Religious Leaders Raise Their Voices in the Immigration Debates

April 11, 2006

Source: Beliefnet

Wire Service: RNS

http://www.beliefnet.com/story/189/story_18941_1.html

On April 11, 2006 Religion News Service reported, "As hundreds of thousands of people flooded the nation's cities Monday (April 10) demonstrating for immigrants' rights, religious leaders rallied at their side. On the Mall in Washington, with the Capitol behind him, Cardinal Theodore E. McCarrick prayed in Spanish and English for the tens of thousands of predominantly Hispanic immigrants standing before him waving American flags... The Catholic cardinal was followed by Lutheran, Jewish, Methodist, Muslim and Baptist leaders -- many speaking a bit of Spanish, all of them asserting immigrants' rights to stay in the United States... A diverse religious presence was obvious at other rallies [held on the same issue] across the country... The outpouring of protest is aimed primarily at a U.S. House bill that could make illegal immigrants, or anyone assisting them, felons. The immigration reform debate has stalled in the Senate. Not all religious leaders and institutions are united in decrying the House bill. The Christian Coalition, for instance, supports the principles of the House bill, although the group is skeptical that it will pass into law."