This morning I attended the Immigrant Justice prayer vigil of which I’ve written several times before. It’s been taking place every Friday morning at 7:00 am at a local immigrant detention center to show solidarity with undocumented immigrants as they are in the process of being deported – and to protest the national shame that is our nation’s current immigration policy.

This vigil previously took place at the Broadview detention facility just west of Chicago, but for the past several months undocumented immigrants have been held and processed at the Federal Building on 101 W. Congress Parkway. If you live in or around Chicago, I encourage you to join us.

Though the vigil was originally established by Catholic activists and featured the recitation of the rosary, it has long included attendees of many faiths. Just recently the first Friday of every month has been formally designated to be an interfaith ceremony. Today’s service included Christian, Muslim and Jewish participants – truly an inspiring show of prayerful solidarity.

Some years ago, I wrote and delivered a prayer specifically for this vigil.  JRC member Gonzalo Escobar recently translated it into Spanish and this morning we read a bilingual version of it together. I’ve included it below, along with other powerful prayers that were recited during our ceremony.

Again, if you live in the area, please join us on Friday mornings at 101 W. Congress and help us raise a prayerful voice all the way to Washington…

Prayer for a Vigil at a Detention Center (translated by Gonzalo Escobar):

Espíritu de Todo lo que Vive:

Ayúdanos. Ayúdanos a defender los valores que son tan importantes para lo que somos: seres humanos creados a imagen de Dios. Ayúdanos a encontrar la compasión en nuestros corazones y la justicia en nuestros actos para todos los que buscan la libertad y una mejor vida. Pueda que encontremos la fuerza para proteger y defender la causa del forastero (extranjero) entre nosotros, para asegurar un trato justo para todos los que habitan en nuestra tierra.

Guíanos. Guíanos hacia una ley. Una justicia. Una de las normas de comportamiento humano para con todos. Aléjanos de la ambigüedad que hace honor a la imagen divina en algunos, pero no en otros. Deja que nosotros siempre testifiquemos que la justicia que pretendemos apreciar no es más que una farsa si no defendemos la dignidad humana básica para todos los que moran entre nosotros.

Perdónanos. Perdónanos por la forma inhumana en que con demasiada frecuencia tratamos a los demás. Sabemos, o deberíamos saber, que cuando se trata de crímenes contra la humanidad, algunos de nosotros podríamos ser culpables, pero todos somos responsables. Concédenos el perdón de los delitos de exclusión que siempre cometemos contra los miembros más vulnerables de la sociedad: los no deseados, los desamparados, los no asegurados, los indocumentados.

Danos fuerza. Danos fuerza para encontrar los medios para hacer brillar tu luz en los lugares oscuros de nuestro mundo. Danos la capacidad de descubrir a los que están ocultos a la vista, encerrados y olvidados. No olvidemos jamás que no hay nada oculto y nadie se ha perdido delante de ti. Fortalécenos con el conocimiento de que no hay ni una sola alma humana que sea desechable o reemplazable, que no podemos nunca, por mucho que tratemos, quitarle la humanidad a nadie.

Recuérdanos. Recuérdanos nuestro deber de crear una sociedad justa, aquí y ahora, en nuestros días. Danos la visión del propósito de evitar la complacencia de lo cómodo – y la determinación de saber que no podemos postergar la causa de la justicia y la libertad por un día más. Recuérdanos que ahora es tiempo y el momento de crear tu reino en la tierra.

Que sea tu voluntad. Y para sea que la nuestra.

Y digamos,  Amén.

Intentions:

We pray for those women and men being deported today form all detention centers in the country, especially the ones leaving today from 101 W. Congress.

We pray for families who have experienced the devastation of raids and deportations

For the children who have lost parents;

For the husbands and wives who were left alone to take care of their families;

For all undocumented people who experience fear and live in a state of uncertainty.

We pray that all those connected with the Department of Homeland Security treat our immigrant brothers and sisters with respect. We pray for ICE, Immigration and Customs Enforcement, and the staff of all detention centers in our country.

We pray for leaders in our country and leaders of all faiths that we may work together with a common wisdom to stop deportations and work toward compassionate immigration policies.

