Immigration conference speaker seeks Catholic response

In 2006, the Mexican woman faced deportation from her home in Chicago. Instead of helping her quietly, her Methodist church decided to house her and to do so publicly. She lived there for a year, but was eventually deported from Los Angeles where she was giving a talk. But activists learned from the experience that a person can find refuge in a church building.

They also learned that they could act in the face of government authority and social disapproval.

“Elvira inspired a model for communities of faith to bring justice,” said Juan Carlos Ruiz, a New York City-based leader in the movement. He will deliver the keynote talk at a conference, “Immigration, Sanctuary, Worlds without Borders,” in Albany, May 27-30.

The event is sponsored by the Justice Studies Association, an international restorative justice group, and hosted by the Albany New Sanctuary Movement (NSM).

The movement, with major chapters in New York, Los Angeles and Chicago, assists some of the estimated 12 million undocumented immigrants in the U.S. Since laws were tightened in 1996 and enforcement in-creased after 9/11, many face deportation, often for minor criminal violations or paperwork snafus.

Mr. Ruiz, 39, helped organize NSM in 2006. They incorporated lessons from previous immigration struggles and the Church’s long history of caring for the dispossessed.

“We were looking for ways to respond to the crisis of seeing our brothers and sisters persecuted and attacked by the immigration laws,” he said.

One successful method: “We tell the stories of people to humanize them to the non-immigrant community,” he said. “That way, we are not being victims but witnesses.”

Mr. Ruiz brings personal experience to the cause. He emigrated from Mexico at age 17 to visit his family temporarily but stayed. He eventually gained citizenship with help from a Catholic church and later became a priest, though he is now inactive.

“People of faith are seeking ways for that faith to be relevant in answering questions posed by a system that’s chewing up our people,” Mr. Ruiz said. “People of faith want to put into practice what it means to be human.”

Albany activists
A local NSM chapter coalesced in 1997, said one organizer, Fred Boehrer. He and his wife, Diana Conroy, run Emmaus House, the Albany Catholic Worker house, where the group is based. So far, the group has assisted more than 50 families.

“We [have] helped people gain legal status, lined up sponsors to help them stay, delayed deportation for some, and gotten others out of jail,” Mr. Boehrer explained.

It has a network of volunteers, attorneys and church partners including St. Helen’s in Niskayuna, Holy Family in Albany, the Albany Friends Meeting House, First Presbyter-ian and Westminster Presbyter-ian. They have trained 55 people to serve as paralegals for immigrants, said Mr. Boehrer.

Church ready
Catholics sympathize. In a national survey conducted for the U.S. bishops, 72 percent said the Church had a moral obligation to help immigrants regardless of their status and 69 percent favored allowing them to become citizens.

Mr. Ruiz appeals to those sentiments as well as basic economics. “Our borders are fluid for goods and capital, and we need to recognize that people have rights to the same mobility,” he said.

The conference will feature 40 to 50 speakers and workshops and organizers expect 200 activists, scholars and volunteers to attend. “It’s for anyone interested or engaged in helping immigrants,” said Mr. Boehrer. “People will learn practical lessons on helping immigrants get health care, housing, legal assistance.”

Mr. Ruiz said the conference and the entire movement should provoke Catholics and others to act.

“We need to wage peace whole-heartedly, since the forces that are arrayed against us are powerful.”