Responding to the Immigration Crisis

As I write this blog on the Immigration crisis I am watching the O’Reilly factor. I just finished listening to Conservative radio host, Mark Levin. As a Conservative myself one would think my personal views on immigration and more specifically illegal immigration would be simple: control the border and stop the bleeding?

But…simple is not how I would describe my very conflicting views.

Conservative talking points on illegal immigration are persuasive:

• Open borders let in criminals – drug cartels – human traffickers
• The crisis on the border will increase disease with many immigrants carrying lice, scabies, swine flu, Tuberculosis and even leprosy.
• We can’t afford these people who will inevitably tax our welfare system
• Immigrants will make more voters for the Democrat Party – this is strictly political

Well…I must admit….these points are compelling.

Politically, I totally get why there is a call to deport illegals and control the border after all, no one want chaos in our nation.

Years ago, I lived in Florida where Cuban immigration was the issue.

In that crisis, I do not recall such political division the way it comes across when you discuss immigration on the Southern border.

Today, illegal immigration is muddied with stories of children, risking death, to cross into our nation. That definitely tugs in my heart. In fact, looking back on the Cuban immigration issue, I was living in Florida when a young Cuban immigrant child was deported after his mother died at sea struggling to get him to America.

His name was Elián González and it was Republicans fighting against the Democrat Clinton administration to keep him here.

Gonzalez was almost 6 years old 1999 when a fisherman found him off the coast of Florida, clinging to an inner tube after his mother and others fleeing Cuba drowned trying to reach American soil.

He was taken to live with relatives in Miami but his father, who was separated from his mother and had remained on the island, demanded that the boy be sent back, saying Elian was taken without his consent.

Bill Clinton’s attorney general Janet Reno ruled that he had to be returned.

So what changed? Maybe it is the terror threat – maybe the economy – who knows? I don’t.

Today the division is ripping our country apart. We can hardly come together to solve these critical issues.

It would definitely appear to me that the Obama administration is using the immigration crisis by refusing to do what is needed to secure the border.

On the other hand, many of the anti-immigration organizations Conservatives rely on for facts on this crisis are muddied up in eugenics.

WHAT?

Yes…as a researcher, I happen to know that many of the groups Conservatives are listening to on this immigration issue are founded in ideology we usually oppose.

Let me explain.

One of the top anti-immigration organizations in the nation today is FAIR, the Federation of American Immigration Reform.

FAIR was founded by John Tanton a former board member of Planned Parenthood who also helped found the group: Zero Population Growth.

On his website, Tanton describes himself this way, “John’s conviction that continued human population growth was a large part of the conservation problem led him to chair the National Sierra Club Population Committee (1971-74), and to the national board of Zero Population Growth (1973-78, including a term as president from 1975-77). In 1979, as immigration grew to be the significant part of the U.S. population problem, John Tanton founded FAIR to address mass immigration reform. John is the author of numerous articles, editorials and opinion pieces, many of which can be found by searching under John Tanton in The Social Contract archives.”

FAIR’s website reads, “John Tanton, M.D…Dr. Tanton is the original founder of FAIR. He became interested in immigration to the United States through his long-standing concerns about the effects of unplanned and uncontrolled population growth and resource depletion. He was the national President of Zero Population Growth from 1975 to 1977 and was Chairman of its Immigration Study Committee from 1973 to 1975. He was organizer and President of the Northern Michigan Planned Parenthood chapter. From 1971 to 1975, Dr. Tanton served as Chairman of the Sierra Club National Population Committee. He is currently editor and publisher of The Social Contract, a quarterly public policy journal. He was a 1990 recipient of the Chevron Conservation Award. Dr. Tanton is a graduate of Michigan State University and the University of Michigan Medical School.”

Tanton also nurtured the anti-immigration groups Numbers USA and the Center for Immigration Studies.

