Thread: The churches will soon be stuffed with illegals

U.S. Immigration Officials Hesitant To Arrest Immigrants Who Seek Church Sanctuary


CHICAGO (AP) — Everyone knows where Flor Crisostomo lives, even the federal immigration officials who have ordered her deported to Mexico. The reason they haven't detained her is her address — Adalberto United Methodist Church.

Another woman famously took refuge in that church as she championed immigration reform, and at least 13 other illegal immigrants are doing the same at churches around the United States. So far, they have little to fear.

U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials have arrested illegal immigrants by the hundreds in raids at factories, restaurants, malls, farms and meat packing plants, but they have handled cases involving churches delicately.

"Our agency takes enforcement actions when we deem it appropriate,'' said Julie Myers, assistant secretary of homeland security for ICE. "I am personally not aware of an instance when ICE has gone into a church. That being said, if there was a particular, extremely egregious, ax murderer or something else, that's not to say we would not enforce the law at that time.''

Avoiding churches is unofficial policy for federal immigration officials, according to Doris Meissner, a former commissioner at the Immigration and Naturalization Service, the agency that oversaw immigration until the Department of Homeland Security was formed in 2003.

Since the 1970s the unwritten rule has been "no churches, no playgrounds, no schools,'' said Meissner, now a senior fellow at the Migration Policy Institute in Washington.
Critics say making exceptions for churches, where immigrants openly — and in Crisostomo's case, very publicly — defy deportation, makes the agency look lax.
"These are people who deliberately violated the law,'' said Dave Gorak, executive director of the Midwest Coalition to Reduce Immigration. "We can't even enforce the laws without being criticized as Gestapo.''

But Meissner said it wouldn't make sense for the agency to devote resources to arrest the relatively small number of people in sanctuary.
"An agency like ICE has far more work than it can possibly ever do,'' Meissner said. "You want to use those resources to thwart as much as possible egregious criminal behavior. A single person in a church doesn't really measure very high on a list.''

Crisostomo came to the U.S. in 2000, paying a smuggler in Mexico to get her across the border. She was arrested in 2006 during a raid at a wooden pallet company in Chicago.
She has been at the West Side church for six months, since the Board of Immigration Appeals ordered her to leave the United States, holding news conferences, writing blogs and lecturing school groups about immigration issues.
Over the past year, ICE has focused on raids at workplaces.

Critics say making exceptions for churches, where immigrants openly — and in Crisostomo's case, very publicly — defy deportation, makes the agency look lax.

They ARE lax!

Another woman famously took refuge in that church as she championed immigration reform, and at least 13 other illegal immigrants are doing the same at churches around the United States. So far, they have little to fear.


"Our agency takes enforcement actions when we deem it appropriate,'' said Julie Myers, assistant secretary of homeland security for ICE. "I am personally not aware of an instance when ICE has gone into a church.

Avoiding churches is unofficial policy for federal immigration officials, according to Doris Meissner, a former commissioner at the Immigration and Naturalization Service, the agency that oversaw immigration until the Department of Homeland Security was formed in 2003.

Critics say making exceptions for churches, where immigrants openly — and in Crisostomo's case, very publicly — defy deportation, makes the agency look lax.

"These are people who deliberately violated the law,'' said Dave Gorak, executive director of the Midwest Coalition to Reduce Immigration. "We can't even enforce the laws without being criticized as Gestapo.''

Two thoughts:

1. Let illegals flood into the church and let the churches take care of them with the church money!!
They will get sick of the monitary drain too.

2. Why the heck can't the IRS take away the tax-free status of the churches that harbor illegls? I don't get it?

Can someone answer #2. Can't we here do anything to MAKE the IRS inforce their own rules???

Big Religion is like any other Special Interest Group, just follow the money. Most Special Interest Groups are only concerned for "their" Elitist and not the people they pretend to speak for or save from harm.

"BOSTON -- The weight of a priest shortage, shrinking collections and the clergy sex abuse scandal combined to force Boston's archbishop to announce Tuesday that his Roman Catholic archdiocese will lose 65 parishes by year's end.

The archdiocese, the nation's fourth-largest with more than 2 million Catholics, now has 357 parishes.

