Fairfax Presbyterian Church · Faith & Resistance
Practicing Faithful
Resistance Today
Case Study Seven · South Africa, 1985 · Carried Over from Week 3
150 South African theologians named what was happening — and what the church was doing about it. They gave everything its right name.
Case Study 7 of 7 · South Africa, 1985
The Historical Moment
South Africa, July 1985 — State of Emergency
The apartheid state declares a State of Emergency. Township after township is in revolt. The South African Defence Force moves in. People are being killed, maimed, and imprisoned at accelerating pace. The Dutch Reformed Church provides apartheid’s theological justification. The English-speaking churches issue statements about reconciliation and non-violence — and do very little else.
Soweto · June–September 1985
A group of ordinary clergy and lay theologians — not bishops, not denominational leaders — meets in Soweto at the height of the crisis. They decide the church must be made to see what it is doing and not doing. Three drafts circulate across the country. Over 150 people sign. The document appears September 25, 1985.
The Kairos Document · Chapter One · September 25, 1985
“The time has come. The moment of truth has arrived.”
Kairos — not clock time, but the moment of decision. The favorable time in which God issues a challenge to decisive action. Jesus wept over Jerusalem because the city did not recognize its kairos “when God offered it” (Luke 19:44). The document’s opening claim: this is that moment for the church in South Africa. And the church is about to be shown up for what it really is.
The Kairos Document · Chapters 2–4
The theological justification of whatever power exists
Uses Scripture — especially Romans 13 — to bless the status quo, sanctify the will of the powerful, and demand obedience from those being crushed. The Kairos Document calls this not merely wrong but heretical and blasphemous. It has appeared in every case study in this series.
The theology of cautious, both-sides discomfort
Agrees that injustice is wrong. Calls for dialogue, reconciliation, and non-violence — without taking a side, analyzing the root cause, or accepting any cost. Prefers a negative peace. The Kairos Document says this is not a lesser version of faithfulness. It is a different religion. It is King’s white moderate, in a South African accent.
The theology that reads the whole arc and names what it sees
Grounds itself in the same Scripture — but reads it from the position of the suffering neighbor, not the comfortable institution. Does thorough social analysis. Takes an unambiguous stand. Accepts the cost of that stand. This is the theology of the seven case studies. It is also the theology of Jesus.
Case Study 7 · Chapter Two
State Theology — In the Document’s Own Words
The Definition
“State Theology is simply the theological justification of the status quo with its racism, capitalism and totalitarianism. It blesses injustice, canonizes the will of the powerful and reduces the poor to passivity, obedience and apathy.”
The Instrument — Chapter 2.1
“Throughout the history of Christianity totalitarian regimes have tried to legitimize an attitude of blind obedience and absolute servility towards the state by quoting this text.”
Romans 13. The document names the pattern this series has tracked across five centuries: the same verse, on the side of the same powers, every time.
The Verdict
“State Theology is not only heretical, it is blasphemous.”
Case Study 7 · Chapter Three
Church Theology — In the Document’s Own Words
The Definition
“In a limited, guarded and cautious way ‘Church Theology’ is critical of apartheid… but it then goes on to make a fatal mistake. It does not first make a thorough social analysis… and it therefore timidly calls for reconciliation and justice without being sure what sort of justice or whose side the Church should be on.”
On Reconciliation Without Justice — Chapter 3.1
“There can be no reconciliation, no forgiveness and no negotiations with a tyrant… To speak of reconciling these two is not only a mistaken belief but it could also, in this situation, be described as sinful.”
Church Theology is comfortable. It agrees apartheid is wrong. It calls for dialogue. It counsels patience. It prefers a negative peace to the costly work of justice. This is not a lesser version of faithfulness. It is a different religion — one organized around the needs of those who are not suffering.
Case Study 7 · Chapter Four
Prophetic Theology — In the Document’s Own Words
The Definition — Chapter 4
“We need a bold and incisive response that is prophetic because it speaks to the particular circumstances of this crisis, a response that does not give the impression of sitting on the fence but is clearly and unambiguously taking a stand.”
