A Christianity that no longer took discipleship seriously remade the gospel into only the solace of cheap grace. Moreover, it drew no line between natural and Christian existence. Such a Christianity had to understand the cross as one’s daily misfortune, as the predicament and anxiety of our natural life. Here it has been forgotten that the cross always also means being rejected, that the cross includes the shame of suffering. Being shunned, despised, and deserted by people, as in the psalmist’s unending lament, is an essential feature of the suffering of the cross, which cannot be comprehended by a citizen’s ordinary existence and Christian existence. (Discipleship p. 80)
Iowa governor Kim Reynolds recently signed into state law a provision that calls for a two year prison sentence for undocumented immigrants who re-enter the state after having been deported. This is one more attempt at the state level to weaponize the immigration issue during the 2024 election. According to Governor Reynolds, “The Biden Administration has failed to enforce our nation’s immigration laws, putting the protection and safety of Iowans at risk. Those who come into our country illegally have broken the law, yet Biden refuses to deport them. This bill gives Iowa law enforcement the power to do what he is unwilling to do: enforce immigration laws already on the books.”
In response, law enforcement leaders around the state have raised serious concerns. In a statement made by the LEITF (Law Enforcement Immigration Task Force), Marshalltown Chief of Police Michael Tupper states, “The problems at the southern border cannot be solved from Des Moines, Iowa. Playing politics with public safety never helps public safety. This law will make the job of law enforcement more difficult. It will diminish public safety because it will cause people to needlessly fear the police. This law has severely harmed community relationships that took decades to build.” Mark Prosser, retired Police Chief of Storm Lake, IA expressed concerns about impact on immigrants living in Iowa. He states, “Iowa local law enforcement has neither the training, staffing nor resources to involve themselves in immigration enforcement. This law and others like it will erect a barrier of fear between the diverse populations in our Iowa communities and their local law enforcement.”
Governor Reynolds cites the Biden administration’s “failure of enforcement” as justification for signing the bill into law, but she fails to acknowledge that congress is responsible for immigration policy. The recent failure of congress to even take up an immigration reform/border security bill that capitulated to many Republican demands is a glaring omission. Criticizing congress doesn’t play well with Presidential politics. Instead, Iowa has followed the example of Texas and Florida in the weaponization of immigration and the cultivation of fear.
Migration is being weaponized all around the world. Taking advantage of the plight of people displaced by war and oppression, states like Belarus have used refugees from Syria and Afghanistan for political purposes:
In the fall of 2021, the leaders of several European countries announced that they were being confronted by an entirely new security threat: weaponized migration. Over the course of a few months, Alexander Lukashenko, the authoritarian leader of Belarus, enticed thousands of migrants and would-be asylum seekers, primarily Kurds from Iraq and Syria, as well as some Afghans, to his country with promises of easy access to the European Union. Flown into the capital, Minsk, on special visas, they were bused to Belarus’s western border, where they were left in large, unprotected encampments as winter approached and temperatures plunged. Despite EU legislation and UN treaties guaranteeing humanitarian protections for asylum seekers, border guards from Latvia, Lithuania, and Poland pushed those attempting to enter their countries back into Belarus, employing tear gas, water cannons, and rubber bullets. In orchestrating a televised humanitarian crisis on the EU’s doorstep, Lukashenko produced a major headache for European policymakers. Although the Belarusian leader’s motivations remain opaque, a key objective appears to have been to discomfit, humiliate, and sow division within the EU for failing to recognize him as the legitimate winner of the flawed 2020 Belarus-ian presidential election and for imposing sanctions on his country after he brutally suppressed the pro-democracy protests that followed. (When Migrants Become Weapons)
Today, Iowa immigrants are at risk of being weaponized for political purposes. The uncertainty around the enforcement of this law will have a negative impact on immigrants who live in our state. Many are trying to acclimate to American culture, unsure of their status or legal rights. All of this will contribute to the scapegoating of immigrants as a common enemy to American life, even though, as has been discussed at length, immigration has been essential to the identity of this country.
The Iowa Republican congress has been heavily influenced by segments of the Christian community in many areas: private education, abortion restrictions, and the dismantling of DEI programs at colleges and universities. Yet, when it comes to one of the clearest biblical mandates in all of scripture, to love our neighbors by caring for the poor and marginalized, and to not be hard hearted or tightfisted toward our neighbor (Deuteronomy 14), these same Christians are strangely silent. Worse, some are leading the charge.
A few years ago, the legacy of Dietrich Bonhoeffer was used to highlight his willingness to stand against the power of a corrupt state. It’s true, Bonhoeffer gave his life in opposition to the Nazi regime. He did so, however, standing alongside those who were being scapegoated. What motivated Bonhoeffer was not some ideological agenda, but the concrete situation of his neighbor. He writes,
To be sure, Christ’s own suffering is the only suffering that brings reconciliation. But because Christ has suffered for the sin of the world, because the whole burden of guilt fell on him, and because Jesus Christ passes on the fruit of his suffering to those who follow him, temptation and sin fall also onto his disciples. Sin covers the disciples with shame and expels them from the gates of the city like a scapegoat. So Christians become bearers of sin and guilt for other people…A Christian becomes a burden-bearer—bear one another’s burdens, and this way you will fulfill the law of Christ. As Christ bears our burdens, so we are to bear the burden of our sisters and brothers. (82)
This is the heart of discipleship—taking up our cross and following Jesus. This is costly grace—recognizing the presence of Christ in the face of my neighbor (Matthew 25). In the next few months, the weaponization of immigration will only get worse, leading to increased fear and uncertainty for our friends and neighbors. The question for Christians of every political persuasion is this: Will we stand in solidarity with our immigrant neighbors? Or, will we cave to political, economic, and religious pressure that relegates the gospel to abstract moral and religious principles for the sake of political power?
I mean, the issue of muslim migration to europe today.
Also will this adequate to assuage legitimate concern on yet another group - muslims? (Especially in Europe)