Revolution #161, April 12, 2009
Taking Revolution Newspaper to a town hall meeting on “Liberty and Justice for all Immigrant Families”
The following correspondence is from a reader in Chicago:
We grabbed up issue #159 and #158, “A Declaration: For Women’s Liberation and the Emancipation of All Humanity,” and headed for what had been described as a part of a series of town hall meetings on immigration reform that Congressman Luis Gutierrez was convening across the country. We’d heard that thousands of immigrants were coming out to these events and among those featured here were Luis Gutierrez and Cardinal Francis George.
As we neared the church’s location on the north-west side, traffic became crowded. Yellow school buses filled with people were heading toward the church. The sidewalks were busy with mainly Latinos, families and individuals, heading toward the church. On the street corners south of the church stood a small group of a dozen “Minutemen” waving large American flags. A call to come out and protest this had been posted to their website. One of the Minutemen was shouting to the people—”Stop breaking the law. Obey God. God commands you to obey the law. The church should not protect illegals who break the law. Obey.” As we got closer to the church we had to pass through a police line and then were greeted by musicians playing on the steps as people passed into the church. Inside, we could see it was huge, filled to capacity and overflowing with overflow seating in the basement 1,000 - 1,200 people possibly.
This church-sponsored event was entitled, “Liberty and Justice for all Immigrant Families” and was designed to send a message for urgent reform of immigration laws to Congress and President Obama. The most impressive aspect of the event was the masses of people drawn to it, families and singles, young and old, mostly Latinos but also Polish, Asian, South African, all for the purpose of hoping for change so they could make a decent living and live without fear of being deported. Coming from the pulpit was the message that the immigration raids should be opposed based on biblical text—God created man and woman and families and no man, no government and no law should tear asunder what god has created. Again based on biblical text and prayer people of all faiths were called to stand with the immigrants and protect them.
The program laid out the problem as being “broken laws,” how the current laws impact the innocent and how even some of the lawyers further victimize the people. Several children made prepared speeches of when and how their parent had been wrenched away from them and deported. One mentioned a father being taken as he was on his way to pick up his wife, eight months pregnant. Another example was a man taken from a gas station while he was filling his car with gas. A young girl was seven when her mother was taken, leaving her the eldest of four in this country. All real horrors, but it was exasperating to see it all unfolding within the “killing confines” of the church and petitions to Congress.
The Cardinal and other priests took a stand against immigration laws but used Bible quotes and used God as the basis for doing so. They spoke of it not being good for government to interfere with what God hath made. Also, the church teaches that the family is sacred so to separate what God has joined is wrong. I thought back to last week’s great newspaper, “A Declaration: For Women’s Liberation and the Emancipation of all Humanity.” It laid out the truth that the family was not made by a non-existent god. The family first emerged as an economic unit after private property was established because the owner of property wanted to pass on his wealth and power to the next generation. In fact, the Latin root of the word “family” is “familia” meaning a household of slaves. Just think of all the men and women trapped in traditional family units and taught it is God’s will! Don’t dare go up against it. It was clear that the audience was being propagandized to ideologically not question religion or the traditional family. All I could think of was how crucial it is to get this newspaper into the hands of as many as possible. Also, the writings of Bob Avakian, particularly in this case, Away With All Gods! Unchaining the Mind and Radically Changing the World. Our Lady of Mercy is a progressive church but all religion is an obstacle to emancipation. As Avakian writes, paraphrasing Stevie Wonder’s song “Superstition”: “When you believe in things and they don’t exist... you suffer...” So the correct stand of opposing immigration raids was being approached by an illusion and worse, a lie, that prayer and god will solve it.
After the meeting we mingled with people waiting for their buses. I don’t speak Spanish so I mainly held up the Spanish edition and read the front page, showed the centerfold of International Women’s Day celebrations and the back page “On the brutal beating of Rihanna by Chris Brown.” The paper had to stand on its own and it did. I sold 22 papers in a short time, mostly to women. The photo of Rihanna broke through the language barrier and provided immediate common ground. Regardless of what the priests had been saying about the family and sacredness of mothers and unborn children (i.e. anti-abortion comments) reality asserted itself. The women were drawn to the newspaper’s revolutionary message. One woman came running up after her friends had bought papers. She had just a nickel but wanted a copy.
A number of people, including women and youth, had been turned off by the religious framework and were interested in a revolutionary approach. A woman came up and quietly said, I agree with you, this is global. I am a socialist. I am a victim of human trafficking. My husband has been deported. I can’t even talk about this now because I am still traumatized—but I will read this.
A family walked by and looked at the paper, the mother said we don’t have the money. I opened up the paper to the center fold showing all the varied forms of the oppression of women incorporated and embraced by capitalism/imperialism. And then I took on the message from Cardinal George, God created man and created woman for man and created children for man. While agreeing that the imperialists were tearing apart families and that all deportations must stop, I told this grouping of women including a 14-year-old girl that the root of the word family is slavery. Her eyes opened wide in shock as her mother pulled her away. A short while later I saw them again and approached them this time, the young girl pulled out her purse with money and peeled off a dollar. “I want to read about it.”
A high school student came up for the paper and said he didn’t like all the heavy weight of religion. He was thinking about revolution but wanted to know more about what we meant by revolution. He thought there should be separation of church and state and when he saw the flyer for the debate on “Morality With or Without Gods”—he took some to tell his friends about and make his plans to come.
We summed up that this was an extremely important event. Undocumented immigrants are not just a problem for the people. It is a huge problem for the system as well which was indicated by the huge crowd attending. Capitalism requires them, yet fears not being in control. It cannot solve the problems arising from it and is vulnerable to the people’s rage and resistance. Religion cannot solve the problem either but there they were, the Congressman and the priest colluding to get people to follow them.
This event posed some questions to us: Why was this meeting held? Why now? Cardinal George is a big voice calling for an end to immigration raids. (He didn’t say end deportation, however.) Congressman Gutierrez attended, got several standing ovations but didn’t speak. Is the Cardinal saying the system is getting too blatant in how it treats immigrants and needs to reform? Isn’t he risking people taking it too far when he calls for a solution now? Is there a growing dissatisfaction with the new Obama administration’s approach? Is the church aiming to reign in a growing momentum for the May 1 demonstration marking the end of the administration’s first 100 days? Is the church competing for members, reacting to losses to Evangelicals especially south of the border? We had thought the event was going to be about the Dream Act that Gutierrez has been promoting, but it wasn’t so we wonder whether the event was tailored for our city or are there other church events across the country similar to this one? It’s a complex situation requiring more investigation. But it’s clear, only revolution will resolve these contradictions and people need Revolution in their hands to build a movement toward that possibility.
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