Dignity, Not Detention

Monday night our JustFaith group at Trinity was part of the monthly vigil outside the immigrant detention center in Aurora. The American Friends Service Committee recently launched a national campaign called, "Dignity, Not Detention: Preserving Human Rights and Restoring Justice."

Over 300,000 immigrants are detained each year in a secretive web of 350 private, federal, state and local jails at an annual cost of more than $1.7 billion to taxpayers. In Aurora, driving without a license can land an immigrant in detention. Immigrants can be detained for months, or even years, without any meaningful judicial review or access to a lawyer. While detained, immigrants face mistreatment by guards, denial of medical care, and separation from family members and loved ones.

The campaign calls for an end to detention expansion and seeks to expose how profit-driven expansion of the detention system is inhumane and unjust. The campaign has 4 main goals: reduce detention spending by the Obama administration, demand the use of secure release options as a meaningful alternative to detention, restore due process to immigrant laws, and end expansion of enforcement programs (i.e. ICE access) that are contributing to the growth of the detention system.

Monday night we gathered on the corner of 30th and Peoria to hold signs and light candles. We affirmed our belief that the immigration system is horribly broken and that, as people of faith, we are called to seek justice for all God's people. After a brief period on the corner, we then walked along the sidewalk to the detention center that is tucked back away from the street. We stood outside the center's windows and we alternated singing with chanting. We chanted, "Dignity, not detention" and we sang "We Shall Overcome" in both Spanish and English.

There were enough of us present that eventually detainees started coming to the windows to look out at us. They waved to us. We waved back. We were separated by glass and bars and razor fences. We sang louder.

One of the men in our group walked up and down the sidewalk slowly so that the immigrants could read his sign. In English it said, "You are not forgotten" and in Spanish it said, "I'm thinking only of you."

It was horrible and wonderful all at the same time. And it was humbling. I've been spending so much time lately thinking about jogging strollers and car seats and this baby...I couldn't help but wonder how many of them had babies at home who were missing their mamas and daddies. It makes my heart sad.

To read more about the campaign or to sign the "Dignity, not detention" statement, click here.

The cover of this month's Sojourners. "Citizen or criminal?"