Love Carefully

I originally wrote this in 2019 and before I started this blog. I’ve added an update to the end so I invite you to grab your favorite beverage and read the whole thing (and pay attention to the paragraph that begins “I also think it is a small step toward stopping all immigration to the US and the possible elimination of all public assistance for permanent residents and even citizens…).”

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Can I share with you a story?

By my income, I’m classified as middle-class. I have a graduate degree and have been working and paying taxes (mostly) since I was 13 years old. I have a full time job with health benefits, a pension, 403b, no debt except for a mortgage, and a decent sized savings account. My parents were well educated, hard working people who raised us kids to be educated, hard working adults. And, for a couple of years when I was a young single mom, working and going to school so I could make a good life for me and my son, I was on food stamps.

Here’s another piece of my story: I am a naturalized citizen of the United States. I was born in Germany, in a German hospital while my dad was in the Civil Service and stationed there. I have a German birth certificate. My parents filed my birth with the consulate in Munich. We moved back to the states when I was 2 and I traveled with an infant stamp in my mother’s passport. When I was 12 or 13 I applied for and received a social security number. In my mid-30s, post 9/11, I was going to travel outside the US for the first time since I was 2 (except for Mexico and Canada which only required I had ID to cross back and forth prior to 9/11) and I applied for my own passport. The state department sent me a letter saying they had no record of my citizenship. Although I had worked and paid taxes since I was 13, I didn’t exist as a citizen of the United States. So, to cut to the chase here, my mom still had her expired passport that had my infant stamp and I sent that to the state department. They did their research and found the original documentation my parents had filed in a basement in the consular office in Munich. It had never been sent to the State Department in Washington. With the paperwork located, I was issued my naturalization papers, dated 1967 and signed by Secretary of State Colin Powell. Yes, I am concerned that some day someone will “do the math” and question the validity of my papers.

So, in my head and heart, I bump my story up against the new rule that says migrants legally applying to live in the United States can be denied if there is any possibility they could go on public assistance. Any possibility. (you can read it for yourself here: https://www.federalregister.gov/documents/2019/08/14/2019-17142/inadmissibility-on-public-charge-grounds).

My childhood would not have pointed to any possibility of going on public assistance, but I did. My current situation does not point to me ever needing public assistance but who knows.

The proper use of public assistance is the right thing for us as a society to do for one another. I believe that we all must carry our own load AND bear one another’s burdens (Cf. Galatians 6:2-5). I used other people’s tax money to feed me and my son and I am happy to think that my taxes help others who need to get back on their feet.

I have no statistics to back this up but I’m fairly certain there are plenty of legal citizens who were born in this country to families who have been citizens since the revolutionary war who have abused the public assistance offered by our government and paid for by our tax dollars. Do we need to clean this abuse up? Absolutely! But I do not agree with the idea that we can deny anyone legal access to the US because they might at some point in the future receive public assistance. Who has such a crystal ball?

I also think it is a small step toward stopping all immigration to the US and the possible elimination of all public assistance for permanent residents and even citizens (but I realize I don’t have a crystal ball either). And it frightens me, for all of our sakes.

So, please, just be careful who you lump into “us” and “them” because more than likely someone you consider an “us” is really more like the “them” than you realize. We are all more similar than we are different.

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So, approximately six years later, here we find ourselves with a president and an overwhelmingly large group of people who want to and are doing everything they can, legal or illegal, to eliminate immigration and public assistance. And I find myself even more frightened.

If our government undoes birthright citizenship, what’s next? Eliminating everyone who wasn’t born in this country, even American Citizens like me? If laws are passed that require women’s names on their IDs to match their birth certificate at least I’ll be ok (I’ve never bought into the idea that women have to change their name at marriage) but with the death of both my father and my husband last year, will I be allowed to have a mortgage in my name or a car loan? Not if some have their way.

So, again, I say, please be careful who you lump into “us” and “them”. Be careful what you label “woke” or “liberal”. Much of what is being labeled as these are exact teachings of Jesus: caring for the poor and the sick and the widows and the orphans and the immigrants.

Mercy, compassion, empathy, and love are not Christian heresies; they are the core foundation of all that Jesus teaches.

Wake up, be alert, pay attention and discern what is of God and what is of the great deceiver. Let’s LOVE more loudly than the hate that is permeating our country. Thanks for your time.