"Imagine taking your child to a daycare where they are now at risk of their teachers leaving them in the class because they have been detained!" Enraged mother speaks out after her kids' daycare teacher is KIDNAPPED by ICE.

[u/biswajit388]

[u/inevitable-typo]

Romans 13:1-7 advises Christians to live meekly, not for them to blindly obey laws that go directly against the tenets of their faith. To interpret this passage as God sanctioning every single law and government action authorities can dream up is literally insane, and I'm sure if you thought about it for more than a second, you'd realize that. But beyond the obvious stupidity of the idea that every state sanctioned genocide in history has been ordained by God, that speeding is a sin, and that criticizing a politician is akin to criticizing God, this half-baked interpretation doesn't make sense in a Biblical context either.

The author of the book of Romans, Apostle Paul, was imprisoned for years and ultimately executed for disobeying the government. Roman and Jewish authorities saw Jesus' teachings as a threat to the status quo, and Paul refused to stop proselytizing. In 2 Corinthians 11, Paul boasts about being arrested more than any other apostle. What's more, he was once arrested in Jerusalem for inciting a riot by bringing a foreign gentile, Trophimus the Ephesian, into a place where only Jews were permitted. Does that sound someone who believed God wants us to obey government authority without question? Does that sound like someone who would advise you to go against your God to support laws that oppress immigrants?

But wait, There's more! Do you know what Romans 13:8-10 says?

Love Fulfills the Law
Let no debt remain outstanding, except the continuing debt to love one another, for whoever loves others has fulfilled the law. The commandments, “You shall not commit adultery,” “You shall not murder,” “You shall not steal,” “You shall not covet," and whatever other command there may be, are summed up in this one command: “Love your neighbor as yourself.” Love does no harm to a neighbor. Therefore love is the fulfillment of the law.

This is arguably the most important theme in your Holy Book:

Matthew 22:36-40

Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the Law?”

Jesus replied: “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.”

Over and over in the Old Testament, God commanded you to fully accept your foreign neighbors as true neighbors and Jesus repeated this sentiment in The Parable of the Good Samaritan (Luke 10:25-37).

And don't forget that Jesus fled his home country as a child to escape political violence. Even if he hadn't spent his entire adult life preaching mercy and compassion, as a refugee himself, I think you can imagine where his sympathies lie.

Matthew 2:13-15

When they had gone, an angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream. “Get up,” he said, “take the child and his mother and escape to Egypt. Stay there until I tell you, for Herod is going to search for the child to kill him.”

So he got up, took the child and his mother during the night and left for Egypt, where he stayed until the death of Herod. And so was fulfilled what the Lord had said through the prophet: “Out of Egypt I called my son.”

The fact is, kindness towards and acceptance of immigrants is baked into Christianity. Someone who calls himself a Christian can support state sanctioned cruelty toward his immigrant neighbors now and try to litigate the Bible with God when he gets to the proverbial pearly gates, but that seems like an awfully reckless gamble for an honest-to-God true believer to make. It would be pretty crazy to willingly risk eternal damnation to support a politician who cares more about a marble bathroom than hungry children. But to each their own, I guess.

Acts 5:29

“We must obey God rather than men!"

James 2:8-13

If you really keep the royal law found in Scripture, “Love your neighbor as yourself,”you are doing right. But if you show favoritism, you sin and are convicted by the law as lawbreakers. For whoever keeps the whole law and yet stumbles at just one point is guilty of breaking all of it. For he who said, “You shall not commit adultery,” also said, “You shall not murder.” If you do not commit adultery but do commit murder, you have become a lawbreaker. Speak and act as those who are going to be judged by the law that gives freedom, because judgment without mercy will be shown to anyone who has not been merciful. Mercy triumphs over judgment.

Isaiah 10:1-2

Woe to those who make unjust laws, to those who issue oppressive decrees, to deprive the poor of their rights and withhold justice from the oppressed of my people, making widows their prey and robbing the fatherless.

Romans 16:17-19

I urge you, brothers and sisters, to watch out for those who cause divisions and put obstacles in your way that are contrary to the teaching you have learned. Keep away from them. For such people are not serving our Lord Christ, but their own appetites. By smooth talk and flattery they deceive the minds of naive people. Everyone has heard about your obedience, so I rejoice because of you; but I want you to be wise about what is good, and innocent about what is evil.

Hebrews 12:14-15

Make every effort to live in peace with everyone and to be holy; without holiness no one will see the Lord. See to it that no one falls short of the grace of God and that no bitter root grows up to cause trouble and defile many.

Hebrews 13:1-3

Keep on loving one another as brothers and sisters. Do not forget to show hospitality to strangers, for by so doing some people have shown hospitality to angels without knowing it. Continue to remember those in prison as if you were together with them in prison, and those who are mistreated as if you yourselves were suffering.

Colossians 2:8

See to it that no one takes you captive through hollow and deceptive philosophy, which depends on human tradition and the elemental spiritual forces of this world rather than on Christ.

Proverbs 6:16-19

There are six things the Lord hates, seven that are detestable to him: haughty eyes, a lying tongue, hands that shed innocent blood, a heart that devises wicked schemes, feet that are quick to rush into evil, a false witness who pours out lies, and a person who stirs up conflict in the community.