May 16, 2008

Prayers for Postville

Dear Partners in Ministry:

I received a note a couple days ago from Steve Ullestad, who serves as bishop of the Northeastern Iowa Synod. He grew up in that synod, in the little town of Postville, Iowa. That name may ring a bell for you for one of two reasons:

• There have been some national stories over the past several years about how this little rural farm community was suffering the decline of most rural communities. Then the largest Kosher meat-packing plant in the world was set up in Postville, and the population swelled, mostly Latino workers who worked in the plant. So national news media over the years have loved to do stories on this rural Iowa town with the kosher Jewish meat plant and the Latino work force.
• Or the second reason you may have heard of Postville: On Monday this week there was the largest single immigration raid with arrests ever held in the US by the Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency (ICE). Nearly 400 jailed in a town of 2,400. Steve said there were lots of children (US citizens) who for two or three days didn’t know where there parents were. People flocked to the Catholic church (closest) for fear of the police raids and are afraid to leave. So now dozens of Lutherans and Catholics are taking care of Jewish and Latino folks. Lutheran Disaster Response (which normally does hurricanes and floods and 9/11 attacks) is there to handle this large-scale human disaster.

Steve wrote in part to indicate ways people who want to help could do that.  I’m attaching information he sent: The letter he sent out, the ELCA news release, and a personal reflection Steve wrote. These documents are also available here.

For many of our people, this is a hot political issue of the day. For hometown folks like Steve Ullestad and for people of God in churches, it’s a deeply human matter—families torn apart, children traumatized, businesses and livelihoods shattered, schools decimated. People of faith are already responding wonderfully. It’s what we do. Our church, through our public statements and especially through our very highly regarded agency Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Service, has been a strong voice for comprehensive immigration reform that stabilizes families and communities.  We began as a church of immigrants. Those of you who heard Steve Bouman, former bishop of the Metropolitan New York Synod who spoke at our ministerium last month, heard his belief that immigration will be the defining issue for our church in this time.

Pray for the people of Postville, especially for the families torn apart by the arrests. Pray for those who live in fear. Pray for those who offer care and support. Pray for public officials, caught carrying out laws that are caught in the crossfire of a body politic that can’t come to agree on a sound and reasonable public policy. Pray that as a people we can come to a more humane place to be, so events like Postville don’t have to be repeated.

May the Christ who announced himself by saying:

“The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to bring good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to let the oppressed go free, to proclaim the year of the Lord's favor.” (Luke 4:18-19)

use us to continue to be the bearers of good news to the poor.

Peter Rogness