Non-UMC immigration reform connections
The Desert Southwest Conference (DSC) collaborates and connects with certain national organizations that are aligned with The United Methodist Church's stated position in favor of comprehensive immigration reform. The conference looks to these organizations to resource and support its work in two general areas:
1. Organizing and strategy
The DSC coordinates and collaborates very closely with the Arizona Interfaith Network in the process of organizing within the churches of the conference.
At a July 6, 2010 meeting of the AIN in Casa Grande, Arizona, the network began moving exclusively in the direction of internal organizing, coupled with the development of electoral strategies, in an attempt to persuade the Arizona electorate to seek out and elect candidates from any political party that will moderate the conversation around immigration reform and help unite rather than further polarize the electorate in Arizona.
In a fileadmin/Website_PDF/immigration/July_2010_VIP_concept_paper_on_Immigration.pdfstatement distributed at that meeting begins to describe an emerging consensus for action focused in three areas:
- To welcome the stranger - by providing the immigrant community the means to protect itself in this changing political climate;
- To engage our congregations - in an ever-widening and inclusive discussion that seeks a more comprehensive definition from all points of view of the immigration reform needed; and
- To hold our elected official accountable - to the expressed desire of the electorate for both border security and a pathway to status for those who now are in the shadow of our economy and our culture.
The three main tools we will use in developing this strategy are:
- Tool Kits that help immigrants understand how the changes in state and national laws affect them and how to react when situations occur in the most effective way to protect themselves.
- Civic Academies (Holy Conversations) and House Meetings that bring together people within congregations from various points on the immigration reform political conversation, and learn how to search together for a comprehensive reform that speaks to all concerned.
- Electoral Strategies that in time will begin to put less strident public servants into office who will work for practical rather than divisive solutions.
There are other national organizations that work with congregations for a kind of organization that can lead to the solution to immigration reform and other fundamental political problems.
2. Information, training, and updating
As you look for information, training and updating for comprehensive immigration reform, some institutions are invaluable:
Advocacy and action groups
Think tanks