So, I think I am going to be a bit lazy right now and just repost a blog that I just sent to the General Commission on Race and Religion about what we have been up to in regards to our work on immigration. Some of it (like my name) is slightly redundant, but always good to have a reminder, eh? So here goes.
I, Marjorie Hurder, am a US-2 Young Adult Missionary with the General Board of Global Ministries of the United Methodist Church at Crossroads Urban Center, a National Mission Institution in Salt Lake City. Part of my job is working in the food pantry and meeting all sorts of people from all sorts of places and providing them with the basics of food, some hygiene items, bus passes and the like. We help everyone from senior citizens on fixed incomes to homeless people on no income to families of ten struggling to get by from paycheck to paycheck. We also work on issues of social justice, such as immigration.
This past December, we joined with churches in the downtown Salt Lake City area to celebrate Las Posadas, the commemoration of the Holy Family’s search for room at the inn. In the brisk weather, we processed around downtown Salt Lake City reenacting Mary and Joseph’s search for room at the inn, cantankerous donkey included. While on our brief journey, we recalled Mary and Joseph’s being turned away from shelter, and in so doing, remembered those in our community, such as undocumented immigrants or the homeless population, who search for shelter but who are turned away.
We used this event to kick-start the “Drop the I Word” campaign here in Utah. We brought this discussion to Utah as a response to divisive and derogatory discourse by political candidates who went as far as to call children of immigrants born in the United States “anchor babies” as if having children was some sort of covert strategy to avoid being deported.
We continued our push towards the elimination of such dehumanizing language by encouraging boards and church councils in the area to consider the pledge to Drop the I Word. So far, the boards at Crossroads Urban Center and First United Methodist Church in Salt Lake City have signed on.
This prompted the Salt Lake Tribune to start a discussion of their policies of how to refer to undocumented immigrants, starting with this article http://www.sltrib.com/sltrib/politics/53756205-90/alien-church-correct-illegal.html.csp about First United Methodist in Salt Lake City’s pledge to Drop the I-word. They also interviewed those who believe that illegal immigrant or illegal alien are the legally correct terms for someone who is undocumented (even if said person has not been proven to be here through unauthorized means). A group of advocates from Crossroads Urban Center, the ACLU, and the Catholic Diocese met with the editorial board to discuss their newsroom policy. They said that they follow the Associated Press style guide and wanted to be accurate in who they deemed “illegal” versus “undocumented”.
I think we need to have more of these sorts of conversations about language and how the words we use affect other people. We might not like the responses that we get. For instance, in the comments section of the article in the Tribune about First United Methodist’s stance, there were some vitriolic comments about immigration and the language I saw was appalling. But there were also those who applauded First United Methodist Salt Lake and were glad to see that people were taking a stand.
The Drop the I Word message got a more enthusiastic response this past Saturday at the Utah Sub-District Meeting of the United Methodist Churches in the area. There was also a presentation about starting a Justice for our Neighbors clinic here in Salt Lake City to work with our neighbors who need help navigating the profusion of immigration law. This is, of course, only the beginning of creating a more welcoming Salt Lake City for all of our neighbors, but it is a beginning nonetheless. Hopefully this conversation will continue to evolve into positive action. I pray that some day, the difficult conversations we need to have about immigration can happen without either side throwing stones at each other.
Marjorie's Mission Montage 