The Ground — Luke 4:18
“The Spirit of the Lord is on me, because he has anointed me to proclaim good news to the poor… to proclaim freedom for the prisoners and recovery of sight for the blind, to set the oppressed free.”
The Central Claim — Chapter 5.1
“God sides with the oppressed… [The Bible] tells us that God is not neutral in the face of oppression, injustice and tyranny. God takes sides.”
Vocabulary for Question 5
Kairos names the theological problem. Wink names the practical response. Then we put them together with the life of Jesus before turning to the present moment.
Walter Wink · Engaging the Powers (1992) · The Powers That Be (1998)
Meet violence with violence
Armed resistance. Uses the same tools as the oppressor. Tends to perpetuate the cycle — the new power becomes what it overthrew. Not present in any faithful case study in this series.
Withdrawal, passivity, accommodation
Quietism. The privatized faith that stays on Floors 1 and 2. Church Theology in Kairos terms: knows what is happening, calls for dialogue, does not show up. The majority option in every case study.
Nonviolent, truth-telling, public, costly
The third way. Uses the powers’ own logic to expose them. Seeks the enemy’s transformation, not their destruction. The form of every faithful case study. Grounded in Matthew 5:38–44. Prophetic Theology enacted.
Matthew 5:38–44 · Not Passive Acceptance — Creative Resistance
Turn the other cheek — v.39
In the first century, a backhand slap to the right cheek was a gesture of social domination, not a military blow. Turning the left cheek forces the aggressor to use the open palm — an act between equals — or acknowledge the other as a peer. It refuses humiliation without resorting to violence. It forces the aggressor to see what they are doing.
Give your cloak too — v.40
In the ancient Near East, nakedness shamed the one who looked, not the one exposed. The debtor stripped bare in court exposes the creditor’s cruelty publicly. Not passivity. Theater that names the injustice.
The Consistent Shape
Refuse to collude. Name the injustice publicly. Absorb the cost. Seek the other’s transformation. This is the field conventicle, the Birmingham march, the Thursday plaza, the Soweto document, the Sanctuary declaration. It is also the form of the cross.
The Case in Front of Us
Before we talk about what to do, we need to see clearly what we are actually inside. Not a partisan debate. A structural relationship — one that implicates all of us.
Question 1 · Who Is Here
Roughly 11 million undocumented people live in the United States. Scripture has been speaking about them for three thousand years.
Exodus 22:21 · 23:9
“Do not mistreat or oppress a foreigner, for you were foreigners in Egypt.”
The obligation is grounded in Israel’s own refugee memory — not in the stranger’s legal status.
Leviticus 19:33–34
“The foreigner residing among you must be treated as your native-born. Love them as yourself, for you were foreigners in Egypt.”
Native-born. Not tolerated. Not processed. Native-born.
Deuteronomy 10:18–19
“[God] defends the cause of the fatherless and the widow, and loves the foreigner residing among you, giving them food and clothing. And you are to love those who are foreigners.”
Care for the stranger is an attribute of God before it is a command to Israel.
Ezekiel 22:29
“The people of the land practice extortion and commit robbery; they oppress the poor and needy and mistreat the foreigner, denying them justice.”
The oppression of the stranger is named as a sin that brings judgment — alongside robbery and injustice to the poor.
Zechariah 7:10
“Do not oppress the widow or the fatherless, the foreigner or the poor.”
The foreigner appears in every prophetic list of the vulnerable. Always in the same company.
Matthew 25:35 · Luke 10:36–37
“I was a stranger and you welcomed me” — “Go and do likewise.”
Jesus places himself in the stranger. The Good Samaritan has no papers. The arc runs from Exodus to the cross without interruption.
The Structural Argument · The Numbers
What the Economy Extracts — What It Returns
Undocumented workers as share of US workforce — selected sectors
Taxes paid annually (2022)
$96.7B
Including $25.7B into Social Security and $6.4B into Medicare — programs they are legally barred from collecting.
Federal benefits received
$0
Barred from Social Security, Medicare, most federal assistance. Pay in. Cannot collect. The arrangement requires this.
