“BE KIND TO
UNDOCUMENTED FOR YOU YOURSELVES WERE ONCE UNDOCUMENTED”
(Sermon by Fred Vergara at St. James Episcopal Church, 84-07 Broadway,
Elmhurst, NY 11373 on May 19, 2013)
Number 3
(three) is my favorite number. It reminds me of one God in three Persons: Father,
Son and Holy Spirit. It reminds me of the three-fold ministry of Christ: king,
priest and prophet. It reminds me of the three levels of my Christian duty:
worship to God, fellowship with the Church, and service to the world. It
reminds me to look at the three areas of a parish: we are a church, we are a
campus, and we are a community center. It reminds me of myself: a spirit, mind and body.
Number 3
also reminds me that it is the strongest number. Why? When we lift a heavy
load, we count “1-2-3” and it is on this number that we are able to do it.
So this
morning, we shall hold three events: a
celebration of Pentecost Sunday; a commemoration of Asian American Heritage
Month; and a Forum on the proposed Immigration Bill. It is an observance of
three areas of time: yesterday, today and tomorrow. In all these three
occasions, we shall remember that “Jesus is the same yesterday, today and
forever” (Hebrews 13:8).
PENTECOST?
What is
Pentecost? The word Pentecost comes from the Greek word “Pentekoste,” which literally means fifty (50). To the Jewish people,
Pentecost is a celebration of the giving of the Torah (Law) or the Ten Commandments on Mount
Sinai, 50 days after their Exodus from Egypt. To the Christians, it is the
celebration of the coming of the Holy Spirit and the birth of the Church, 50
days after the resurrection of Jesus Christ.
It was on
the Day of Pentecost when the promised Holy Spirit came down upon the
disciples. Shaped like tongues of fire, the Holy Spirit rested upon the
disciples of Jesus and they began to speak in various languages. They were
ordinary fishermen from Galilee but the words they spoke that day were
understood by people in Jerusalem, people from various nations and cultures.
It was a
miracle that the disciples of Jesus were given by the Holy Spirit the gift of
languages; and it was a double miracle that the people from many nations heard
the word of God and understood them. On that Day of Pentecost, 3,000 people
received the Lord Jesus Christ and were baptized. They began to gather in homes
and synagogues. They devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and
fellowship and the breaking of the bread and prayers. God worked wonders in
their midst and the Church was born.
So today,
Pentecost Sunday, we celebrate the birthday of the Church. Will you turn to the
person next to you and say, “Happy birthday, Church!”
ASIAN AMERICAN HERITAGE MONTH
You and I
today are fortunate that we are in the borough of Queens, the most diverse
borough in the United States. State Senator Jose Peralta, in his recent visit
to Elmhurst, said that Queens is the “united nations of the world.” Here you
will find people from various nationalities, ethnicities, races and cultures.
When you stand by and listen just outside this church for one day, you will
hear a hundreds languages spoken in our streets.
So I have a
story of an extra terrestrial bird, which came down to Queens. The first ones
who caught it were the Native Americans, and they worshiped the bird. It flew
and went to the Anglo/Europeans and they studied the bird; then it went to the
Black or African Americans and they sang songs about the bird; then it went to
the Latino/Hispanic, and they had a Fiesta around the bird. Finally, it went to
the Asians, and the Asians cooked the bird!
I suspect that many of you today are not
familiar with the history of Asians in America. Most of our history books were
written from the perspective of Anglo-Europeans, and seldom, if ever are you
able to find churches where they teach you about immigration.
The first
Asians who set foot in America were said to be the Filipinos in the year 1573.
They were a group of Manila men or “Luzon Indios” who served as crewmen or “slaves” in the
Galleon (ships) of the Spaniards who sailed from Manila to Acapulco. While they
were in the sea in Louisiana, they jumped ship because of the maltreatment from
their Spanish masters. They settled in what was known as “Malong village” in
New Orleans and intermarried with the natives. Little was known about them,
except they figured as pioneers in the “shrimp drying” industry. Some oral
history claim that their descendants participated in the American War of
Independence in 1776.
So it was
really in 1849 when the first Asian immigration happened among the Chinese. Recruited
by American contractors, they came to California to help mine the mountains for
gold and to build the transcontinental railroad. It is a sad part of American history
that after the mining industry succeeded and after the railroads were
completed, hospitality to Chinese turned to hostility. It culminated into the
Anti-Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882. In 1886 while the Statue of Liberty is
being unveiled in Ellis Island to welcome the immigrants from Europe, the
Chinese in San Francisco and Seattle, were being driven out of the United
States.
