#61 Refugees

This week I think we need to talk about refugees. I realize that many of you may consider this a controversial topic. However, I don't think refugees should be controversial at all for Christians, at least when we think in broad terms. My goal in this post is to clearly explain why.

First, I want to focus specifically on refugees, not on immigration in general. A refugee, according to the United Nations, is a person who, "owing to a well-founded fear of being persecuted for reasons of race, religion, nationality, membership of a particular social group, or political opinion, is outside the country of his [or her] nationality and is unable to or, owing to such fear, is unwilling to avail himself [or herself] of the protection of that country." The U.N. estimates that there are 22.5 million refugees in the world today, and an additional 43 million people who have been forcibly displaced from their homes. (These additional people are still in their home countries.) As Christians we believe that every single human being is created in the image of God. God calls us to love our neighbors as ourselves, and Jesus makes it clear that God's definition of neighbor is broad enough to include everyone. So we must care for and care about refugees.

Second, there is a lot of misinformation and lies that are spread about refugees. We as Christians must speak the truth in love. So here is the truth. Under the U.S.'s current refugee screening system, refugees are not realistically a threat to the security of this nation. The Christian Reformed Church's Office of Social Justice says, "Refugees are the most intensely screened group of individuals to enter the United States. The U.S. resettlement process is the lengthiest and most robust in the world, taking from 18 months to three years and involving five governmental agencies with each case." You can read about the process here and here and here. The CATO Institute published an article two years ago that found that at that time, out of the 859,629 refugees the U.S. admitted since 2001, exactly 0 were convicted of murder. (For the sake of reference, that article notes that 1 in 22,541 Americans committed murder in 2014.) A 2016 CATO institute study concluded that between 1975 and 2015, the chance that a refugee would kill an American in a terrorist attack was 1 in 3,638,587,094 a year. And it makes sense that refugees wouldn't be a threat. If you waited years to find safety in a new country after fleeing from your own homeland, why in the world would you put that safety at risk by committing murder?

I'll try to wrap this up quickly. There are 22.5 million refugees without homes today, and the U.N. says the majority of these people are children. Refugees are fleeing for the lives, and many refugee camps and nearby countries are overwhelmed. I can't see how a loving, Christian response would not include supporting the resettlement of these well-screened refugees. I try to be careful as a pastor when it comes to politics. Here I feel the morals are clear: we should vote in favor of supporting as many refugees as we can. (By the way, when it comes to money, refugees only receive funding from the federal government for eight months. The Department of Health and Human Services says that over time refugees actually contribute more to our economy than they receive.) As part of the U.S.'s work in the United Nations, our government has agreed to take in refugees. We should urge our government to keep that promise. The government may decide not to do that. But we can still keep loving refugees. We can speak well about refugees and even advocate for them. We can work with organizations such as Bethany Christian Services to help settle refugees in the U.S. We can support organizations such as World Renew, which work to help refugees around the world. And finally, we can pray for refugees. We should never forget the suffering of our fellow human beings. We pray that God will bring safety, healing, and restoration soon.

Grace and peace,
BMH