Truth does not go Away just because it Enters a Political Realm

   Truth does not go away just because it enters a political realm. If a principle exists, it exists. If a rule of human nature exists, it exists. If something is right or wrong, it is right or wrong even on a public stage. If you are not to gossip, and not to spread false rumors, those things apply to public life as well as to private. If you are not to wrongfully judge, then you are not to wrongfully judge those in the news any quicker than those in your community.
  If you are to love others, you are to love others. If it is good to help others, it is good help not just the neighbor next door, but the people across the sea.
   Or across the border.
   "When saw we thee a stranger, and took thee in?" the scripture asks. Does the validity of the scripture end when it enters on political grounds? Or, are we expected to take people into our nation just as quickly as we are into our individual homes?
  Our public lives should equal our private lives, and the morals we practice in one should also be practiced in the other.
   I think of the hatred toward the immigrant.  Or, do we just -- as we are wont to say -- hate the sin but not the sinner? I wonder if we use such words to justify what might be considered a sin, itself. For, are we using the phrase to justify ill feelings towards others -- specifically, the migrants flowing this way across Mexico?
   We have ill feelings towards them, even angry feelings. Is that not hatred? If it were hatred just for what they are doing, the feelings would not be directed at them, themselves.
   And, what of these sins of theirs? Are we justified as calling them sins? The sin? Crossing our borders illegally. The sin? Coming to take advantage of our welfare system. The sin? Being terrorists or members of MS-13.
   I think on how it is wrong to wrongfully judge. I think of how I have been taught great harm exists in a rumor. Are there terrorists among the migrants? Or, is that just a rumor? What is the harm that swirls in the path of this rumor -- the rumor that there are terrorists among them? And, what if a terrorist or two does sneak among the whole? Does that mean the whole of them should be rejected from entering America? One bad apple . . .
   Understand that the migrants would have freedom in America. If a rumor can shut them down, the damage is freedom itself. When hurtful words come on a public stage, they shut down the refuge of a needy people. Without those words, the immigrants receive safe. But once enough people believe in the witness against them, the immigrant is stopped at the border, or turned back around if found across the border.
   "Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbor," says the commandment. And, if that is true, it is true that we should bear false witness against those trudging this way from Honduras. False witness? I read the definition in the dictionary: "Speaking unjustly against our neighbor, to the prejudice of his reputation." And, I think of the reputation of a whole class of people, and how they are thought ill of from what is said.
   Is it wrong to wrongfully judge? We hear stories of how these migrants join in prayer circles as they trudge on foot across the length of a nation. We hear how they tote their Bibles and call on their God. We hear that they are but fleeing poverty and oppression. Are we then to judge them to be different than that? Do we take a beggar for a terrorist? Do we so accuse them? If we take the poor and oppressed, and not only deny to let them in, but paint them as the worst of criminals in the process, wherein lies the greater sin? In them, or in us?
   What then, you may ask, of their coming here, and ending up on our welfare rolls? Well, charity comes with a price; It comes with a bill. Do we expect to provide charity without expending any money? We will help, as long as it doesn't cost any money? "Our own" -- as we call them -- also end up on charity. Is being on welfare a "sin" that they commit, as well? If we hate the sin and not the sinner, consider we must be saying it is a sin for people to be on welfare.
   And, what of their coming illegally? If a person were assaulted on his home property, and he fled to find refuge in his neighbor's yard, would that neighbor scream at him for trespassing? Would he say. "Listen, I don't mind you coming into my yard, but next time, call me up and get my permission before you come."
   Why is it so different if their lives are in jeopardy, and we are telling them they must wait years for the immigration process?
   Yes, some of these people come not to escape crime, but for economic reasons. Of them? Consider back to the scripture we started with? I will paraphrase it: When saw we thee naked, or hungry, and did not take thee in?
   The scripture doesn't lose value just because it enters on the public stage, just because it is a nation that must give the charity and not a person.