For many years, I saw this silhouette of a child, mother, and father on a yellow highway sign near the immigration checkpoint on the five, between Oceanside and San Clemente. Each time I saw it, I’d give thanks. Then as now, our government refused to adopt common-sense immigration reform. It’s our greatest civic sin. But I was grateful that someone in the system, either at the Border Patrol or CalTrans, was decent enough to warn drivers to look out for those at risk.
Rector Neil Tadken gave me this button when I visited him and his people at St. Luke’s in Monrovia today. It applies Jesus Christ’s teaching to the immigration question. I hope the sign is still there on the five. Even if it is, it’s an artifact of a time when our leaders were capable of taking a hard line while expressing a modicum of decency toward those most at risk. Nowadays, Trump and his minions talk about immigrants using the language of racial hatred. National groups, Haitians and Somalians, derided as scum. Warnings about the pollution of our blood. Savage public abuse of deported immigrants of color. Extralegal massacres on the high seas.
If Trump and ICE have let up for the time being, it’s because he realized it was hurting him politically. And that means there’s hope for our national soul yet.
Our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, whom heretical nationalists claim to follow, said that all scripture as he understood it added up to one thing. We should act toward others as we would have them act toward us. It’s in Matthew 7:12. It’s called the golden rule. It is at the root of every religion and philosophy. If you’re a person of faith, I will try to persuade you that wisdom, sophia, logos, reason, the Word — whatever you may call the pre-corporeal Christ — built the golden rule into the universe, including us, at the beginning of all things, when Creation’s foundations were forged in the factory of God’s love. Applied to public policy, the golden rule wouldn’t solve every problem. But it would require those in power to do the best they could for the largest number of people. It would also rule out cruelty for cruelty’s sake.
If I could swing a golden hammer, if I had my way, millions of people of faith and their leaders would unite in the form of an All-Faith Democratic Union. We would fund ads in close House and Senate races aimed at incumbents who support Trump’s policies. The ads would say, “Mr. or Ms. Congress Member, tell Trump and Miller to find a way to secure the border without their acts of sadism — without torturing parents and children looking for a better life. Tell them to stop hurting people on purpose to keep power. Tell them to follow the golden rule.” The ads would feature images such as this one. It used to appeal to our better angels, no matter what we thought about immigration policy. I pray that it still will.