To the Honorable (sic) Jeffrey Sessions
Attorney General of the United States
Dear Mr. Sessions:
Sir, as one who reveres the Separation of Church and State guaranteed by the 1st Amendment to the Constitution, I am uncomfortable with direct connections between the Bible (or ANY religion’s sacred texts) and public policy. As a Christian, the Bible motivates my approach to politics, but I work, as we must in a pluralistic democracy, to translate into public principles that can be affirmed by persons of any faith or no faith at all. But since you, sir, have invoked the Bible in justifying your horrific policy of ripping children from their families (kldnapping them) and holding them in detention while prosecuting their parents without even considering their asylum applications, I have no choice.
Sir, the Bible is actually very clear about the importance of humane and just treatment for immigrants, refugees and asylum seekers. The topic is generally referred to as “hospitality to strangers,” a practice and command in both Testaments. “Hospitality” here doesn’t mean offering pie or iced tea. In the ancient world there were no hotels and travel was fraught with dangers, including being set upon by robbers. So, the practice developed of allowing strangers to visit in one’s home—where they were to be fed, clothed, and given the best bed even at some discomfort for one’s family. They were also offered the protection of the house. The story of Sodom in Gen. 19 is not about “homosexuality” but about a town that so violated hospitality that it regularly practiced male/male gang rape.
Now this was the sin of your sister Sodom: She and her daughters were arrogant, overfed and unconcerned; they did not help the poor and needy. (Ezekiel 16:49)
After the Exodus, Israel (and later Israel and Judah) was constantly reminded to treat strangers justly because when they were strangers in Egypt, they were enslaved instead of being treated humanely and justly.
When a foreigner resides among you in your land, do not mistreat them. The foreigner residing among you must be treated as your native-born. Love them as yourself, for you were foreigners in Egypt. (Leviticus 19:33-34)
In fact, God loves foreigners, including refugees:
[God] defends the cause of the fatherless and the widow, and loves the foreigner residing among you, giving them food and clothing. And you are to love those who are foreigners, for you yourselves were foreigners in Egypt. (Deuteronomy 10:18-19)
The “gleaning laws” instruct Israelites to leave food for the poor and the foreigner:
When you reap the harvest of your land, do not reap to the very edges of your field or gather the gleanings of your harvest. Do not go over your vineyard a second time or pick up the grapes that have fallen. Leave them for the poor and the foreigner. (Leviticus 19:9-10)
One is not to oppress a foreigner, refugee, asylum seeker (these are all the same term in Hebrew):
Do not oppress a foreigner; you yourselves know how it feels to be foreigners, because you were foreigners in Egypt. (Exodus 23:9)
One is not to deprive the refugee of justice (such as not letting them file asylum applications):
“So I [God] will come to put you on trial. I will be quick to testify against sorcerers, adulterers and perjurers, against those who defraud laborers of their wages, who oppress the widows and the fatherless, and deprive the foreigners among you of justice, but do not fear me,” says the Lord Almighty. (Malachi 3:5)
God’s people are instructed to do whatever the sojourning stranger asks of them:
“As for the foreigner who does not belong to your people Israel but has come from a distant land because of your name— for they will hear of your great name and your mighty hand and your outstretched arm—when they come and pray toward this temple, then hear from heaven, your dwelling place. Do whatever the foreigner asks of you, so that all the peoples of the earth may know your name and fear you, as do your own people Israel, and may know that this house I have built bears your Name. (1 Kings 8:41-44)
You invoke the 13th chapter of Paul’s letter to the house churches in Rome which tells Christians to submit to the governing authorities. But it never says one cannot protest unjust laws. In the preceding chapter, Paul has just been echoing Jesus teaching to love enemies! Romans 13 is about paying taxes, not about endorsing whatever unjust laws a government imposes. This chapter has been lifted out of context to justify slavery, segregation (I believe you did this when you fought the Civil Rights movement in Alabama and tried to prevent people from registering African-Americans to vote), and every other kind of unjust law. It is Scripture twisting at its very worst, sir.
Be ashamed! Your policy is very unbiblical. It violates human rights and international law. It makes all of us who do pay our taxes guilty of participating in this kidnapping of children.
Shame! Repent!
Sincerely,