The ‘Good News’ of Migration

T he Bible itself is a story of migration; an exodus of generations. Abraham

was nomadic! His grandchildren were immigrants in Egypt. Even Jesus was in
exile in Egypt.

Kudos! Migration is the true spirit of Christianity. Migration is a new point of

evangelization and solidarity.

I know it is hard to digest. We often feel alienated and dejected. We are

‘rootless’, well, sometimes ‘ruthless’ too. We are aliens in very strange
terrains.

But, one who accepts a stranger accepts the Lord:

“I was a stranger and you made me welcome” (Mt. 25:35).

I dare to say, migration is a divine vocation; a vocation for re-evangelization of

the world.

What is migration?

Migration is the movement of people from one location to another for

temporary or permanent living. It is presently a worldwide phenomenon. This
covers persons of various categories, such as migrant workers and their
families, students, refugees, asylum-seekers, internally-displaced persons,
stateless persons, victims of human trafficking, particularly women and
children, and others.

The migration story is a key to Biblical ancestry.

Abraham: The Father of Migrants

The Lord said to Abram: “Leave your country, your relatives, and your father’s
home, and go to a land that I am going to show you. I will give you many
descendants, and they will become a great nation. I will bless you and make
your name famous, so that you will be a blessing.” Genesis 12: 1-2

That was the starting point of the migration of the ‘God chosen’ man; a true
vocation by the God Himself. Abram recognised this divine call and migrated to
Canaan; an alien land.

Abraham’s second migration was from Canaan to Egypt to survive from the
famine in Canaan.

In Genesis 15, God tells Abram his role in this ‘migration story’.

The Lord said to him, “your descendants will be strangers in a foreign land;
they will be slaves there and they will be treated cruelly for four hundred years”
(Genesis 15: 13)

The story continues in Abraham and Sarah’s desire for children. At Sarah’s
insistence, Hagar, the Egyptian slave-girl, the foreigner, bears Abraham a child,
Ishmael. Eventually they are exiled into the wilderness and God promises to
make Ishmael a great nation – the same promise given to Isaac. (Genesis 21)

The migration story continues with famine causing Isaac to settle in the land of
Gerar as an alien. (Genesis 26:2) It picks up with Jacob travelling to another
land for a wife. Later he is forced to flee because of his sons’ violence. God
directs him to Bethel. We eventually learn that Jacob settles in “the land where
his father had lived as an alien, the land of Canaan.” (Genesis 37:1)

Joseph: The ‘Immigration Consultant’!

The story of Joseph in Old Testament is a true story of giving asylum to an
entire community. Eventually, they are becoming a larger community in the
foreign land. God’s plans are weird!

Those jealous brothers sell Joseph into slavery and being transported to Egypt
and rising to power. It comes full circle, when famine strikes over much of the
world and Joseph’s brothers come to Egypt seeking grain.

The circle is complete when Joseph’s father and brothers, their families, flocks,
and all they possess leave Canaan and migrate to Goshen, where there is food.
(Genesis 37-47)
Exodus: The Inevitability of Immigration
The book of Exodus begins with a story of persecution of infant boys. They are
all to be thrown into the Nile. However, one, who would in today’s language be
referred to as an “Unaccompanied Alien Child” is rescued from the river and
raised in Pharaoh’s palace. His name was Moses. Moses becomes an exile in
Midian due to some unfortunate events.

In Midian, Moses marries Zipporah and is eventually called by God to return to

Egypt because, in God’s words, “The cry of the Israelites has now come to me; I
have also seen how the Egyptians oppress them. So come, I will send you to
bring my people, the Israelites, out of Egypt.”

Moses wonders how he could possibly do this and God replies, “I will be with
you.” (Exodus 3:1- 3:12)

Moses returns to Egypt, and facilitates the Hebrew Exodus through a series of
plagues and dialogues with Pharaoh. When his people are finally permitted to
leave, they leave as most refugees leave, with not enough time to pack, but
with God leading them.

The uprooted story continues throughout the Bible and the story of the exile of
the Israelites. This can be followed in Kings, Chronicles, Esther, Jeremiah,
Isaiah, Ezekiel, and Amos.

Literally everyone is on the move and most are going into exile. This includes
the prophets, the priests, and the people. Exile shows no mercy, however
there are persons who did not and do not go into exile.

Infant, But Immigrant Jesus!

Jesus was born in Bethlehem, to which his parents traveled because of the
census and taxation. We know that Jesus, Mary, and Joseph settled for about
two years in Bethlehem, until after the Wise Men’s appearance.

Once the three kings left, an angel appeared to Joseph in a dream and said,
“Get up, take the child and his mother, and flee to Egypt, and remain there
until I tell you; for Herod is about to search for the child, to destroy him. Then
Joseph got up, took the child and his mother by night, and went to Egypt and
remained there until the death of Herod. This was to fulfill what had been
spoken by the Lord through the prophet, ‘Out of Egypt I have called my son. ”
(Matthew 1:13-15)

Jesus, Mary, and Joseph become ‘asylum seekers’ in Egypt. Without travel
documents, they cross the border, looking for safety and sanctuary. Someone
takes them in. Someone welcomes them and protects them.

The Vocation of Migrants

Thus says the LORD of hosts, the God of Israel, to all the exiles whom I exiled
from Jerusalem to Babylon: “Build houses to dwell in; plant gardens, and eat
their fruits. Take wives and beget sons and daughters; find wives for your sons
and give your daughters husbands, so that they may bear sons and daughters.
There you must increase in number, not decrease. Promote the welfare of the
city to which I have exiled you; pray for it to the LORD, for upon its welfare
depends your own.” Jeremiah 29: 4-7

The first and primary duty of each migrant is to work hard for the
well being of the country they are migrated in. A Christian migrant
needs to pray for the host country.

A vision of Isaiah announced this: “In the days to come the mountain
of the temple of Yahweh shall tower above the mountains… All the
nations will stream to it” (Isaiah 2:2).

In the gospel Jesus Himself prophesied that “people from east and
west, from north and south, will come to take their places at the
feast in the kingdom of God” (Lk 13:29), and the Apocalypse sees “a
huge number… from every nation, race, tribe and language” (Ap 7:9).

Proud to be an Immigrant and Catholic

I am Catholic; proud to be an immigrant. Because, the true spirit of

Christianity is ‘movement’.
The Bible begins with the ‘migration’ of God’s spirit and ends with
John in exile on the Isle of Patmos – between those two events the
uprooted people of God seek safety, sanctuary and refuge.