UPDATE: The promised links to the articles I reference have been added.
This morning’s Prince William Extra makes the conservative Republicans on the Board of County Supervisors the subject of a multi-pronged assault, two front-page news stories (here and here) and two letters to the editor (here). Those evil Republicans hate immigrants, the old, the sick, the poor…. I suppose if you looked long enough in the Washington Post, you would find that Republicans hate everyone. Republicans are so selfish, it appears the Washington Post believes Republicans even hate each other.
In her letter to the editor, Elena Schlossberg-Kunkel made the most direct (and thus perhaps the most honest) assault on conservative Republicans (here). She briefly reviewed the history of persecution in America and liken the “frenzy enveloping the illegal immigration issue” to the Salem witch trials, stealing the land from the Indians, women’s suffrage, the Inquisition, the internment of the Japanese during World War II, and the Jim Crow laws.
What drives people say such positively foolish things? As near as I can tell, Schlossberg-Kunkel answers that question herself. She cites this command from the Torah, “You shall love thy neighbor as thyself.”
While I respect Schlossberg-Kunkel’s efforts to love her fellow human beings, I don’t appreciate her insinuations about those who disagree with her. However kind her intentions, I and other conservatives do not appreciate being called names. In fact, such behavior is disappointingly immature. If Schlossberg-Kunkel actually listened to what her opponents have to say about the issue, she would not say such things.
As difficult as perfect love may be, it is not an act of self-destruction. Before we can help our families, we must take care of ourselves. Before we can come to the aid of our country, we each must provide for our families. Before we can save mankind, we must save our own nation.
No one who loves the American experiment can blame someone from another nation for wanting to come here. Nonetheless, although God has been generous to us, even America has limitations. We cannot accept everyone who wants to come here without negative consequences.
- Because our government mandates so many free services, there is an unlimited demand for such services. Thus, for example, those who love more than thou insist we provide free educational services and medical care to illegal immigrants. Such costly welfare programs are relatively new. Immigrants did not use to receive such costly benefits, and we still cannot afford to give away so much. While it may be “free” from the perspective of illegal immigrants, it is not seen as “free” from the perspective of the taxpayer.
- The large majority of the illegal immigrants entering this nation cross our southern border. These people are poorly educated and most do not speak English. They are arriving in sufficient numbers that our nation cannot assimilate them. We risk balkanizing our country into poor Spanish-speaking and middle-class English-speaking communities. Read your history books; this is a recipe for instability and civil war. Yet those who love more than thou have set out to manufacture such a cultural divide.
Hopefully, Schlossberg-Kunkel and others will reflect upon what they are asking and then go back and read their Torahs and Bibles. What is love? Is it about forcing the rich to give away all they own and calling them selfish if they refuse, or is love a choice we each make on our own to share what we have?
Look again at God’s command, “You shall love thy neighbor as thyself.” God knows we are weak. To obey His command, each of us need only save the world one neighbor at a time. We each begin by begging God’s grace we might find something worth loving and saving within our own soul.