Avg state/local tax rate
10.1%
Undocumented workers
Avg state/local tax rate
7.2%
Top 1% of US households
Estimated price increases if undocumented labor is removed from the economy
+14.5%
Food & grocery prices
FWD.us / CUNY model
+10%
Food prices (broader estimate)
Peterson Institute, 2024
+6.1%
Construction costs
FWD.us / CUNY model
+90%
Milk prices (dairy workers)
Farm Aid / dairy industry est.
“There’s no question that mass deportation of immigrants will disrupt the agriculture and food processing industries, resulting in severe labor shortages, higher costs and thus higher prices for a wide variety of groceries. The only question is how high prices will go.” — Mark Zandi, Chief Economist, Moody’s Analytics
The Arrangement
What They Came For · What the Deal Gave Them
Safety
Escape from violence, persecution, and the collapse of ordinary life.
Opportunity
Work. A wage. The chance to provide for children.
Belonging
A community. A school. A church. Roots in a place.
Dignity
To be seen as a neighbor. To exist without fear.
No path to legal status
The last amnesty was 1986. Decades of work, taxes paid, children born here — no road to permanence.
No political voice
No vote. No representation. No ability to organize without risk.
No protection, no benefits
Labor rights unexercisable. Social Security uncollectable. Precarity permanent.
Scapegoated when convenient
When elections need an enemy, when anxiety needs a target — the people with no voice and no recourse are available.
The arrangement requires this precarity. A regularized workforce would have rights. Rights would cost more. This is not an accident of policy. It is the design.
The Structural Argument · Six Administrations
Click any administration above. The pattern is the same in every chapter: extract the labor, avoid the resolution.
Reagan · 1986
Congress passed the last immigration reform this country has ever attempted. It hasn't tried since.
2.7M
People granted amnesty under the Immigration Reform and Control Act of 1986.
Never
enforced
IRCA also introduced employer sanctions for hiring undocumented workers. They were never meaningfully enforced. The labor kept flowing.
39 years
ago
The last time the U.S. government tried to resolve the status of undocumented people already here. Every administration since inherited the unresolved population and left it unresolved.
Clinton · 1996
A Democratic president built the enforcement infrastructure every subsequent administration used. The tools were not invented by Trump. They were waiting.
IIRIRA (1996)
The Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act. Created expedited removal, mandatory detention, multi-year re-entry bars, and sharply limited judicial review. Every one of these tools is still in active use.
Deportations
70k → 188k
Annual deportations nearly tripled in the two years after IIRIRA passed.
Total expulsions
~12.3M
Including voluntary returns — more than any other president in history.
Same year
Welfare reform barred undocumented immigrants from most federal benefits. IIRIRA and benefit exclusion signed in the same legislative session. Pay taxes in. Cannot collect.
Bush · 2001–2009
9/11 gave immigration enforcement a national security frame and an open checkbook. The agency was rebuilt, funding exploded, and local police became federal immigration agents.
The reorganization
INS abolished, replaced by DHS. Immigration enforcement reframed as counterterrorism. Secure Communities launched in 2008 — a system that automatically ran fingerprints from every local arrest through federal immigration databases, flagging anyone without legal status regardless of whether they were convicted of anything.
287(g) agreements
Over 70 local and state law enforcement agencies deputized to perform immigration enforcement by 2009. Local police as federal immigration agents. This is where that began.
Annual enforcement budget by end of Bush years
$18B
More than the FBI, DEA, Secret Service, U.S. Marshals, and ATF combined. See next slide for the full spending trajectory.
Obama · 2009–2017
Immigrant rights groups called him “Deporter-in-Chief.” Three numbers tell the story.
Formal removals
2.75M
Highest in U.S. history at the time. Peak: 1,123 per day in 2012.
Who Secure Communities caught
>70%
Had no serious criminal record — despite the stated priority of targeting criminals. Secure Communities ran fingerprints from every local arrest through federal immigration databases automatically.
What DACA covered
~7%
~700,000 people brought here as children — about 7% of the undocumented population. Temporary. Subject to court challenge. The other 93% remained unaddressed.