We pray that your spirit of goodness and love be a more powerful witness than the spirit of fear, hatred, and discrimination expressed in anti-immigrant legislation in the country.

A Paraphrase of the Lord’s Prayer, modeled after one by Guatemalan theologian Julia Esquivel:

Our Father

Father also for the immigrants, the homeless and all the poor

Hallowed be Your Name

Hallowed more than any hero, idol or saint on earth

Your kingdom come

A Kingdom of justice, peace and equality, without borders, visas or deportees

Your will be done in earth as it is in heaven

When all this will be tolerant of each other and all would welcome the strangers

Give us this day our daily bread

A bread of kindness and mercy, a bread of friendship, humility and generous spirit

And forgive us us our debts as we forgive our debtors

When no longer we would think of ourselves and allow others to be the first in line

And lead us not into temptation but deliver us from evil

Help us to remain strong in our convictions, help us to clean our minds of evil thoughts

All: For Yours is the kingdom and the glory and the power forever, Amen.

Some great Shavuot satire from the Israel Religious Action Center. (h/t Elaine Waxman)

This week we celebrate Shavuot, the holiday on which we read the Book of Ruth. The following is a simulated correspondence between IRAC and the Ministry of Interior if the Biblical Ruth, the great-grandmother of King David and Judaism’s first convert, were to be seeking legal status in Israel today. Chag Sameach!

Attn:
Mr. Eli Yishai*
Minister of Interior
Kaplan 2
Jerusalem

Dear Sir,

Re: Ruth the Moabite – Request to Obtain Permanent Status in Israel

Our client, Ruth the Moabite, is the non-Jewish widow of a Jewish husband, Chilion son of Elimelech. Her husband passed away outside of Israel, in Moab, and is buried there. My client entered Israel legally with her Jewish mother-in-law, Naomi, who was also widowed while abroad.

The following is a declaration of our client, Ruth the Moabite, regarding her strong link to the Jewish people: “Where you lodge, I shall lodge; thy people shall be my people, and thy God my God. Where you die will I die, and there will I be buried” (Ruth 1:16-17).

In addition, you may find attached the appeal of Mr. Boaz son of Salmah, an Israeli citizen, who participates in this request for Ruth the Moabite’s permanent status in Israel with his intention to marry my client.

I ask that you grant our client status in Israel by virtue of her prior marriage to a Jewish man.

With respect,

Anat Hoffman, Executive Director
The Israel Religious Action Center
The Israel Movement for Progressive Judaism

*Yishai (Jesse)—Biblical name of the father of King David and grandson of Ruth the Moabite.

Attn:
Anat Hoffman
The Israel Religious Action Center
Jerusalem

Dear Ms. Hoffman,

Re: Ruth the Moabite

Your request was received by our offices and has been reviewed by our staff at the Ministry of Interior. The request is rejected due to the absence of essential documents needed for the Ministry’s procedures regarding these matters:

The Moabite woman is required to present a marriage certificate when requesting verification, as the marriage was performed abroad.

A death certificate of the deceased Jew signed by a recognized Chevra Kadisha must be presented.

Your client’s declaration of her link to Judaism is not acceptable as a conversion. In the absence of a conversion certificate, she is registered as a Moabite, not a Jew.

In reference to your client’s declaration: “Where you die will I die, and there will I be buried.” This statement cannot be used to seek approval from the Burial Council.

Your client is attempting any and all potential methods to legitimize her being in Israel, first through her claim that she is a widow to a Jewish husband and now through her new claim that she is the partner of Boaz son of Salmah.

In light of the above, we ask that the Moabite woman exit from Israel within 30 days from the receipt of your initial request in order to arrange her documents from abroad. As such, she can present herself at the Israeli Embassy in Moab to submit all of the required documents that meet the specified criteria for obtaining residency status in Israel.

The position of the Minister is that one must regret the situation in which a respected Jewish citizen of such high status, such as Boaz son of Salmah, requests to marry a non-Jewish woman. Do we lack proper women here in Israel? It is necessary and advisable to take into account the status of the expected children from such a union.

With respect,

Dr. Shuki Amrani
Director-General
Interior Ministry

The LA Times reports:

Israel moved Sunday to deport the offspring of hundreds of migrant workers, mostly small children who were born in Israel, speak Hebrew and have never seen their parents’ native countries.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said the new policy was intended to stem a flood of illegal immigrants, whose children receive state-funded education and healthcare benefits, and to defend Israel’s Jewish identity.

