Entries by Harold Heie

A Both/And Approach to Immigration Reform

The following reflections were prepared in preparation for my participation in a June 6, 2018 panel presentation in Storm Lake, Iowa on the topic “Leading the Way: A Living Room Conversation on a New Approach to American Immigration” that was sponsored by the “Bibles, Badges and Business” network that is a project of the National Immigration Forum

The two prompts for my initial comments tonight are lifted from two announcements that I received for this important event. One announcement suggests that “we” need to “explore a new, reasonable approach to immigration.” A second announcement asks “how we can move forward together.”

In Support of Sheriff Dan

 The following opinion piece was published on April 13, 2017 as a Letter to the Editor of the Sioux County (Iowa) Capital Democrat, signed by 18 members and friends of CASA of Sioux County. The Center for Service, Assistance and Advocacy is a non-profit organization, for which I serve as co-director, that envisions transformed Northwest Iowa communities that welcome, empower and celebrate people from all cultures. 

The Sheriff of Sioux County, Dan Altena, has recently come under criticism for abiding by the County policy of not honoring Detainer requests from ICE (Immigration and Customs Enforcement) unless a judge has approved such detention with a probable cause warrant. 

Untruth Cannot Withstand Respectful Conversation

A foundational basis for my eCircle on human sexuality and my previous eCircles is a particular expression of “love” for others. 

There is no disputing that Jesus calls those who claim to be his followers to love others (Mark 12:31). But there is a particular expression of such love that is all too rare.

I believe it is a deep of love for another when you create a safe and welcoming space for the other person to express her disagreements with you on any given issue; when you listen empathetically to her perspective in order to adequately understand the reasons she has for her position; and when you then engage in respectful conversation about your differing perspectives for the purpose of seeking common ground and illuminating remaining disagreements in a manner that will facilitate ongoing conversation.

Learning from Someone Who Disagrees with you: Immigration Reform and Beyond

It is a challenge for those who hold to their beliefs with deep conviction to acknowledge that they may be wrong about some things and could learn from someone who disagrees with them about the issue at hand.

The root problem is all-or-nothing thinking: I have the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth and everything the other person believes about the issue is false.

As recorded in Acts 15, the early Christian church modeled a way to get beyond such all-or-nothing thinking by means of conversation. Some Christian Jews believed that Gentiles who wished to embrace the Christian faith needed to be circumcised and keep all other aspects of the “law of Moses” (v. 5). But at the Jerusalem Conference, “all the assembly kept silence; and they listened to Barnabas and Paul as they related what signs and wonders God had done though them among the Gentiles” (v. 12). 

 

Seeking the Good of your City: an Expansive View of God’s Redemptive Purposes

But seek the welfare of the city where I have sent you into exile, and pray to the Lord on its behalf, for in its welfare you will find your welfare (Jeremiah 29:7)

 

In the pietistic Lutheran Church in which I was nurtured as a teenager in Brooklyn, New York, we were called to evangelism: sharing the good news that people can be redeemed from the tyranny of selfish will and be restored to a proper relationship with God through Jesus Christ. That was good, as far as it went, because Christians are called to be agents for fostering redemption between persons and God.

 

But when I was exposed to the Reformed Christian tradition, first as a faculty member at Gordon College in Massachusetts, and then, in no uncertain terms, when I moved to northwest Iowa in 1980, I came to the conclusion that that my earlier view of God’s redemptive purposes was severely truncated: In addition to, not in place of, the “saving of individual persons,” God intends for all of the Created order to be redeemed through Jesus Christ (Colossians 1: 15-20). As beautifully expressed by Abraham Kuyper, “There is not a square inch on the whole plain of human existence over which Christ, who is Lord of all, does not proclaim ‘This is mine!’”

 

Modeling Humility and Love in Public Discourse

When is the last time you heard someone say the following about a controversial issue: “This is what I believe, but I may be wrong?

We are often quick to say “this is what I believe.” But the qualification “I may be wrong” is a rarity. Why is that? Rather than dealing in abstractions, I will set the stage for my answer by considering a concrete example with which I have had some direct experience.

Disagreements as a Pathway toward Common Ground in Politics

Considering the goal of politics to be the search for common ground that promotes the common good, there are enormous disagreements as to the substance of that common ground. That is to be expected. But what is alarming is the inability of most politicians to respectfully engage each other about those disagreements. More often than not, politicians resort to shouting at rather than talking with those who whom they disagree.

Root Causes of Political Rancor

It was like watching a food fight among 6th graders at my former public school in Brooklyn, P. S. 105. But I was actually watching the Republican debate among presidential candidates in South Carolina on February 13.

POLITICS IN THE TRENCHES: LOCAL ADVOCACY FOR IMMIGRATION REFORM IN IOWA

Promoting public justice in a dysfunctional political system is not for the faint of heart. Systemic obstacles are enormous, such as closed primaries that minimize the number of moderate voters and candidates participating in the nominating process; gerrymandered voting districts that protect or harm the political interests of incumbents and parties; winner-take-all elections that militate against the diversity of voices within our pluralistic society, and the inordinate political influence of those with wealth since Citizens United (See Thomas E. Mann and Norman J. Ornstein. It’s Even Worse Than it Looks: How the American Constitutional System Collided with the New Politics of Extremism. New York: Basic Books, 2012, 143-160).

These seemingly intractable obstacles are enough to tempt a Christian to give up hope, or succumb to a truncated view of God’s redemptive purposes that focuses exclusively on modeling Christian values within our Christian communities. To be sure, such modeling is important. But if we wash our hands of the messy business of political engagement, we ignore our calling as Christians to plant seeds of redemption in all areas of life, including the political realm (Colossians 1: 19-20; Matthew 13: 31-32).