Trump 45 · 2017–2021
Prosecutorial discretion ended. Every undocumented person became a removal priority. And then came the children.
Zero tolerance
Every adult crossing without authorization criminally prosecuted. Prosecutorial discretion — the practice of not pursuing removal against people with long community ties and no criminal record — ended entirely. All 11 million undocumented people became a removal priority.
Remain in Mexico
Asylum seekers required to wait in Mexico while their U.S. cases were heard. Approximately 70,000 people enrolled before courts halted the program. Many were exposed to kidnapping and extortion while waiting.
Family separation
As a direct result of zero tolerance, parents and children were separated and processed through different systems. Thousands of children held without their parents. The American Academy of Pediatrics said the harm was “irreparable.” A federal court ordered reunification. The government could not locate many of the parents.
Biden · 2021–2025
He reversed the most visible cruelties on day one. By the end of his term he was implementing asylum restrictions more severe than anything Clinton had signed.
Day one, January 20, 2021
Record border encounters
The 2024 border bill
Negotiated with Republicans. Would have:
Senate Republicans killed it on Trump 45’s instruction — he didn’t want Biden to have the win. Biden then imposed similar restrictions by executive order.
Trump 47 · 2025–
Every previous administration, however aggressively, maintained due process as the nominal floor. This one removed it.
Alien Enemies Act
A 1798 wartime statute invoked to bypass immigration courts entirely. People deported to third countries — including El Salvador's CECOT prison — without individual hearings.
Laken Riley Act
Detention required on arrest alone — no charge, no conviction, no hearing required. The presumption of innocence does not apply if you are undocumented.
Arrests everywhere
Inside churches. In courthouses. At schools. ICE operations targeting families who have lived in communities for decades. Military deployed at the southern border.
The budget
ICE's 2025 budget: $85 billion — more than all other federal law enforcement agencies combined. The One Big Beautiful Bill provided a $75 billion supplement on top of its $10B base. ICE doubled its agents from 10,000 to 22,000 in a single year.
Click an administration above — or click anywhere to advance
Immigration Enforcement Spending · 1993–2025
ICE + CBP Combined Annual Budget — Across Six Administrations
ICE + CBP (FY2025)
$85B+
FBI
~$11B
DEA
~$3B
ATF
~$2B
Secret Service
~$3B
U.S. Marshals
~$2B
The Bridge Case · United States, 1981–1992
The Sanctuary Movement — The Presbyterian Postscript
The Crisis · El Salvador and Guatemala, 1979–1992
Civil wars backed in part by U.S. military aid produced hundreds of thousands of refugees. Salvadoran and Guatemalan civilians fled to the U.S. southern border. The Reagan administration denied asylum at rates above 97% for Salvadorans and Guatemalans, while granting it at much higher rates for Cubans and Eastern Europeans. People refused asylum were deported. Some were killed after return.
The Question
There are people in front of us who are in documented danger. The government has declared it will return them to that danger. What do we do?
Jim Corbett · Quaker rancher · Tucson, 1981
After encountering Salvadoran refugees in INS detention, Corbett began helping people cross the Arizona border. He wrote to churches: the choice is between complying with enforcement policy or committing civil initiative — openly breaking the law as a public act of conscience.
John Fife · Presbyterian pastor · Southside Presbyterian, Tucson
On March 24, 1982 — the second anniversary of Oscar Romero’s assassination — Fife declared Southside Presbyterian a public sanctuary for Central American refugees. He sent the declaration in advance to the INS, the U.S. attorney, and the media. Not covert. Public theological witness. By 1987, more than 500 congregations had followed. Fife was convicted under federal law. Five years probation.
The Postscript
The Movement Ended. The Question Did Not.
2017 · Trump 45 · ~1,000 congregations
When Trump took office in January 2017, the number of congregations declaring sanctuary doubled within months — from roughly 400 to over 1,000. Presbyterian, Methodist, Baptist, Unitarian, Jewish, and Quaker congregations across the country opened their buildings. St. Andrew’s Presbyterian in Austin sheltered a Guatemalan mother and her son for years. Churches posted signs: ICE may not enter without a judicial warrant.
