Kudos to World Relief

Kudos to World Relief for welcoming refugees and to The Spokesman-Review for telling its story. It is important to understand the struggles that such newcomers have when they arrive in the United States, and the conditions they leave behind.

There is another group of immigrants in our community – the undocumented – that is largely ignored, yet when they are the focus of attention they are vilified, though the reasons they are here are the same as refugees. However, we choose to ignore that, separating immigrants like we do with all dispossessed people, into those deserving of our charity and those not. We correctly recognize the chaos that throws refugees into the migrant stream, yet ignore the fact that undocumented immigrants are likewise displaced by factors beyond their control; often the result of the economic and foreign policies of more powerful nations.

“In Christ there is no slave or free, Jew or Gentile,” St. Paul writes to the Galatians, yet we welcome some immigrants while returning others to unbearable, even life-threatening conditions.

Again, kudos to World Relief and The Spokesman-Review. If only all newcomers to the United States could be welcomed as warmly and have their stories told so well.

Gregory Cunningham

Spokane