OK, remember last week when I suggested you start slowly with a couple of half-hour podcasts? They were thought provoking, weren’t they?
Well, to up the ante, I am also going to recommend a book by the same person.
Here’s the details:
Title: Christians at the Border: Immigration, the Church, and the Bible
Author: M. Daniel Carroll R. (Rodas)
Page count: 143 pages
Christians at the Border deals most specifically with Hispanic immigration, but can be applied to other aspects of immigration, too. The book is on one hand a more thorough look at the immigration stories and teachings in the Bible, (if the lectures piqued your interest in that area, the book will flesh things out some more). He has two chapters on the Old Testament materials and one from the New Testament which all end with “implications for today” sections. Carroll also deals with some of the main points of contention in the debate over immigration (the impact on national identity and economics) and discusses the impact Hispanic immigration has on American religion. The author gives a good overview of the history of Hispanic immigration in the US, too (which will brings the current immigration discussion into new light).
As far as style, the author has a PhD, but the book is written so that you can all read and understand it (there aren’t a ton of statistics and charts, and he makes an effort to define all his terms). He also helps put a personal face on the issue of immigration. Part of the way he does that is that Carroll himself is half Guatemalan and half Irish-American. One of the things I really appreciated about this book is that Carroll can easily identify with both the majority culture and the Hispanic community. He takes the heat out of the discussion.
It’s a great place to start thinking about Hispanic immigration from a Christian perspective, or even just from a balanced viewpoint (the chapter on history/economics/American identity is really helpful). There’s also a great appendix with lots of varied resources if you want to start digging deeper.
It’s short, easy to read and practical…but it also pushes you to think outside of the dialogue we are used to hearing in the immigration debate.
Give it a look! (Besides, my mom already ordered the book after hearing the lectures last week. And you know you want to be like her!)
OK, I’ll leave you with the book’s dedication (first to the Hispanic community, and then to the Christian church in the US):
Al pueblo Hispano—
peregrinos en tierra ajena,
artesanos de una vida nueva,
semilla de esperanza—
paz y animo para el largo camino
To the Christian church in the United States:
may we never forget that we are
sojourners in a strange land,
and that among us
there is neither Jew nor Greek
PS. The book has also been translated into Spanish. You can buy it on Amazon and can maybe find it in your local library—I know Hardin-Simmons and TCU have copies.