Another FAIR board member, Sarah G. Epstein, now serves on Planned Parenthood’s board in Washington. Epstein also serves on the Pathfinder International board founded by eugenics financeer, Clarence Gamble. In fact, Epstein is the daughter of Gamble, and as she serves on Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR’s) Board : According to the North Carolina Winston-Salem Journal, “Gamble helped found the Human Betterment League of North Carolina in 1947 to promote eugenic sterilization, and Journal research shows a long history of abuses in the N.C. sterilization program – abuses that Gamble consistently glossed over..” One major eugenics promoter which Gamble linked up with was Margaret Sanger.

Also, on the list is the man who helped legalize abortion in Colorado in 1967, Richard Lamm. Colorado became the first state in the US to legalize abortion.

I have blogged about these ties before. My research is no secret and can be viewed here , here and here.

What absolutely confuses me is why Conservatives and especially pro-life Christian Conservatives would interview and promote groups that were founded in eugenics by Planned Parenthood and population control ideologues?

I am not saying that we should have no views on immigration- not at all. But, come on, shouldn’t pro-life Christians at least avoid these groups to make their points?

But, I digress.

On this crisis, I remain conflicted. Seeing children in need pulls at my heart strings.

Listening to all the talking points on the possible dangers pulls on my fears.

Red flags go up when I hear stigmatizing descriptions of immigrants taxing our welfare rolls or spreading disease.

Is this not the same rhetoric we heard to discourage freeing Black slaves or taking in the Jews from Germany or accepting other immigrant groups who made their way to our shores?

So where do we draw the line? Compassion or policy?

I still do not have the answers. One thing I do know, as a Christian, I am called to show compassion to every human being. I am blessed to have been born in the United States. I would not hesitate to help any fellow human being and especially a child in need legal or illegal.

On the other hand, mayhem and chaos are not good for my fellow Americans either. What we are facing is a crisis not just at our border but in the very heart of this nation. This crisis is not the fault of poor illegal immigrants bleeding across our borders – no- this is a crisis of moral decay leading to a country that is ripping apart.

I do not have the answers here but I know who does.

Jesus through His Bride, the Church, many of whom may be immigrants now seeking refuge into this country, has a solution.

Perhaps God is trying to show us that we are in desperate need of Him, in need of real solutions and answers.

I remain conflicted. I hate seeing illegal activity so blatant on our border. Breaking our laws shows disrespect for this nation and it should not be taken lightly.

In addition, I despise American citizens being turned down for jobs because an illegal immigrant can do it cheaper.

I join many Americans concerned that porous borders allow terrorists who will kill Americans and immigrants alike into this nation.

But- deep in my heart – I know that America has snubbed our nose at Almighty God. We have executed 55 million unborn children with abortion – we export pornography – and our God is entertainment.

If I look at this crisis spiritually I will acknowledge that the illegal immigration crisis is yet another symptom crying out for the ultimate cure in America-that we bend our knee in repentance and seek Divine intervention and wisdom.

This is not the first crisis America has faced and it won’t be the last.

But, how we respond may have changed over time.

In 1774 John Hancock penned these wise words in his time of crisis, “We think it is incumbent upon this people to humble themselves before God on account of their sins. He hath been pleased in His righteous judgement to suffer a great calamity to befall us, as the present controversy between Great Britain and the Colonies. [And] also to implore the Divine Blessing upon us, that by the assistance of His grace, we may be enabled to reform whatever is amiss among us, that so God may be pleased to continue to us the blessings we enjoy, and remove the tokens of His displeasure, by causing harmony and union to be restored.”

In 1781, Thomas Jefferson made this powerful statement, “God who gave us life gave us liberty. And can the liberties of a nation be thought secure when we have removed their only firm basis, a conviction in the minds of the people, that these liberties are of the Gift of God? That they are not to be violated but with His wrath? Indeed I tremble for my country when I reflect that God is just; that His justice cannot sleep forever.”

Yes, on today’s illegal immigration crisis I remain conflicted – but prayerful.

Until a Divine solution comes please join me in lifting up America before Almighty God that He will purify our hearts, send revival to this nation and give us the wisdom to handle these critical issues facing us today.