FRC president Tony Perkins |
That's an uncomfortable reality, even for the church. There seems to be a growing chorus of Christians who justify these open-door policies on immigration or asylum with the Bible's command to "love the stranger." I agree, we should love the stranger -- but that doesn't mean we have to do so at the expense of our own security. The president's chief responsibility is to protect Americans from all enemies, foreign and domestic. It's our job then, as individuals, to show love and compassion. And there are plenty of charitable solutions for refugees that don't involve bringing them to America, unchecked and unaccountable. One option would be to make their homelands safe while we offer as much humanitarian relief as possible.
Our nation can be caring and benevolent without unnecessarily endangering our own people. What many forget is that in Scripture, loving the stranger is just one component. God also commands these foreigners to assimilate and keep the laws of the land. As Exodus 12:49 makes clear: "There shall be one law for the native and for the stranger who sojourns among you." The United States' goal should be a safe haven for everyone. And that means protecting the refugees' shelter abroad without sacrificing ours at home.
The statement sounds reasonable except for the fact that it is predicated on the unverified belief that one of the perpetrators of the attack in Paris posed as a Syrian refugee.
But according to Think Progress:
The majority of attackers were identified as French or Belgian nationals. An Egyptian passport was also found, but the Egyptian Ambassador to France said it belonged to a critically wounded victim and not a perpetrator. The Syrian passport caused a ruckus, with some politicians in Europe and the U.S. calling for a halt to Syrian refugee resettlement. An increasing number of state governors are trying to defund the settlement program. American officials told CBS News that the passport might be fake, while British-daily the Independent reported that a man was arrested in Serbia while carrying a Syrian passport with matching details to the one found in Paris.
We all know that the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) claimed responsibility for the attacks but again, the passport claim has not been verified as a complete fact.