Sources: PBS NewsHour (2018); VOA News (2017); America’s Voice (2018)
2025 · Trump 47 · A new condition
On his first full day in office, Trump rescinded the longstanding federal policy protecting churches as sensitive locations where ICE would not act. Five Quaker societies immediately sued the federal government under the Religious Freedom Restoration Act. The Episcopal Diocese of New York declared itself a sanctuary diocese. Lake View Presbyterian in Chicago converted a Sunday school classroom into a studio apartment for immigrant families. Southside Presbyterian in Tucson — Fife’s church — continues the practice it began in 1982.
Sources: NPR (March 2025); Christian Science Monitor (January 2025); Documented NY (January 2025)
What Faithful Action Looks Like
Form 1
Speaking and Writing the Truth
The prophets. King’s Letter. Naming what is happening in public, without softening.
Form 2
Directed Giving
Jubilee. The Sanctuary Movement’s basements. Deploying what you have toward who is suffering.
Form 3
Presence and Protest
The second mile. Las Madres. Physical presence as theological argument.
Form 4
Accompaniment
Ruth. The Sanctuary volunteers. Being present through a system designed to isolate.
Form 5
Sanctuary
Cities of refuge. Fife. Declaring that this building is a place of protection.
Form 6
Political, Legal & Civic
Esther. Calvin’s lesser magistrates. Using the access you have, for this.
Form 1 of 6
Speaking and Writing the Truth
Week 2 Root · Amos 5:24
“Let justice roll down like waters, and righteousness like an ever-flowing stream.”
Amos, Isaiah, and Jeremiah did not lobby in private. They named in public, at cost, without softening. The prophetic voice speaks to power on behalf of the vulnerable.
Week 3 Anchor · King’s Letter from Birmingham Jail, 1963
“[The white moderate] prefers a negative peace which is the absence of tension to a positive peace which is the presence of justice.”
Written in a newspaper margin, addressed to comfortable clergy who called his timing wrong. The written word as the form of faithful witness.
What a Church Can Do — Choose at Least One
Issue a congregational statement
Write to your representatives as a church
Submit a letter to the editor as a congregation
Engage the PCUSA Office of Public Witness
Hold a congregational discernment conversation
Form 2 of 6
Directed Giving
Week 2 Root · Deuteronomy 14:28–29
“At the end of every three years… the stranger, the fatherless and the widow who live in your towns shall come and eat and be satisfied.”
The tithe explicitly funds the stranger. The economy of the covenant community is structurally oriented toward the vulnerable. What you do with your resources is a theological act.
Week 3 Anchor · The Sanctuary Movement
Southside Presbyterian’s basements were the material expression of Fife’s declaration. 500 congregations deployed buildings, budgets, and networks. Theological witness without material commitment is speech without a body.
What a Church Can Do — Choose at Least One
Designate a budget line item for immigrant legal defense
Create a rapid-response fund
Open the building for legal clinics and consultations
Volunteer through Just Neighbors
Form 3 of 6
Presence and Protest
Week 2 Root · Matthew 5:41 — The Second Mile
“If anyone forces you to go one mile, go with them two miles.”
The second mile is freely chosen, public, and reframes the power dynamic. The act exposes what the first mile was about. Presence — chosen, costly, public — is a theological argument.
Week 3 Anchor · Las Madres de Plaza de Mayo
Fourteen women on a Thursday afternoon. The junta could not acknowledge the march without acknowledging the disappearances. Presence was the argument. They did not need permission. They needed to show up.
What a Church Can Do — Choose at Least One
Organize a congregational vigil at Farmville or Caroline Detention
Join immigrant-led marches and actions
Show up at County Board of Supervisors hearings
Hold public worship that names what is happening here
Physical presence is harder to dismiss than a petition.
Form 4 of 6
Accompaniment
Week 2 Root · Ruth 2 & Matthew 25:35
Boaz notices Ruth in his field, speaks to her directly, and leaves grain deliberately for her to find. Not charity from above. Presence alongside.
“I was a stranger and you welcomed me.”
