Lest I unfairly be labeled a liberal

As a counter-point to my prior post on Glenn Beck, let me reiterate that co-opting the Gospel witness for liberal political causes is every bit as wrong as it is to co-opt it for conservative political causes. Case in point comes from a blog post at the Sojourners blog, the online home of Jim Wallis (the post was written by Debra Dean Murphy, not Jim):

In a review of the book I noted that Soerens and Hwang challenge any reader who claims to follow Jesus to consider immigration through scripture’s insistence that we see ourselves as a people in exile: sojourners in a foreign land who live not by claiming “our rights” over and against so-called outsiders, but solely by the mercy and grace of a generous, hospitable God.

(My note: If that is where she stopped, I would have been sort of OK with it. Alas, she kept writing)

We are exiles who follow an alien, undocumented, migrant Messiah. As Edgardo Colón-Emeric notes (in the sermon linked above), “Jesus did not have a valid birth certificate. Mother’s name: Mary; Father’s name: unknown. In fact, Jesus had no papers in his name, no title deed, no rental contract. Nothing. ‘Foxes have dens, and birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man has nowhere to rest his head.’”

A phrase formerly associated with interrogators of the Third Reich — “let me see your papers” — will now enter the lexicon of law enforcement in Arizona. Jesus — in the guise of the brown-skinned “other” — will be asked for documentation he doesn’t have. And unless his followers practice the kind of perfect love that casts out all phobos (1 John 4:18), fear, on both sides of these encounters, will have won the day.

- We are Exiles Who Follow an Alien, Undocumented, Migrant Messiah

Oh my.

So a free Republic, a republic made up of laws enacted by the democratically elected representatives of the citizens of said republic, is analogous to the Roman Empire and Jesus Christ, the Son of God, was little more than a “brown skinned” undocumented alien, an ancient Caesar Chavez if you will?

Seriously?

See I thought that the events surrounding the birth of Jesus happened in the context of his parents, as subjects of the Roman Empire, going to Bethlehem to be….registered. Let me check my Bible, I am sure there was something about Mary and Joseph sneaking into Palestine via immigrant smugglers from Babylon or something. No, wait. It does say that they were being registered in a census…

In those days a decree went out from Caesar Augustus that all the world should be registered. This was the first registration when Quirinius was governor of Syria. And all went to be registered, each to his own town. And Joseph also went up from Galilee, from the town of Nazareth, to Judea, to the city of David, which is called Bethlehem, because he was of the house and lineage of David, to be registered with Mary, his betrothed, who was with child. And while they were there, the time came for her to give birth. And she gave birth to her firstborn son and wrapped him in swaddling cloths and laid him in a manger, because there was no place for them in the inn. (Luke 2: 1-7)

Huh. So Jesus wasn’t homeless, His mother and Joseph were travelling away from home and all of the hotels were booked. They weren’t “undocumented”, in fact they went to Jerusalem to BE documented. In His adulthood, Jesus also might have taught a thing or two about being subject to the rulers of the land and about rendering unto Caesar. If the laws of the land say that Caesar (or Governor Napolitano in this case) expects people to verify their citizenship in the course of a traffic stop, then it sounds like you should pony up your drivers license and if you can't prove your citizenship (something every new employee is supposed to do), it is probably because you are here illegally.

Migrant worker, union organizer, “brown skinned alien” Jesus is as much a false caricature as NRA member, Tea Party guest speaker, American flag waving Jesus.