Commentary
COMMENTARY: Don’t All Deserve to be Welcomed and Fed?
THE AFRO — Today, we are witnessing an increased level of inhospitality towards those who have sought to find welcome in the U.S. For example, CNN reported that President Trump has introduced an immigration proposal that addresses border security and moves toward a merit-based immigration system, which gives preference to highly skilled and educated individuals. Prioritizing those who are skilled and educated leaves people who are impoverished and marginalized to fend for themselves – counter to the biblical principle of hospitality.
“When a stranger sojourns with you in your land, you shall not do him wrong. You shall treat the stranger who sojourns with you as the native among you, and you shall love him as yourself, for you were strangers in the land of Egypt: I am the Lord your God (Leviticus 19: 33-34).”
These welcoming words from the Old Testament and later in the New Testament in Hebrews 13:1-2, Matthew 25:35, Romans 15:7, and 1 Peter 4:9 remind us that hospitality to strangers is an important way we live out our faith. These Old and New Testament proposals were considered radical in the days Jesus exercised the holy gift of hospitality. The same was true of the Hebrew people in the Old Testament.
The United States has also created policies that have mirrored these biblical principles of hospitality. In the Bread for the World Pan African devotional guide “Lament and Hope,” this month’s devotional focuses on how immigrants were welcomed in the U.S. The devotional writer, Mr. Derick Dailey, quotes Drs. Charles Hirschman and Elizabeth Hogsford from the abstract of their paper “Immigration and the American Industrial Revolution From 1880 to 1920:”
“The size and selectivity of the immigrant community, as well as their disproportionate residence in large cities, meant they were the mainstay of the American industrial workforce. Immigrants and their children comprised over half of manufacturing workers in 1920, and if the third generation (the grandchildren of immigrants) are included, then more than two-thirds of workers in the manufacturing sector were of recent immigrant stock.”
Mr. Daily goes on to note, “It is in this context that Congress passed, and President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed, The Social Security Act of 1935. The legislation codified many government initiatives that protected immigrants and others who were already in the United States.”
At the same time, such welcome was not equitably implemented with people of African descent. Although 1935 was after the enslavement period, the vestiges of this period and Jim Crow laws that followed showed hospitality towards people of African descent was not equitably applied by this new law. The devotional points out many of them were either farm or domestic workers and therefore were excluded from being eligible for social security. Many also were unemployed or paid less than White workers.
Today, we are witnessing an increased level of inhospitality towards those who have sought to find welcome in the U.S. For example, CNN reported that President Trump has introduced an immigration proposal that addresses border security and moves toward a merit-based immigration system, which gives preference to highly skilled and educated individuals. Prioritizing those who are skilled and educated leaves people who are impoverished and marginalized to fend for themselves – counter to the biblical principle of hospitality.
This also contradicts a counter history of the U.S. that has welcomed certain newcomers to the U.S. Isn’t it time to do this again? Many of those who were immigrants in 1935 became leaders in our country. Being hospitable is a good exercise of faith that builds communities and nations. May we advocate for all to be welcomed and fed.
Angelique Walker-Smith is senior associate for Pan African and Orthodox Church Engagement at Bread for the World.
The opinions on this page are those of the writers and not necessarily those of the AFRO.
Send letters to The Afro-American • 1531 S. Edgewood St. Baltimore, MD 21227 or fax to 1-877-570-9297 or e-mail to editor@afro.com.
This article originally appeared in The Afro.
Activism
Oakland Post: Week of April 24 – 30, 2024
The printed Weekly Edition of the Oakland Post: Week of April 24 – 30, 2024
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Activism
Oakland Post: Week of April 17 – 23, 2024
The printed Weekly Edition of the Oakland Post: Week of April 17 – 23, 2024
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Commentary
Opinion: Surviving the Earthquake, an Eclipse and “Emil Amok.”
Last Friday, a 4.8 magnitude earthquake shook New York City, reported as the “biggest earthquake with an epicenter in the NYC area since 1884” when a 5.2 quake hit. A bit bigger. The last quake similar to Friday’s was a 4.9 in 1783.Alexander Hamilton felt it — 241 years ago. That’s why New Yorkers were freaking out on Friday. They were in the room where it happens.
By Emil Guillermo
I’m a Northern Californian in New York City for the next few weeks, doing my one-man show, “Emil Amok, Lost NPR Host, Wiley Filipino, Vegan Transdad.”
I must like performing in the wake of Mother Nature.
Last Friday, a 4.8 magnitude earthquake shook New York City, reported as the “biggest earthquake with an epicenter in the NYC area since 1884” when a 5.2 quake hit. A bit bigger. The last quake similar to Friday’s was a 4.9 in 1783.
Alexander Hamilton felt it — 241 years ago.
That’s why New Yorkers were freaking out on Friday. They were in the room where it happens.
And it just doesn’t happen that often.
Beyonce singing country music happens more frequently.
When I felt New York shake last week, it reminded me of a time in a San Francisco TV newsroom when editors fretted about a lack of news an hour before showtime.
Then the office carpeting moved for a good ten seconds, and the news gods gave us our lead story.
On Friday when it happened in NYC, I noticed the lines in the carpeting in my room wiggling. But I thought it was from a raucous hotel worker vacuuming nearby.
I didn’t even think earthquake. In New York?
I just went about my business as if nothing had happened. After living near fault lines all my life, I was taking things for granted.
Considering the age of structures in New York, I should have been even more concerned about falling objects inside (shelves, stuff on walls) and outside buildings (signs, scaffolding), fire hazards from possible gas leaks, and then I should have looked for others on my floor and in the hotel lobby to confirm or aid or tell stories.
Of course, as a Californian who has lived through and covered quakes in the 4 to 6 magnitude range, I tried to calm down any traumatized New Yorker I encountered by taking full responsibility for bringing in the quake from the Bay Area.
I reassured them things would be all right, and then let them know that 4.8s are nothing.
And then I invited them to my consoling post-Earthquake performance of “Emil Amok, Lost NPR Host…”
It was the night of the eclipse.
ECLIPSING THE ECLIPSE
In New York City, the eclipse was about 90 percent visible. Good enough for me. Though a full solar eclipse is a celestial rarity, blockages of any sort aren’t generally celebrated. My one-man play is about growing up with the eclipsed history of American Filipinos and how I struggle to unblock all that.
For example, did you know the first Filipinos actually arrived to what is now California in 1587? That’s 33 years before the Pilgrims arrived in America on the other coast, but few know the Filipino history which has been totally eclipsed.
I was in Battery Park sitting on a bench and there was a sense of community as people all came to look up. A young woman sitting next to me had a filter for a cell phone camera. We began talking and she let me use it. That filter enabled me to take a picture of the main event with my iPhone.
For helping me see, I invited her and her boyfriend to come see my show.
Coincidentally, she was from Plymouth, Massachusetts, near the rock that says the year the Pilgrims landed in 1620.
In my show she learned the truth. The Pilgrims were second.
History unblocked. But it took a solar eclipse.
Next one in 2044? We have a lot more unblocking to do.
If you’re in New York come see my show, Sat. April 13th, 5:20 pm Eastern; Fri. April 19, 8:10 pm Eastern; and Sun. April 21st 5:20 pm Eastern.
You can also livestream the show. Get tickets at www.amok.com/tickets
About the Author
Emil Guillermo is a journalist and commentator. He does a mini-talk show on YouTube.com/@emilamok1. He wishes all his readers a Happy Easter!
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