Matthew 25:35
Week 3 Anchor · The Sanctuary Movement
Corbett drove through the Arizona desert to people in INS detention. Sanctuary congregations housed families, drove people to hearings, sat in waiting rooms. That verse is not metaphor. It is a description of someone being in your house.
What a Church Can Do — Choose at Least One
Accompany individuals to immigration hearings
Provide congregational translation support
Host a Know Your Rights workshop
Build relationships before the crisis arrives
Accompaniment is not a program. It is a practice of proximity.
Form 5 of 6
Sanctuary
Week 2 Root · Cities of Refuge — Numbers 35, Joshua 20
“Select some towns to be your cities of refuge, to which a person who has killed someone accidentally may flee… They will be places of refuge.”
Six cities designated for protection pending a fair hearing. No one faces irreversible harm before their case is heard. The oldest legal sanctuary concept in the Western tradition — from Scripture.
Week 3 Bridge · John Fife · Southside Presbyterian, 1982
Fife sent his sanctuary declaration in advance to the INS, the U.S. attorney, and the media. Not covert. Public theological witness. Convicted under federal law. Five years probation. 500 congregations followed. As of 2025, the question is the same one he was answering.
What a Church Can Do — Choose at Least One
Hold a congregational vote to declare sanctuary
Post a sign at the entrance
Connect with the New Sanctuary Coalition
Prepare a plan for if ICE comes to this building
The Sanctuary Movement ended. The question it was answering did not.
Form 6 of 6
Political, Legal, and Civic Engagement
Week 2 Root · Esther 4:14
“Who knows whether you have not come to the kingdom for such a time as this?”
Esther has access to the king that Mordecai does not. The civic and political access this congregation has — citizenship, fluency, economic stability, relationships with elected officials — is a kairos.
Week 3 Anchor · Calvin’s Lesser Magistrates
Institutes IV.20: elected officials hold offices with God-given vocation to protect the people. When higher authority inverts that vocation, they do not merely have permission to resist — they have an obligation. In a democracy, citizens share in that function.
What a Church Can Do — Choose at Least One
Contact Walkinshaw, Kaine, and Warner — with names and cases
Testify at Fairfax County Board of Supervisors hearings
Support Legal Aid Justice Center’s Virginia advocacy
Partner on voter registration in immigrant communities
The access this congregation has is the form of resistance available to it.
Together
If You Want to Go Deeper
Sources & Citations
Center for Migration Studies of New York · American Immigration Council, Contributions of Undocumented Immigrants (2022) · Americans for Tax Fairness, undocumented tax data (2022) · Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy, effective tax rate analysis (2023) · Council on Foreign Relations, economic impact analysis
FWD.us / Prof. Francesc Ortega (CUNY), economic modeling of immigration policy price impacts (2025) · Peterson Institute for International Economics, deportation and food prices study (2024) · Mark Zandi, Chief Economist, Moody’s Analytics, quoted in CNN (November 2024) · Farm Aid / Center for Migration Studies, dairy sector workforce estimates
Migration Policy Institute, The Obama Record on Deportations (2017) · DHS Yearbook of Immigration Statistics (annual) · TRAC Immigration, Syracuse University, Secure Communities data · Latino News Network, deportation statistics by administration · El Paso Matters, fact brief on presidential removal totals
American Immigration Council, The Cost of Immigration Enforcement and Border Security (2024) · DHS Budget-in-Brief, FY2003–2025 · Institute for Policy Studies, ICE/CBP budget analysis (2026) · NPR, “How ICE became the highest-funded U.S. law enforcement agency” (January 2026) · USAFacts, ICE spending data FY2003–2024
American Academy of Pediatrics, statement on family separation (2018) · DHS Office of Inspector General, family separation reports · Human Rights Watch, Remain in Mexico documentation (2019–2021)
Brennan Center for Justice, ICE budget and authority analysis (2025–2026) · American Immigration Council, One Big Beautiful Bill analysis · Congressional Research Service, FY2025 appropriations · Institute for Policy Studies, ICE/CBP budget doubling report (February 2026)
The Series