Letter to the editor: Bible tells us to love neighbors, foreigners

As a Christian who has studied and taught the Bible most of my life, I’m struck by a regular theme in it. Did you know that the familiar command, “Love your neighbor as yourself,” first appears in Leviticus 19? Then, 15 verses later, the command is, “You shall love the foreigner as yourself.”

After Ruth, a foreigner, moves to Bethlehem, she becomes the great-grandmother of King David. Later Jesus talks with a woman from the land of Samaria. He also tells his disciples to go into the whole world with his message. Paul does just that, reaching out to all sorts of people. The Book of Revelation speaks of an enormous multitude at the “marriage supper of the Lamb,” then pictures a new Jerusalem with a tree of life “for the healing of the nations.”

In the current political setting, then, I’m puzzled as to why Christians follow politicians who demean or abuse people from other nations because they look different than we do. Does any place in the Bible encourage us to value the lives of immigrants from some places — Eastern Europe, for example — but not those from Central America or Asia?

I understand the need for secure borders and a rational immigration policy, but that is quite different from vilifying and stoking fear about certain kinds of foreigners. Politicians who do that may speak of God or display a Bible, but they are not worthy of our votes.

James Davison

Verona