The Bible...Written By, For, and About...Immigrants, Refugees, ...

[bobbieinok]

http://www.churchworldservice.org/Immigration/bible-as-handbook.html

The Bible as the Ultimate Immigration Handbook: Written By, For, and About Migrants, Immigrants, Refugees, and Asylum Seekers

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The book of Exodus, the story of the Exodus – is the story of the movement of the people of God away from slavery and injustice to freedom and new life. It is perhaps the world’s greatest and best-known migration story. Exodus began with the Hebrews being oppressed by their taskmasters. Their persecution was increased with the orders of the King of Egypt to have all newborn Hebrew boys killed. However, one was protected and hidden until he was three months old, at which time he was placed in a basket in the river. In today’s language he would be referred to as an “Unaccompanied Alien Child.” The child was rescued from the river by Pharaoh’s daughter, who chose to ignore her father’s orders to kill all male infants. She named him Moses, and raised him in Pharaoh’s palace.

****(Unaccompanied children picked up at a U.S. border, unless immediately returned to their country of origin, are placed in juvenile detention facilities. If they are very lucky, they are placed in foster care until a decision about their immigration status is reached.)****

Moses grew up to witness the oppressive treatment of the Hebrews by the Egyptians. In responding to this injustice, he killed an Egyptian, and became a criminal alien, who fled for his life to a strange land. He was taken in and given sanctuary in Midian.

****(Today, in the U.S., he would be put in prison, serve his sentence, and eventually be deported back to Egypt, to be imprisoned there if that country would accept him. If it would not, he would spend the rest of his life in prison in the United States.)****

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In fact, care of the alien is so important that Deuteronomy 27:19 states, “Cursed is he who distorts the justice due an alien, orphan, and widow. And all the people shall say Amen.

****(There is a translation that reads, “Cursed is the nation….” Perhaps this is a prophetic warning for governments to consider closely.)****

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The New Testament begins with a migration story, and perhaps the only documented, recorded “alien” story. Alien is a term that is offensive to many, as it brings to mind a vision of someone from outer space. Looking at it in that manner, one might say that perhaps Jesus was truly an “alien.” He came from heaven (the outer limits of space – although he did tell us the kingdom is within) and took the form of a human being to become for us the Refugee Christ. The reality is that all Christians owe their salvation to a refugee.

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Jesus was not only a refugee and a migrant. He was also undocumented both as a child and at the end of his life. We know that Jesus was crucified “outside the gates” of the city because he was not a citizen (Hebrews 13:12). As Christians, we know that he died for the sins of the world, but at that time the theological implications of his death were not considered in handing down his sentence. Jesus was crucified because he was one with the oppressed and marginalized people of that time, and the religious and political powers feared he was instigating an uprising of the poor. The Romans thought Jesus was planning to overthrow those in power. He was one with the stranger, the sojourner, the migrant, the day laborer, the least, the last, and the lost. He did not have the rights of a citizen (he was one with each and every undocumented migrant in the world). Because he did not have these rights, his crucifixion had to be outside the gates and it was in the garbage dump of the city. He suffered, so others would not have to do the same.

The next time you hear of the death of an undocumented person, stop a moment and think of the undocumented Christ and remember we never know when the person we are looking at is Christ in one of his disguises.Since 1995, over 3,000 migrants have died crossing the U.S./Mexico border in their search for work and survival.

more....

[The Straight Story]

1. Is Mexico that bad? I though the US was the bad guy???

What is so bad about Mexico that people want to leave there in droves to come here? What about NAFTA and such? What about America being the most vile and evil country in the universe?

If you could choose any country to live in, would it be here?

[Igel]

2. The Israelites were invited guests,

and became guest workers. That didn't quite work out, now did it? "Citizenship" would have meant "assimilation", also something that didn't quite work out. Then there were too many and threatened their hosts.

Then the 'stranger' that was Moses didn't go because he had too many kids and couldn't support them all, or wanted a better house or to help his community by building a clinic, or even making himself a better career. He left for the reasons that most immigrants in that period did: He fled for his life. Not because he wasn't rich enough or because of overpopulation.

The next immigration was an invasion, as much military as ethnographic, if you take the story at face value.

On the other hand, Jesus was amply documented. If he was undocumented, there's a problem. But the Romans required none; he was not a citizen; while he could move about in the empire, he was simply a resident. He was one with the stranger, *and* with the taxcollector, with the sick *and* the well; with the sinner, *and* with the righteous; with the wealthy and with the poor. He preached forgiveness, but also preached righteousness, which he had no need to define, but which needs a definition today because people have forgotten the one he assumed. He never said 'no' to scrupilous observance of the Torah's dictates, and had nothing to say about secular government. He hated hypocrisy, and while he was forgiving to those that rejected righteousness and justice (calling upon them to become righteous), he reviled those that made up their own version of righteousness that they wanted to impose, adding to what God had already said because they didn't like what he said, or wanted something different.

[sarcasmo]

3. Bible= Mythology