"[b][i]O'Malley's announcement completed a process that began in December, when he said the archdiocese would be forced to undergo a major downsizing.

"He said the reduction was needed because of declining Mass attendance, a shortage of priests and the inability of the archdiocese to support struggling parishes in the midst of a financial crisis caused partly by the abuse scandal. "

O'Malley said many factors contributed to the need to close parishes. He said more than a third of the 357 parishes are operating in the red and 130 of its pastors are older than 70. Also, many buildings are deteriorating -- it would cost more than $100 million to repair church buildings in Boston alone.

Thus, the Catholic church enters Caesar's world and attempts to rebuild its coffers and fill its schools and churches by asking its members to violate the sovereign laws of the USA. Maentime, the Vatican is still a walled city where immigrants are not allowed---and never will be.

I do not renounce my faith. I do renounce the adminstrative body in charge and their criminal attempts to change America to satisfy their corporal needs. The church should be stripped of its tax exemption so long as it labors in the political arena.

Revoke the tax-free status for every church found to be harboring illegal immigrants.

Harboring illegal immigrants is a felony, as is aiding and abetting.

Police departments routinely confiscate vehicles and homes during drug busts, saying these were used in the commission of a crime.

Why are they not confisctaing church properties and arresting preists and nuns and everyone else harboring illegal immigrants?

I should start my own church, allow illegal immigrants to seek sanctuary protection there and then call ICE and have them come pick them up!

Why, when it comes to the church, they can enforce some laws (like sex abuse) but not others (IA's being harbored)? Our govt picks and chooses what laws to enforce once again.

I think they should go in and get her. What an excellent PR statement that would be. You break the law -we're coming in. Then all boundaries are broken -and she and others won't have that smug feeling of 'you can't touch me.'

So Flor has been away from her kids for 8 years??? In another article she says this below. How do you like her logic and use of the word abandon?!?!


Flor Crisostomo, an illegal immigrant who sought sanctuary in a Humboldt Park church after defying a January deportation deadline, laughed when asked if she would consider surrendering to ICE.

''This is the most ridiculous thing. We know this is not going to work,'' said Crisostomo, 29, of Mexico. ''How can they ask us to self-deport when they know our country depends on the money we send. To accept this new proposal means we are accepting abandoning our families.''

http://www.newspress.com/Top/Article/ar ... 2223880219

Illegals not dropping enough pesos in the collection plate to support the churches?

Originally Posted by misterbill

"BOSTON -- The weight of a priest shortage, shrinking collections and the clergy sex abuse scandal combined to force Boston's archbishop to announce Tuesday that his Roman Catholic archdiocese will lose 65 parishes by year's end.

The archdiocese, the nation's fourth-largest with more than 2 million Catholics, now has 357 parishes.

"[b][i]O'Malley's announcement completed a process that began in December, when he said the archdiocese would be forced to undergo a major downsizing.

"He said the reduction was needed because of declining Mass attendance, a shortage of priests and the inability of the archdiocese to support struggling parishes in the midst of a financial crisis caused partly by the abuse scandal. "

O'Malley said many factors contributed to the need to close parishes. He said more than a third of the 357 parishes are operating in the red and 130 of its pastors are older than 70. Also, many buildings are deteriorating -- it would cost more than $100 million to repair church buildings in Boston alone.

Thus, the Catholic church enters Caesar's world and attempts to rebuild its coffers and fill its schools and churches by asking its members to violate the sovereign laws of the USA. Maentime, the Vatican is still a walled city where immigrants are not allowed---and never will be.

I do not renounce my faith. I do renounce the adminstrative body in charge and their criminal attempts to change America to satisfy their corporal needs. The church should be stripped of its tax exemption so long as it labors in the political arena.

The Catholic church is bleeding money for a reason. Alot of us used to donate alot of money to help our less fortunate CITIZENS, believing we would be helped when needed. Instead the church is taking our money and giving it to illegal aliens who are gone once they have taken all they can.

Illegal aliens cannot support the church, they only take. I, for one, stopped all donations to ANY catholic organization and I'm not alone.

I did not abandon my faith, the catholic church abandoned me.