Religion: Jesus was a refugee

Our days are filled with extreme concerns for our immigrant population, especially refugees seeking asylum in the United States. Levels of anxiety, uncertainty and fear seem to rise daily, not only for those who are directly affected but by those of us whose faith traditions have specifically called us to care for foreigners. 

We, or our ancestors, were once strangers in a strange land. Due to famine, war, religious persecution and literal death threats, most of us actually came to the United States as immigrant refugees of one kind or another. 

Christian tradition tells us that as an infant Jesus and his parents, Mary and Joseph, had to flee Israel as refugees. They went to Egypt for safety. In the Gospel Book of Matthew (Chapter 2:12-13) we read that baby Jesus’ life was threatened by King Herod. Jesus’ father, Joseph, learned in a dream that he needed to go to Egypt, to protect his family from literal death at the hands of a tyrannical King.

Wise Men—philosophers, scientists, astrologists—from a variety of Eastern countries with various religions and beliefs came to visit the child. They brought expensive gifts honoring him, believing him to be a special child who would one day be King. They knew they could not tell the vicious King Herod where the child resided, as it would put his life in danger. 

Deep in our Biblical tradition is the belief that when God’s people are threatened with their lives, God guides them to places of refuge. 

Not only in the Biblical tradition but across most if not all faiths is the belief that our Creator calls each of us to “welcome the stranger,” offering hospitality.

My Christian tradition, The Episcopal Church, is part of the worldwide Anglican Communion, which has a long history of being dedicated to welcoming refugees. 

My own great-grandparents were fleeing from religious persecution and found hospitality and refuge in The Episcopal Church.

For more than 40 years, Episcopal Migration Ministries has resettled 100,000 refugees in partnership with the government. 

Nearly 40% of our funding has been from grants from the United States. In January 2025, the U.S. government stopped doing the work of refugee resettlement, until early May. 

However, White Afrikaners, so-called refugees, were brought from South Africa. They are not classified by the United Nations or any other group as “threatened with their lives.” 

Episcopal Migration Ministries, under the leadership of Episcopal Presiding Bishop Sean Rowe, knew our faith could not, as a moral imperative, resettle Afrikaners while being told not to continue the resettlement efforts for current asylum seekers. 

These are true refugees who were promised entrance in the U.S. after assisting us with the Afghan and Iraq wars. 

We were also denied opportunities to continue resettlement of people already here from such places as Guatemala, Sudan and El Salvador. 

The Episcopal Church decided we would no longer receive funds from U.S. government grants as of Sept. 30, 2025. The Episcopal Migration Ministry will continue its work through non-governmental funding.

As we approach Independence Day on July 4, let us remember the words on our Statue of Liberty, as Lady Liberty states: 

“Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, the wretched refuse of your teeming shore. Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed to me, I lift my lamp beside the golden door!”

The Rev. Mary B. Blessing, a longtime resident of Morgan Hill, is the Episcopal Priest of the Episcopal Diocese of El Camino Real. She is an active member of Interfaith Clergy Alliance of South County.