Religious groups rally in Oakland to support immigration reform

About two dozen people, some with the phrase, “Stand Up! Fight Back!” emblazoned on their shirts, gathered outside an Oakland church to protest the halt of immigration reform and what they deem to be the mistreatment of Hispanic immigrants in the United States.

The demonstrators met at noon Friday outside the Community of Reconciliation Church, located on North Bellefield Street, to take part in nationwide protests that were held Friday and Saturday.

The protesters represented a range of ages, religions and racial backgrounds. They convened in honor of what was referred to as the “National Day for Dignity and Respect.” In observance of this event, which took place Friday, members of labor organizations, immigrant communities and faith-based organizations across the country demonstrated and called attention to the challenges that immigrants must overcome in order to become and remain American citizens.

The Pennsylvania Interfaith Impact Network, comprised of organizations active in southwestern Pennsylvania, organized the event.

Sarah Regenspan, an organizer for the network, said that the legal status of immigrants can break families apart.

“It’s very scary for people to live here and not know if a family member could be picked up by [U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement] tomorrow and be put into deportation proceedings, or even transferred from one jail to another without them knowing,” she said.

The protest came less than 48 hours after Rep. Joe Garcia, D-Fla., introduced a bill aimed to make the first steps toward comprehensive immigration reform. Members of the audience cheered “Pass the bill!” each time a speaker mentioned it.

“It’s a very painful process when a family gets torn apart,” said Regenspan. “And we’re just here to say that we’re not going to back down until this bill gets passed.”

Several prominent members of Pittsburgh’s religious communities, including Sister Betty Sundry of the Sisters of Divine Providence, Rabbi Ron Symons of Temple Sinai and Rev. Linda Theophilus of the Emmanuel Lutheran Church, gave provocative speeches in which they criticized the government over what they saw as its inaction on immigration reform.

Some speakers quoted famous people, religious and secular, such as Pope Francis and Abraham Lincoln. Others introduced guest speakers who have had family members taken away and threatened with deportation, and all said they supported a change in the immigration policies of the United States.

Theophilus said in a speech that judges in the United States make no allowances for permanent and legal residents when trying Hispanic immigrants. She said that even in the case of veterans or those who moved to America as young children, a minor charge can lead to arrest or deportation.

Symons had a more positive outlook on the situation. 

“Jews understand that going way back when, all the way to the Old Testament, that caring for the stranger is one of the most important things that we have to do,” he said.

According to Symons, the Torah tells its readers to “love the stranger” more than 36 times. He reminded them, “for you were strangers in the land of Egypt.” 

This observation led to enthusiastic applause from the crowd. His talk ended with a brief prayer, for which those gathered bowed their heads.

Regenspan said after the speakers finished that she hoped the shutdown of the federal government would not interfere with the passage of immigration reform.

“We have so many people in the faith community that have been working so hard for so many years to get comprehensive immigration reform to come in the form of a real bill, and so we just can’t let all of that hard work be sidelined now with all of the shenanigans going on in Congress,” Regenspan said. 

Sister Janice Vanderneck, the director of Casa San Jose, a religious aid center that she opened over the summer that assists Latino immigrants in Pittsburgh, motioned to a group of parents and children in the protest group.

“You see several families there,” Vanderneck said. “Those are the families that suffer from the lack of immigration reform.”