Thread: Hayward Church Studies Role in Illegal Immigration Debate

http://www.insidebayarea.com/dailyrevie ... ci_4007293

Hayward church studies role in illegal immigration debate
Members hope to show various sides of argument
By Martin Ricard, STAFF WRITER



For parishioners at the United Church of Hayward, the immigration debate strikes a different chord — not just one of race, class or citizenship but one of personal responsibility.
Among this church's small congregation, some are immigrants from different countries or have family members who are immigrants — some here illegally.

On Sunday, the church began a conversation about immigration and faith, and whether it had an obligation to respond to the growing discussion stemming from the pending immigration bill in Congress.

"All churches do because, in my view, you could say when Joseph, Mary and Jesus decided to leave, they were immigrants in Egypt," longtime member Kristina Burnett said in an interview. "And Jesus welcomed anybody into his fellowship. Churches have an obligation to do the same thing."

The church hoped to broaden the immigration debate Sunday by allowing members to share their own immigration stories attempting, along with churches around the nation, to show the many facets of the immigration debate.

One is that "immigration" and "Latino" are not always synonymous (Burnett is an immigrant from Germany and another member isfrom Hong Kong, for example). Another is the church believes it has a role in perpetuating Christianity's long trend of understanding "God's refugees."

The congregation began thinking about its contribution to the immigration debate after Burnett's son's girlfriend, Diana Villanueva-Hoeckley, recently began a legal battle against extradition to Guatemala, the country from which she illegally immigrated 13 years ago to be with her mother in California.

Since then, Villanueva-Hoeckley's case has joined efforts pushing Congress to pass legislation to reverse a ban against illegal immigrants pursuing higher education gaining access to in-state tuition, loans and private scholarships. The bill would provide qualified students with a path to conditional permanent status.

According to the National


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Council of La Raza, about 65,000 immigrant students graduate from U.S. high schools each year.

It would be unrealistic to keep immigrant students raised in the United States from going to school, Burnett said, though more responsibility should be given to parents who broke the laws to allow their children to come illegally in the first place.

"But I can't see that for a child who has come at the behest of their parents," she said. "I don't think the child should be punished."

The pastor, the Rev. Kathryn Shreiber, led the conversation by showing the congregation a globe and pointing to Ur, the biblical land that is now called Iraq.

Preaching that Ur was the first land where God made his covenant of the Promised Land to the children of Israel, according to Christianity, Shreiber reminded members that just like the Israelites, Americans have been "strangers in a strange land" as well. Shortly after, she asked for a show of hands from those who were born either outside Hayward or the United States to help show how church members have been migrants at one point or another.

This was necessary, Shreiber said, to show that before the nation can act on a new immigration policy it must remember to engage first in a conversation about its own migration journey.

"We've forgotten where we came from, just like with the Promised Land," she said after the service. "If this is the land of liberty, ... whose land of liberty is it for?"


Martin Ricard can be reached at mricard@dailyreviewonline.com.

Yes, America... La Raza wants you to pay for educating the children of criminals and people that do not pay taxes. The illegals can educate thier own children, with all the tax dollars they have not paid.

No more freebees!

Dixie