The photos of the men in the prison in El Salvador have been tormenting me for weeks. Men, forcibly shaved, stripped down to nothing, put into cells with bunk beds four stories high, with barely any elbow room, sharing breathing space with other men... I see those pictures and I wonder, what could they possibly have done to deserve this?
Is there anything they could have done to deserve this?
It has been well-documented by now that most of the men our country sent there were not, in fact, criminals of any kind. They had no criminal record, and many were even here with legal permission. They were basically kidnapped, nabbed off the street, racially profiled as Hispanic with tattoos, and shipped off to that hellhole for no other reason. No trial, no charges, no due process, they merely "looked" guilty. In at least a few different cases, ICE even knew they were innocent and not the person they had come to arrest, but took them anyway and then shipped them off to El Salvador without a second thought. They certainly did nothing to deserve this.
But what about those who had committed crimes? Does that mean they deserve this?
Two apparently had a record for committing petty crimes. Petty crime is a "minor legal offense" including things like jaywalking, public drunkenness, and pickpocketing. Does committing petty crime mean they deserve to be treated as less than human? Caged like animals and unable to leave their cell except for one 30-minute break a day? To be humiliated, broken down, beaten, raped, tortured, and starved? To never have any contact with their family ever again?
Where’s the line for you?
If it was discovered they had committed auto theft, would that mean they deserve this? Or if they had committed a rape? Or an armed robbery? At what point would you argue they deserve to be there and treated that way?
It’s a copout to say, they’re criminals. They’re gang members. They're terrorists. They’re illegals. Any title we give them soothes our conscience because it makes them seem less than human, and, therefore, we can justify in our minds that they deserve to be treated this way. They deserve to be stripped of their humanity and their dignity. They deserve to be treated worse than dogs - or better yet, worse than an animal that we hate - worse than cockroaches.
Some weeks back, I posted a photo of one of the detainees who was sent to Guantanamo. He looked like he couldn’t have been more than 18 and he looked terrified. I said, what could he possibly have done to deserve this? One of my Facebook friends commented on my post, noting Victor Antonio Martinez-Hernandez (the undocumented immigrant Trump used to vilify all undocumented immigrants) looked young and innocent too, but he was convicted of raping and killing a mother of five. That was her line in the sand. Apparently, raping and killing a woman meant to her that you deserve to be sent to a torture chamber, where you’d be beaten, raped, tortured, etc., for the rest of your life, however, long or short that might be. Without any access to legal services, without any support, without any contact with your family or the outside world. That was her line. Of course, in her example, at least Martinez-Hernandez had official charges drawn up, had a court hearing where he had the opportunity to plead his case, had an official ruling, and is now in jail. Which is how the system is supposed to work.
Where is your line?
The more I understand about God and God's love for humanity, the more I believe there is no line. Nothing anyone could do would merit the type of treatment these men are receiving in El Salvador. All people are created in God's image, and as such, all people are deserving of basic human rights, dignity, and respect. Yes, there should be consequences for actions that hurt other people and for violating fair and just laws designed to protect the public. But not this. This is the stuff of corrupt third world countries and fascists and nazis. This is not justice. This is not even deportation.
There is another man who has become important. The case of Kilmar Abrego Garcia is significant because of what it stands for. Abrego Garcia is the man who has become the focus of all the innocents sent to El Salvador. He is a husband and a father. He is a believer. His wife recently said on the news that God has not forgotten him. I believe she's right. This man’s life is valuable and he is incredibly loved by God. But... this is so much bigger than him.
Because if our government can pick up a man who lived in the United States for 14 years with no criminal record and no problems with the law, who was here with legal permission, and simply send him to the world’s worst prison due to an admitted "administrative error", then supposedly not be able to bring him back - what’s to stop them from doing that to anybody else they want?? Any journalist or politician who opposes Trump. Any protester who is swept up from the street. Any historian or lawyer posting truth online or fighting in court for justice. Anyone involved in the resistance movement. Any random person who "looked" guilty. Anyone. Could be kidnapped off the street by men in masks, put on a plane with no formal charges, no formal arrest, no record of their whereabouts even, and sent to a foreign prison, never to be seen or heard from again.
That’s what’s at stake here.
When you add that this president has not only been taking on power only Congress should have, and yet no one has stopped or challenged him, but now is openly defying the courts...
This is an incredibly scary situation that makes me wonder how long I'll be able to speak this way before it becomes too dangerous.
Where is the Church in all this? What is the Church's responsibility?
There have long been two opposite sides to Christianity - the Christians who use the Bible to justify things like slavery and child abuse and shipping people to El Salvadorian death camps, and the Christians who fight for justice and freedom from oppression, who were part of ending slavery and gaining women's rights and welcoming immigrants. One side seeks earthly power and kingdom, the other seeks the kingdom of God. Both think they are following God's will.
For example, there are certainly verses in the Bible where slaves are told to be obedient to their masters. Slaveholders loved teaching those verses to their slaves. There were other parts of the Bible they ignored, however, like verses which told the slaveholders not to be cruel or unnecessarily harsh to the slaves, to provide fair treatment, and to make sure their needs were met. There are even verses that command a provision for slaves to have a way out of slavery. The Bible supports a view of slaves as people loved by God, not as individuals who are less than human. Slaves in America were not allowed to read the Bible on their own for that very reason - the Bible is, after all, revolutionary.
The Bible tells us to love our enemies and to pray for those who persecute us. It tells us to walk the extra mile and to go out of our way to take care of the poor, the widow, the orphan, and the stranger. It tells us to love our neighbors - all our neighbors. It tells us to welcome foreigners and to treat them as if they were our own.
We like to ignore those things, too. It is very inconvenient. It gets in the way of our nationalism and our pride and our selfish ambitions.
The prophets of old didn’t have any trouble calling out the people of God when they went astray. Consider the words of the prophet Isaiah in chapter 10:1-4:
Woe to those who make iniquitous decrees,
who write oppressive statutes,
2 to turn aside the needy from justice
and to rob the poor of my people of their right,
to make widows their spoil
and to plunder orphans!
3 What will you do on the day of punishment,
in the calamity that will come from far away?
To whom will you flee for help,
and where will you leave your wealth,
4 so as not to crouch among the prisoners
or fall among the slain?
For all this his anger has not turned away;
his hand is stretched out still.
We need to listen to the prophets of our day. Because they are saying the same thing to today's Church in America. We are not supposed to be after earthly power. And we definitely should not be getting it by oppressing the poor or the vulnerable. God's hand of judgment is going to fall on us incredibly hard and incredibly swiftly if we do not repent and turn from our wicked ways.
Where is the line for you? Where is the point where you say, I as a child of God cannot stand for other children of God equally loved, equally chosen by Him, to be treated this way.
Kilmar Abrego Garcia doesn’t deserve this.
None of them deserve this.
Bring them all back.
As a Church, this should be our battle cry.
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