“On the one hand, this problem is a humanitarian problem,” Netanyahu said during a meeting Sunday of the Cabinet, which had debated the move for nearly a year. “We all feel and understand the hearts of children. But on the other hand, there are Zionist considerations and ensuring the Jewish character of the state of Israel.”

My two cents:

In many ways, this story is reminiscent of the immigration policy debate here in the US. (I encourage you to learn about and support “The Dream Act” which has been considered by Congress in one form or another since 2001 but shamefully, has yet to be signed into law).

Still, there are important differences between the American and the Israeli situations.  Perhaps most critically, although Netanyahu cites concern over illegal immigration, Israel is moving to deport children of immigrants who entered the country legally.

As the article points out, Israel began allowing Chinese, Thai, Filipino and other workers into the country in the 1990′s to replace Palestinians as a source of cheap labor in the wake of the First and Second Intifadas. Today there are 250,000 to 400,000 foreign workers in Israel – but now that they have (quite naturally) begun having families of their own, Israel is growing increasingly concerned over the “demographic makeup” of the Jewish state.

To be sure, every nation has the right/responsibility to regulate its own residency and citizenship laws. Nonetheless, the criteria it uses to maintain these regulations is crucial. And this raises another important difference between the American and Israeli immigration policy debates. Here in America, no one but the most abject racist would openly suggest it is appropriate to cite the religious/ethnic identity of immigrants when considering their children’s legal status.

In this regard, Netanyahu’s comment – framing it as a choice between humanitarianism and Zionism – in profoundly telling. Is this indeed Israel’s ultimate choice? And if so, which will it ultimately choose?

Bravo to Rotem Ilan, chairwoman of an Israeli advocacy group for migrant workers’ families, who is quoted in the article thus:

It’s the deportation of children that threatens Israel’s Jewish character. The obligation to act with kindness and compassion to foreigners is the most frequently repeated commandment in the Torah.

If you are looking for ways to translate your outrage over Arizona’s anti-immigrant law into action, here is a list of companies based in Arizona that you should consider boycotting.  Some prominent examples include:

- Arizona Diamondbacks, Location: Phoenix, Arizona

- Best Western International, Inc., Headquarters: Phoenix, Arizona

- Cold Stone Creamery. Headquarters: Scottsdale, Arizona

- Grand Canyon

- P. F. Chang’s China Bistro. Headquarters: Phoenix, Arizona

- PetSmart. Headquarters: Phoenix, Arizona

- Sky Mall, Headquarters: Phoenix, Arizona

- U-Haul. Headquarters: Phoenix, Arizona

- US Airways. Headquarters: Tempe, Arizona

Click here to send a strongly worded message to Arizona Governor Jan Brewer. Click here to read a letter signed by 90 prominent organizations and individuals in the American Jewish community that was delivered this morning to congressional leaders.  And if you live my home state, I encourage you to check out the Illinois Coalition for Immigrant and Refugee Rights website for more information and action opportunities.

While the American Jewish conversation on Israel-Palestine is filled with horrid and divisive rhetoric, it is heartening to read that a wide and diverse array of Jewish organizations have spoken out decisvely against the new Arizona anti-immigrant law:

The new law has been criticized by an array of Jewish groups, including the Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society, Anti-Defamation League, American Jewish Committee, Simon Wiesenthal Center, National Council of Jewish Women and the Jewish Council for Public Affairs, a public policy umbrella group comprised of the synagogue movements, several national groups and scores of local Jewish communities across North America.

Gideon Aronoff, the president and CEO of the Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society, who supports legislation like Schakowsky’s and that of Sen. Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.), said he is working actively with other Jewish organizations to draft a broad statement condemning the federal government’s failure to enact comprehensive reform. HIAS also is coordinating with its partners in Arizona and anticipates that rallies, the filing of amicus briefs and other actions may be warranted in the near future.

