Our Lady of Guadalupe parish in Logan Heights has joined a lawsuit against the federal government to keep immigration enforcement out of “sensitive locations.”
In January, the Trump administration took back a longstanding policy that generally kept places like churches, schools and hospitals off-limits to immigration raids and arrests.
“That just sent, I would say, fear tremors throughout the community,” said Reverend Scott Santarosa.
He said one church member put it this way: “‘Padre, es como que están cazados como si fuéramos animales.’ As if they're hunting us, as if we're animals.”
When churches first became fair game for immigration enforcement, Santarosa said the pews were noticeably emptier. Volunteers didn’t show up. People were afraid.
Then, to his surprise, attendance rose even higher than before.
“A lot of parents who might be undocumented send their children, their adult children, to do errands for them,” he said. “But what they can't send their kids to do is to go to church for them. They need to come themselves. I think they're making that decision, and they're weighing it, and they're taking the risk.”
After the Trump administration suspended the refugee resettlement program, Our Lady of Guadalupe suspended the migrant shelter they used to run out of their community room. The flow of migrants seeking a safe place to sleep ended.
Still, Santarosa said immigration challenges are consuming the church and making it hard for staff to serve in other ways.
“Since Jan. 20, my time and my fellow priests’ time and energy is taken up with — how do we help people know their rights? How do we help people get legal services that they might need? How do we help people feel safe and protected?” he said.
In a divisive time, he believes the lawsuit will find common ground.
“God doesn't really ask questions about whether we have documents, where we were born, whether we're the president of the United States or a priest, whether we're rich, or whether we're poor. God loves us all because we're God's sons and daughters. I think everyone would agree with that,” he said. “There should be certain places where people don’t feel hunted.”
The parish is one of five plaintiffs across the country filing the suit, including four religious organizations.
