The Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) is among 165 faith-based organizations that have signed onto a letter opposing actions that they fear will lead to a new asylum ban in the United States to address continued challenges at the Southwest border.
Following Tuesday’s decision by the U.S. Supreme Court to allow the continued expulsion of asylum seekers from the United States until justices oral arguments on Title 42 in February, the Rev. Carolyn Winfrey Gillette has written a new hymn, “Mary, Joseph! Take Young Jesus!” and based it on Matthew 2:13-18, part of the lectionary reading for Jan. 1, 2023.
A more humane immigration system will aid not only communities along the U.S.-Mexico border ministering to asylum seekers, but also organizations in the interior portions of the country increasingly called upon to help endangered and harassed people who are fleeing for their life.
Presbyterian Disaster Assistance took part in an online teach-in Monday as part of an effort to get the United States to end policies that make it difficult for asylum seekers at the country’s southern border to find safe haven.
On Friday Tucson Borderlands Young Adult Volunteers joined with members of a partner organization, Tucson Mennonite Voluntary Service, to hold a streetside vigil demanding the removal of Title 42, the federal policy that has expelled more than 1.2 million asylum seekers since the beginning of the pandemic.
The Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) was represented at a vigil and action in front of the White House Wednesday to commemorate the 70th anniversary of the United Nations Refugee Convention of 1951 and call on President Joe Biden to do more to reform the United States’ immigration and refugee policies.