Theology and Immigration Ethics: A Starter Kit

A Partial Bibliography for Understanding Migration

The best way to combat bad things is to slow down, learn, and step in.

Learning Is Not Everything

Before offering this very partial list of places to begin understanding migration, a brief caveat. The best place to begin with migration is by listening, through testimony. Next month, I’ll have a review of Isaac Villegas’ forthcoming Migrant God—I have some minor quibbles, but on the whole, it’s a potent reminder of this basic truth: to understand complex moral questions, we must not only reason, but listen to those who are walking through it.

Migration doesn’t happen for no reasons. No one leaves their home without compelling reason to do so. Imagine what would compel you to leave, to cross a border—several borders—and to undertake the danger involved. This, I think, is the place to begin, even if it is not where understanding ends.

In a season where governmental initiatives are making it harder for us to think of a United States with migrants, it’s more important than ever for Christians to have a full and sober sense of the landscape.

Photo by Markus Spiske on Unsplash

A Partial Bibliography, Briefly Annotated: Eleven Books To Start With