Let’s agree on this

Let’s agree on this: Human rights are not the kind of politics it’s impolite to talk about.

Right now, tens of thousands of wanna-be Americans are stuck in an asylum system with the deck stacked against them. 0.1% are making it through.

Every day, laws of the United States are being violated in an effort to keep people out. That’s not an opinion, that’s what is happening in plain sight. Don’t believe me? Give me four hours and I’ll show you today.

These policies are not rooted in existing immigration laws, they are rooted in racism. (If we can’t agree racism is morally wrong, I’m not really sure we can agree on much.)

What do I want? I want our laws to be obeyed. If there are to be changes to immigration laws impacting asylum seekers, I want those laws to pass through the House of Representatives, the Senate, signed by the President, and upheld by our courts.

There is a process for changing how the United States deals with asylum seekers and what is currently happening is not it.

No more executive orders written to get around existing immigration laws, which are written in full knowledge they’ll loose in court eventually but can impact pain & suffering in the meantime.

No more stalling. No more kangaroo courts where 3 year olds stand before a judge with a federal attorney attacking them. No more child separation. No more detention. No more private detention centers collecting $700/day per person.

I want our laws obeyed.

It’s just that simple. And I won’t shut up about it.

Not just because it’s the legal thing to do, but it’s the right thing to do.

We are better than what we are allowing to happen. We must do something. It is our job.

You and I just have to agree that human rights transcend politics. We have to be able to talk about the people who are being hurt, and sometimes killed. We have to fight for the poor who are suffering because of decisions made in Washington.

I simply cannot remain silent.

It’s not politics. It’s human rights.

So let’s agree on that. We can disagree about how the church should respond to that. But Christians, faced with injustices, are duty bound to act. It’s who we are. It’s who Christians have historically been for millennia. We must get involved.

And we can’t stop until the current wrongs are righted.