Offering sanctuary to refugees who face dangerous deportations is "not our first choice," but a prominent Canadian church leader says it is sometimes the only way ”to exercise the obligation to love and the duty to care.”
United Church of Canada moderator, Rev. Peter Short, was among a panel of church leaders responding Wednesday to criticism of the practice from Immigration Minister Judy Sgro.
Ms. Sgro said last week that churches should stop harbouring newcomers fighting for refugee status in Canada. She called on their leaders to share information about refugees with the federal government.
”We're Canadians, and we know that it's good to love your country and your fellow citizens, but we're convinced there's no good reason that love should stop at the border,” Mr. Short said during Wednesday's press conference.
”For us, the duty to care for refugees at risk takes the form of hospitality and nurture and solidarity and protection and hope.”
Mr. Short noted that sanctuary is trying both for the sheltered and for the hosting community.
”It is in a sense like going into a state of ... suspended animation,” he said.
He said church leaders share Ms. Sgro's hope for a day that sanctuary would no longer need to be practised in Canada but added that, in the meantime, it is sometimes necessary.
”[Sanctuary] stops the [deportation] process for a time, so that people can bring forth the best sources of their wisdom, their strength, their justice and their compassion,” he said.
”It comes at great cost, because nobody wants life to be stopped. But often, that's necessary if we're to take the next steps that are right and true.”
Ms. Sgro's comments last week came in the wake of several thorny cases. Refugee advocates and clergy were alarmed four months ago when 10 police officers in Quebec City stormed Église Unie St. Pierre and took away 35-year-old Mohammed Cherfi, who had taken refuge in the church basement.
Mr. Cherfi, who faced deportation to his homeland of Algeria, was arrested for violating bail conditions imposed after his participation in a demonstration. He was then turned over to immigration officials.
About half a dozen people, most of them failed refugee claimants, are currently being sheltered in churches across the country.
Mr. Short said he trusts that the federal government shares the humanitarian aims of the church community and suggested that a merit-based appeals process would give worthy refugee applicants more time to make their cases.