Below is a response
to the recent zero-tolerance immigration policy which I have sent to congressional
and Senate leaders and news outlets.
**
There is no question
in the most basic ethical thinker sees a big problem with Trump’s
zero-tolerance policy rolled out last month by Attorney General Jeff Sessions
and Homeland Security Secretary K. Nielsen, and that it is a stark example of the
totalitarian style injustice. Sessions, a so-called “christian”, poorly (ignorantly?)
cited St Paul in one of the most misunderstood sections of his letter to the
Romans, missing the [ancient] contextual meaning conveyed regarding the “law of
love”. It’s a shame we have fundamentalist
behavior in the Trump administration (e.g., based in fear, rigid interpretation,
the need of the law of one’s country to lend legitimacy to one’s religious
beliefs, belief (misinformed) trumps
action—this all makes it easy for those in authority to abuse).
What Session and others are unable to see (having no ears?) is,
if indeed they (Trump, Sessions, etc,) are part of an “authority . . . established
by God”, then they have a responsibility to be “servant[s] of God for your [our]
good”. Obviously this is not the case,
since the concept of Eastern “good” includes the spirit of hospitality and the universal
care of “the poor, the fatherless and
widows” contained in the ethical teaching of Judeo-Christian tradition. In
this case, they are allowing the opposite, separating children from their
parents. They should recall the classic parable of the “Good Samaritan.”
It is also important to note (if one is to use/follow St.
Paul’s teaching in the letter to the Romans) the whole book pivots on chanter
12, verses 1-2. It may do us all well to
recall that the time of St. Paul’s writing was a critical time (eschatological
time, meaning justice needs restored). So when the civic and governing authorities
go against one’s Christian, religious, or otherwise social ethic and
conscience, history teaches us to have public discussion, be informed, and if
necessary, take action that seeks to fulfill the law of love using the “weapons
of light.”
If anything, St. Paul’s letter puts the government on notice!
Furthermore, since Trump has been in office, it would seem that the US is becoming
demoted in terms of the lens of scriptural reasoning. They should beware.