The Passover 2010 seder supplements are arriving fast and furious. In my last post I shared my JVP supplement – here are a few more you can download and use to spice up your seder meal:

- The “Moral Voices” initiative of Penn Hillel has published “From Chains to Change” – a supplement that connects the lessons of Pesach to the contemporary scourge of human trafficking;

- Workingman’s Circle’s “10 Modern Plagues” demonstrates how our contemporary bounty is diminished by the suffering of others;

- J Street’s supplement asks “Four More Questions” about the prospects for the peace process in the coming year;

- Tikkun Magazine’s supplement, thoughtful as ever, is so verbose that it could be its own haggadah…

- The new supplement created by American Jewish World Service focuses on disaster relief:  “Dayenu: Supporting the Long Journey from Disaster to Recovery;”

- Jewish Funds for Justice highlights immigration reform with “For We Were Strangers;”

- A print-out placemat from Mazon asks a 5th question: “Why On This Night are Millions of People Going Hungry?”

A zissen Pesach – all the best for a sweet and liberating Passover…

Brazil has set aside a day to honor Jewish immigrants to the country.

Brazilian Vice President Jose Alencar signed a measure setting March 18 as Jewish Immigration Day. The date coincides with the re-inauguration date in 2002 of the Brazilian synagogue Kahal Zur Israel, the oldest synagogue in the Americas.

“It was not easy to choose a date among many that represent the influence and the contribution of the Jewish community to the development of our country,” said Marcelo Itagiba, the Jewish congressman who had proposed the bill…

Brazil has some 120,000 Jews, the second largest Jewish population in Latin America after Argentina.

After reading the news I did a quick survey of Brazilian Jewish history and discovered that there have been Jews in Brazil since after the Spanish Inquisition. Moroccan Jews immigrated in the 19th century and, of course, European Jews arrived during and after the Shoah. As this latest news indicates, the Brazilian Jewish community clearly continues to thrive into the 21st century.

If you’d like to celebrate, JDub records has helpfully provided some choice jams from the contemporary Brazilian music scene in honor of this news. Parabéns!

How do we discover the true meaning of spiritual commitment in our lives? Perhaps the first step is simply taking a closer look at our lives themselves. Maybe, just maybe, the source of our emunah is much closer than we think.  On Rosh Hashanah we say in our liturgy “Hayom Harat Olam” – on this day the world is born.  Your entire life has been leading up to this moment. Take the time to look back. What has led you here to this place tonight? Who are the people who have helped to guide you on your journey? What are the memories and experiences that you continue to hold sacred? And, finally, how will you transform them into faithful action? How will you commit to them honor them in the coming year and the years after that?

Click below for the entire sermon:

Every Friday morning, in the Broadview neighborhood on the west side of Chicago, a group of nuns gathers in front of an Immigration detention center.  It’s an unremarkable brick building – nothing about it would tip you off to its actual purpose. The Broadview center is the last stop for undocumented immigrants. This is where they receive their final processing before they are sent to O’Hare airport to be deported.

Friday is deportation day.  And so every Friday, the Sisters of Mercy come to the facility. They begin to arrive at about 6:45 or so.  As they arrive, they congregate with others on the sidewalk in front of the center. At 7:15 sharp they take out their beads and begin leading the assembled in the rosary. At least once during their vigil, a large barbed wire-topped gate will roll open and a bus will pull away from the center.  As this happens, the Sisters pause in their prayers, look up, and wave with a smile to the passengers inside.

The Sisters of Mercy gather at Broadview every week without fail. It doesn’t matter if the rain is pouring down, if there’s a blizzard, if the wind is whipping in off the lake. Every Friday morning at 7:15, this is where they can be found.

It seems to me they do it for several reasons. They do it because they want to convey to these prisoners, most of whom are being separated from their families, to know that they are not forgotten. They do it to voice their prayerful protest against our nation’s broken and unjust immigration policy. Mainly, though, I think they do it because they don’t believe that they have a choice.

From time to time, I’ll join the Sisters in their prayer vigil – often bringing several JRC members along with me. But I will confess to you: there have been more than a few Friday mornings in which I’ve had every good intention of going, but just couldn’t quite pull myself past the snooze alarm. Yes, it’s true: there have been times in which the prospect of an extra forty minutes in my cozy bed actually trumped driving to the West Side to stand in the freezing rain with the Sisters of Mercy.

