the reality that Christian love is not a concept but is a practical engagement that always has a concrete goal.

        Engaging with immigrants becomes more complicated for the congregation when issues related to illegal immigration and undocumented living in the country are involved. Here, the document leads us into another Lutheran teaching, the theology of the Two Realms. “The commands to love our neighbor (including the alien) and to obey civil authority are both included in the law of God and, therefore, Christians are required to fulfill their demands.” (p.27) Therefore, tension is established. However, “As members of the church and as citizens or residents of the land, Christians seek to live and work faithfully in both of God’s realms or kingdoms” (p.31). There is a tension present and a balance needed in this area in which Article VII of the Augsburg Confession helps. The local congregation is reminded that “the unity of the church is grounded in and nourished by the Gospel and the sacraments. This means that such unity neither depends on nor is determined by a particular position on current immigration law.” (p.33). True and authentic Christians who agree in word and Sacrament ministry (Right Hand) may strongly disagree in secular topics, especially connected to immigration laws (Left Hand). 

The debate over the topic brings an opportunity for the Church that was not experienced by many generations before us. Christ has sent us to preach the Gospel to all nations, but now the nations are coming to us. In certain metropolitan areas of bigger American cities, it is possible to find over 80 different ethnicities coexisting, many of them knowing little to none about Christ and the Bible. The local congregation, therefore, utilizing the Bible as the Norm and Word and Sacraments as the essence of her proclamation has before herself a double opportunity: in one hand, to extend the Gospel and a helping hand to every person, regardless their legal status. Christ is for all, including people who live in the outskirts of legal society. On the other hand, the congregation can promote legal parameters to be followed, or improvements in immigration laws, since Christians are bound also to obey authorities and laws.

This attitude of the Church is related to our teaching about Vocation. “When a Christian serves his neighbour in the context of his God-given vocation or “station in life,” he fulfills concretely God’s “commandment of love” and thus His will that we love our neighbour as ourselves.” Local congregations are constituted of Christians who live their vocations in daily life. Individually, and as a group, the local Church responds to God’s love in living out their vocation also in connecting the Gospel of Hope to many immigrants in need of it.

Finally, I note that the topic resonates with me in the fact that I and my family are immigrants in Canada. Legal immigrants, who now have become citizens. In our current city immigration is on the rise, and the same holds true in the area we are moving to. The local congregation that I am moving to also has a school with 250 students including many immigrants. There lies a great opportunity to serve them in Christ, as well as tending to the demands of the law. Above all, to live our vocation as Christians sharing the love of Christ in Word and Sacrament, so that many of them will become citizens of the Kingdom of God.