After the
Chinese came the Japanese (1885-1924) who took to the fields in Hawaii and the
West Coast and became great farmers. Many of them became American citizens but
when the Second World War broke out in the Pacific, many of them were
incarcerated in the Internment camps in remote areas of the country. One of our
Japanese Episcopal clergy, the Rev. Hiram Hisanori Kano, a farmer-priest from
Nebraska is being proposed in the book of “Holy Women, Holy Men” for serving as
spiritual leader during the Internment era.
After the
Japanese, followed the first Korean Immigration in 1902, the time when Korea was
under the Japanese Empire. For Koreans, it was an escape from their homeland
which was under Japanese control.
Then came
the Filipino immigrants, which began in 1906 when the Philippines became a
neo-colony of the United States. They were composed of both students who were
to be trained American democracy and the bulk of immigrants being farm workers
for Hawaii and California and fish cannery workers for Alaska.
Like the
Chinese and the Japanese before them, Filipino farm workers suffered from
racism and discrimination. Restaurants in such places as Watsonville in
California had signs “No dogs, No Chinese and No Filipinos Allowed.” Most of
them who came as young men, were not allowed to marry because of the
“anti-miscegenation law” that prohibit intermarriage between white and colored
people, thus ended up being bachelors until they died. Despite their suffering, however, the Filipinos became the pioneers in community organizing. Larry Itliong and Philip Vera Cruz were the first ones who organized the farm workers in California, an organization which was later consolidated by Mexican American Cesar Chavez as
the “United Farm Workers Union.”
Today, in
history things are changing for the better. Gone are the blatant discrimination
and the unjust laws, thanks to the work of the Civil Rights Movement,
championed by Martin Luther King, Jr. Today, San Francisco is led by a Chinese
mayor; Milpitas is led by Filipino mayor; and Hawaii had once a Japanese
senator and a Filipino governor. Asian Americans (coming from over 20 countries), are starting to excel in
politics, business and arts.
IMMIGRATION FORUM
This leads
me to comment on the Forum on Immigration which will be held following this
Church service. I would like to ask you
to remain and listen to our three invited immigration attorneys: John
Whitfield, representing a Black perspective; Ramon Guerra, representing a
Latino perspective; and Felix Vinluan, representing a Filipino/Asian perspective.
Elmhurst Community leader, Jean Lu, will translate in Chinese.
As you
listen to their presentations, I would like you to remember what the Bible says
about immigrants. First, Abraham who is the father Jews, Christians and Muslims
was an immigrant. Second, the Church was born on the Day of Pentecost among the
many immigrants that gathered in Jerusalem; third the Scriptures remind us to
be kind to immigrants ---because we are all immigrants. Exodus 22:21 and Exodus
23:9 both say, “Do not oppress or mistreat strangers for you were strangers
once, in the land of Egypt.” I would like to adapt it to say, “Be kind to
undocumented immigrants, for you are all undocumented once.” In America, as a culture or ethnicity, only the indigenous, the Native Americans are not immigrants.
In a manner
of speaking, we are all strangers in this world. There is no permanent resident
on earth. We are all passing through this world, which is not ours, but God’s. Let me read from the Book of Hebrews, something
about our father Abraham and it says:
“By faith, Abraham when called to a
place he would later receive as his inheritance, obeyed and went, even though
he did not know where he was going. By faith, he made his home in the promised
land like a stranger in a foreign country. He lived in tents, as did Isaac and
Jacob, who were heirs with him of the same promise. For he was looking to the
city with foundations whose builder and maker is God.” (Hebrews 11:8-10)
My friends,
you may live in a mansion, in an apartment or a condo but mark this. At best
you are only living in a borrowed tent. I visited a park one day and saw a
sign, “take nothing but photographs, leave nothing but footprints.” Yes, we are
all visitors in a park, strangers and sojourners, travelers and pilgrims in
this world. Our ultimate citizenship is in heaven, where there is no more pain
or sorrow but life everlasting. So while we are on earth, let us make it a
better place than when we found it not only in the physical and the material
world, but in the lives of “the least of God’s people.” We pass through this
park only once, and so whatever service we can give to our fellow visitors, let
us do it. For we can take nothing and leave nothing from this park, but
photographs and footprints. Amen.