Now don’t get scared. My Rosh Hashanah message this year is not that we should all leave at the end of services tonight and join a nunnery.  However, I am interested in what is takes to demonstrate this level of faith. I’d like to explore the unique kind of faithfulness that is modeled by people such as the Sisters of Mercy. I want to examine the meaning – and the challenges – of spiritual commitment. And most importantly, this Rosh Hashanah, I’d like to ask if this level of faith something we might aspire to together.

I’d like to start by taking a closer look at the word “faith” itself. What are we actually talking about when we speak of our faith?  Does it merely refer to our denominational affiliation and nothing more? Is faith about the official tenets of organized religion? Is it only about what we believe – or is faith something else entirely?

I would personally argue that faith has less to do with religious belief than it does with how our beliefs inform our commitment. After all, when we say that someone did something “faithfully” (or “religiously”), we mean that it was done in a regular, dependable manner. If we say that someone is being “faithful” to his/her spouse, we’re talking about the active upholding of a marital commitment.

I would suggest that being religiously faithful is not about signing on to a set of religious beliefs. Religious dogma may differ from tradition to tradition, but true religiosity, it seems to me, is universal. It resides not in faith, but faithfulness. It’s less about what we believe than how we act upon our beliefs. In the end, I think, living lives of faith means making and following through on the most essential commitments in our lives.  It means having the willingness to devote our lives to spiritual values that are greater than ourselves.

Jewish tradition, as you might expect, has a great deal to say about faithfulness. The Hebrew word for faith is “emunah.”  Many scholars, however, have pointed out that a more appropriate translation of this word isn’t “faith” but “trust” or “trustworthiness.”

There are, for instance, numerous Biblical examples in which God is held up as a paragon of emunah – instances in which God demonstrates God’s commitment to us.  It also abounds in our liturgy. In the Modeh Ani, for instance, the traditional prayer that we say every morning as we awake, we end with the words, “rabbah emunatecha” – “how great is your emunah.”  Whenever we say this prayer, we make a daily acknowledgement about God’s faithfulness to us and to the world.  In other words, as we awaken each and every morning, we thankfully affirm the divine rhythm that dependably rouses us to new life.

There are also descriptions in the Torah of human emunah – human faithfulness toward God.  Abraham, in particular, is typically held up as a paragon of faith.  As you may remember, when we first meet Abraham, he demonstrates his emunah by following God’s instructions to leave his family home and head out to parts unknown with nothing but the promise of future blessing.

We often laud Abraham for his unshakable belief in God – and particularly for his recognition that there was only one God in the universe.  However, I would claim it goes even deeper than this. I would say that Abraham’s greatness doesn’t come from passive belief, but from his willingness to transform his faith into action. To put his trust and allegiance in something beyond himself, beyond his family, beyond anything he could see or hear or touch or feel. Something truly transcendent.

It is this very same challenge that is laid before us every Rosh Hashanah.  So as we gather to greet another year together, let’s give ourselves the space, the permission to explore these questions honestly and openly. What is going to get us out of our cozy beds at 6:00 in the morning?  What are the values, what is the purpose to which we are prepared to be faithful no matter what?  What are the commitments that we have no choice but to commit to? And perhaps most important: where will we find the strength to follow through on them?

There are, of course, no simple answers to questions like these – but I’d like to make a few practical suggestions that might help us get started.  One thing that occurs to me is that our faith often seems to be connected to our own life’s journeys in ways we don’t often fully understand.  Think about it for a moment. As you look back over the course of your own lifes, doesn’t it often seem as if it was just one simple experience: an interaction, a meaningful relationship, a chance encounter, that gave you a sudden sense of purpose – maybe without you even realizing it at the time?

Of course many of us don’t have to look too far to discover such moments. Some of these turning points are patently – or even painfully – obvious. Too often, these turning points are the result of crisis or loss.  I’m sure we all know of numerous instances in which individuals were able to find meaning in their own personal tragedy by transforming it into a commitment to a higher purpose.

It’s certainly not something we would wish on ourselves, but I do believe that if there can be any meaning at all in the tragedies that befall us, it is in the way our pain can make us more faithful people – the challenges in our lives can commit us that much more deeply to making a difference in our world and in the lives of those around us.

