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Illegal immigration polarizes Christians
Mary Lou Pickel - Staff
Wednesday, August 10, 2005

The Rev. Julian Herrera of Norcross says Jesus would not harshly judge immigrants who cross the U.S.-Mexican border looking for work.

"The way people can glorify God is to lend these people a hand instead of persecuting them," Herrera said.

The minister's views make many angry.

Gregory Howard, chairman of the Gwinnett County Republican Party, listened to Herrera recently at a forum on immigration held at the Christ Fellowship of Atlanta church in Norcross.

"What he's saying is we're not children of God and we're not Christians if we don't allow this," Howard said. "I'm deeply offended by this."

"Give unto Caesar what is Caesar's," Howard said. "You follow the rules."

Two groups with conservative values --- evangelical Christians and Republicans --- find themselves on opposite sides of the thorny immigration issue. As Atlanta's Hispanic evangelical population continues to grow, conservative Republicans are grappling with how to relate to this group. Evangelical Hispanics tend to share conservatives' views on social issues such as gay marriage and abortion, but disagree strongly on illegal immigration.

Herrera says he was offended earlier this year at a meeting of the Christian Coalition of Georgia.

"They said they needed to ship us back to our countries like a UPS package," he said. "They blamed us for traffic congestion and overloaded hospital emergency rooms."

Herrera, a native of Mexico, became a Christian in Atlanta 15 years ago. He later returned to Mexico and studied at an Assembly of God seminary. He became a pastor and returned to the United States in 1999 at the invitation of a church in Marietta.

Earlier this year, Herrera went to Washington with other Hispanic pastors organized by a group called CONLAMIC --- the National Coalition of Latino Clergy and Christian Leaders --- to lobby for immigration reform and driver's licenses for those without immigration documents.

"We can't stay with our hands tied," he said. "We need to raise our voices."

He plans to return to Washington with the same group next month.

As part of his effort to lobby for immigration reform, Herrera agreed to call together his congregation for a forum moderated by Anthony-Scott Hobbs, host of radio show "Citizen Georgia" on WGKA-AM (920). Herrera also broadcast the forum on his radio station Radio Vida, WWWE-AM 1100.

Toward the end of the forum, which consisted mostly of each side taking turns telling the other side it was wrong, people started alluding to the Bible to back up their views.

Kathy Hildebrand of Snellville compared immigration to passage into heaven. In both cases there's a proper way, she told the crowd of at least 500, most of whom were immigrants from Mexico and Central America.

Wanting to get into heaven and actually getting into heaven are two very different things, she said.

In turn, Manuel Mendoza, a Baptist pastor from El Salvador, said the laws of God are greater than the laws of man. Mercy is one of the most important acts a Christian can show, he said.

Sadie Fields, executive director of the Christian Coalition of Georgia, said her group held a panel on immigration reform in January, but she says people did not say the things Herrera alleges.

"We are a welcoming country," Fields said. "We are one of the most generous countries in the world. We do expect people to come here legally and to assimilate into our culture," she said.

Illegal immigrants break the law in coming here, she said, and they put a burden on hospitals, schools and other public services.

Open borders also put the United States in danger of terrorist infiltration, Fields said.

The appropriate Christian response to illegal immigration is an interesting question, said Tina Pippin, professor of religious studies at Agnes Scott College.

"Who can know what Jesus would do," she said.

"Jesus broke all sorts of social boundaries. He talked to prostitutes and tax collectors . . . and he went into the homes of the wealthy."

Pippin believes it would be hard to argue that Jesus would call for isolationism because of the overwhelming inclusiveness of his message.

The Rev. Charles Strong, pastor of Christ Fellowship of Atlanta, says he hasn't considered what Jesus would do about illegal immigration.

"It's obviously something that's becoming more and more an issue," Strong said.

Herrera rents space at Strong's church for his Spanish-speaking congregation.

David Jenkins, who teaches at the Candler School of Theology at Emory University, has worked with refugees and says helping the stranger is central to Jesus' message.

"Jesus was often in close company with strangers --- people who rabbis and Jewish men were not allowed to associate with because they were not keeping the law," Jenkins said.

"They were from other traditions --- sometimes enemies, like the Romans. Jesus was constantly breaking a lot of the cultural norms of his tradition," Jenkins said.

Dennis McCann, professor of Bible and Religion at Agnes Scott College, said he'd be surprised if Jesus had much sense of borders and jurisdictions other than the Roman colonial system.

In all things concerning the Romans, he was indifferent rather than hostile, McCann wrote in an e-mail.

"He seems to have emphatically rejected zealotry or the idea of armed struggle against imperial occupation. Thus, I would be surprised to find Jesus endorsing any kind of punitive policy against illegal immigrants. Probably, if asked, he would favor amnesty for those already here, and generally would favor a borderless world, where people could come and go freely without interference from the state," McCann wrote. "That's my guess."