Heartbreak and Hope in Miami

Jose Antonio Vargas Flickr Photo by Tiffany L. Clark/Creative Commons

by Rev. Laura Barclay

Last week, I attended a screening of Documented, Jose Antonio Vargas’ film about his coming out as an undocumented immigrant after winning the Pulitzer Prize. His journey is honest, poignant, and humorous. A lesser subject would have cut some of the material showing the strain of the situation on his familial relations, but the film never flinches from the raw story.

I sat in on a panel discussion after the screening filled with members of an organization featured in the film, “DREAMers Moms.” I had a chance to speak with several of them, and one story stuck out in particular. One mom left her country for the good of her children so they would have hope of a positive future in the United States. She hasn’t seen her mother in 13 years and won’t until immigration reform is passed into law. If she leaves the U.S., it’s likely she wouldn’t be allowed to return and care for her children. This would leave them essentially orphans who would be placed into foster care. Her mother is now in her 80s, frail and sick. This woman is losing hope of ever again touching the woman who cared for her, but still prays daily for a miracle.

Jose mentioned during the panel that a largely untold side effect of being undocumented is the toll that the constant fear of deportation and worry about family has on mental health. As he edited the film, he said, he noticed several points where he was clearly suffering from depression. I asked panelist Gaby Pacheco, an immigration activist and Dreamer who also appeared in the documentary, how she and others she knew developed mental health strategies for coping with anxiety and depression. She said it is vital to find others suffering from similar fears and share stories with them. With a lack of mental health resources for undocumented persons, that communal sharing is a form of therapy. She also voiced a need for mental health services to be included in comprehensive immigration reform.

The documentary will air on CNN, and be screened at film festivals and in theaters. Don’t miss a chance to see this film and encourage others to see this story that humanizes immigration reform. Partisan rhetoric has fueled this issue to a point beyond realism, but this film makes the political intimate and personal. After you see the film, join the discussion at organization,
www.defineamerican.com. Address the question, “How do you define American?”

I became passionate about immigration reform a few years ago when working with pastors Javier Benitez and Hector Villanueva at the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship of North Carolina. The two work constantly to protect their parishioners from racial profiling and deportation, especially on Sunday morning when police camp outside entrances to Hispanic churches in order to profile and catch potential undocumented persons on the way to worship. This is intolerable. It is a moral imperative that we find ways to welcome the stranger as Scripture calls us to do. We must listen to immigrant stories and respond appropriately out of love. What does a Christian response to immigration look like in your community?

The article originally appeared on Sojourners.

The Courage to Change

by Dr. Chris Chapman

It has been a heavy summer in terms of news of all kinds -- local, state, national, and world. In recent weeks, like most people, I have been greatly troubled by the revelation of molestation and cover-ups at Penn State University and the tragic shootings in Colorado. Yet, for me, an additional level of concern grows out of the ambiguous way we respond to these problems as a society.

At first glance, it may seem that there is no ambiguity. Everyone is quick to denounce such shameful behavior. The only arguments are over what the appropriate punishments are. Yet, if we consider the way we attempt to respond to the bigger issues of how to prevent such calamities in the future, our ambiguity is exposed.

We want children to be safe but whenever we attempt to put in place better safety procedures, there is resistance. Here I speak from thirty years of experience. Every attempt I have made to protect children has met resistance. "The church is a community of trust," people will say, "How can we question our own people?" Further, when I have become aware of a problem and dealt with it, there have been some who have been angry with me even knowing what happened.

In regard to the shootings, we know mental health issues have to be taken seriously but again and again we do not. Friends, family members, and various professionals ignore warning signs. We belittle people with mental health challenges and underfund treatment of mental illnesses. And we refuse to take reasonable measures to limit access to weapons. (Yes, people kill people, but they do it a lot more efficiently with certain weapons.)

So, how do we feel as a nation about these problems? If we really are outraged, let's express that sentiment in something more than a passing wave of anger. Let's have the courage to change our behavior. We may never prevent all harm but we can do better. Until we do, our expressions of courage are insincere.

Chris Chapman is the pastor of First Baptist Church of Raleigh, NC. This article originally appeared in their church newsletter, First Foundations.