No, at the end of the day, I don’t believe that our faith is a product of conscious choice. More often than not, I think faithfulness is something that finds its way to us. The sources of our devotion seem to be indelibly wrapped up in the places from which we come, the families to which we are born, the people we are fated to meet, the seemingly random occurrences that befall us along the way.

How do we discover the true meaning of spiritual commitment in our lives? Perhaps the first step is simply taking a closer look at our lives themselves. Maybe, just maybe, the source of our emunah is much closer than we think.  On Rosh Hashanah we say in our liturgy “Hayom Harat Olam” – on this day the world is born.  Your entire life has been leading up to this moment. Take the time to look back. What has led you here to this place tonight? Who are the people who have helped to guide you on your journey? What are the memories and experiences that you continue to hold sacred? And, finally, how will you transform them into faithful action? How will you commit to them honor them in the coming year and the years after that?

Tomorrow is the only time of the year in which we will be asked to proclaim our ultimate faithfulness. At the end of the service will come our acknowledgement of Malchuyot: God’s sovereignty over the Universe. This is the moment in which we are commanded to literally get down upon our knees, and show our faith in a Power that exists far beyond our own. This is the challenge we will present to ourselves: Where do our ultimate loyalties lay? To what higher purpose will we be faithful?

I truly believe you don’t have to live in a nunnery or be an Abraham or a Sarah to aspire to this level of faith. Rosh Hashanah comes every year to remind us that we all carry this potential within ourselves.  We just need to remember the things in life that are truly worthy of our loyalties.  To hold tight to what makes a difference in our lives; to what ultimately matters in our world.

But Rosh Hashanah offers us the reminder – the rest will be up to us. It will be up to us to drag ourselves out of bed when we’d rather just hit the snooze. Or, to go forth into an unknown future when it would be much more comfortable to stay home with everything we already know.

Hayom Harat Olam. Today the world is reborn. Let us greet it with faith and renewed commitment. And may we give one another the strength to remain true to all that is good and right and enduring in our world.

Amen.

Yesterday marked the one year anniversary of the ICE raid on the Agriprocessors plant in Postville, IA – at the time the largest immigration raid in US history.  Here in Chicago, I was honored gather with the Jewish Council on Urban Affairs and other orgs for an interfaith rally at Federal Plaza. It offered an important opportunity to remember this infamous milestone and to help keep immigration reform/worker justice alive on the national radar.

Our gathering offered prayers, updates and testimonies, after which we marched several blocks to ICE headquarters where each name of the 389 arrested Agriprocessor employees was read aloud (below). It was a powerful moment of bearing witness – a reminder that our advocacy of immigration reform represents a fight for the real individuals, real lives, real families.

After all the names were read, we delivered a letter to Feds that demanded an end to unjust raids, detention and deportations. Following the rally, several members of our delegation traveled to Postville to mark the anniversary with a gathering at St. Bridget’s Church and the Agriprocessors plant. (Click here to donate to help support the residents of this devastated community.)

Though the Obama administration supports reform, there are any number of obstacles that might prevent immigration legislation from making it to a vote in Congress in 2009. Passage of the newly reintroduced DREAM Act would certainly be a great start (it’s currently eight votes short). Click here to offer your support.

You need to read this new Amnesty International report on immigrant detention in our country. Even those who have some knowledge about this national shame will be jolted by AI’s findings:

- Tens of thousands of people languish in U.S. immigration detention facilities every year — including a number of U.S. citizens — without receiving a hearing to determine whether their detention is warranted.

- Hundreds of millions of taxpayer dollars are being used to hold these people for months—sometimes years—in detention. The people detained include lawful permanent residents, undocumented immigrants, asylum seekers and survivors of torture and human trafficking.

- Oversight and accountability is almost nonexistent and individuals in detention often lack treatment for their medical needs. 74 people have died while in immigration detention over the past five years.

If you’re looking for a healthy way to channel your rage after reading the report, you can send this letter to Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano,  urging her to find meaningful alternatives to detention and ensure that conditions in detention are “humane and meet international standards.”

(…and then while you’re inspired to help change our deeply broken immigration system, send this letter to your congressperson and urge him/her to help pass the Dream Act in 2009. )