Posts Tagged ‘Lobby Day’

The Road from Phoenix: Compassionate Immigration Reform

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Feb 25, 2013

This spring, we have a once-in-a-generation opportunity to pass compassionate, comprehensive immigration reform. As people of faith, we must raise our voices for an immigration reform bill that promotes justice and compassion, and that keeps families together. Last year, we stood on the side of love in Phoenix, faithfully witnessing against the harsh practices and policies directed against immigrants and their families. What we did in Phoenix was meaningful, but now what? What is next on the Road from Phoenix?

Congress will likely pass Comprehensive Immigration Reform (CIR) legislation this year and whether it is compassionate in addition to comprehensive depends on how much we and other faith communities influence the outcome.

No matter where you live, you can make a difference in this debate. The first step is to commit to doing an in-district lobby visit, i.e. neighbor-to-neighbor meeting, with your members of Congress. In-district visits are one of the most effective ways to ensure that your voice is heard. Click here for our step-by-step guide to doing an in-district lobby visit.

Your members of Congress will be in their home offices for a “state work period” from March 25 to April 5, so call now and make an appointment to meet with them ASAP. It’s easy to make an appointment to speak with your legislators, and a small group from your community can have a real impact.

Never done a lobby visit before? No worries! Join the Interfaith Immigration Coalition webinar on Monday, March 4 at 4pm ET for an informative presentation on neighbor-to-neighbor visits. Click here and scroll down to “Step 3″ for more details.

With your help, people of faith will play a key role in ensuring that immigration reform is compassionate, and reflects the worth and dignity of all people. Commit to doing an in-district lobby visit today!

In faith,

Susan Leslie
Lead Organizer
Standing on the Side of Love

PS: The first 50 congregations to sign-up will receive a packet of Standing on the Side of Love goodies to support their work–click here to register your in-district visit today!

The message above went out on Monday, February 25, 2013 to Standing on the Side of Love supporters. You can sign-up for these emails here.

Tags: comprehensive immigration reform, immigrant families, immigrant justice, Interfaith Immigration Coalition, Justice General Assembly, Lobby Day, migrant rights, Phoenix, undocumented immigrants, webinar

Love in the Balance–Minnesota Lobby Day

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Mar 21, 2012

The message below went out on Tuesday, March 20, 2012 to Standing on the Side of Love supporters that live in Minnesota. You can sign-up for these emails here.

I don’t think I could have believed, till just that moment arrived when 2,000 people woke up on a cold February morning in 2006, and poured in to St. Paul from all over the region. They were coming to an interfaith rally at the Capitol against a Minnesota marriage amendment to legislate love.

As I stood at the microphone in the heart of the Rotunda, offering words of welcome to this record-setting crowd of gentle, angry people, I really came to believe in the power of people of faith standing for love and signaling a change of heart in Minnesota. I could see the power radiating in the faces of Methodists, Lutherans, UUs, Jews, UCCs, Baptists and more as we called so clearly for faith, for family and for fairness. Our legislative allies told us they could feel it too, and they told us that morning helped shift Minnesota history.

You can stand with us for Love. You can help shift Minnesota history again, into being the first state to say NO to a constitutional marriage amendment.

Interfaith organizers like us were successful in turning back the bill championed by then state Senator Bachmann, and for five years our state was in an uneasy limbo. An amendment could come again. But each year more congregations were becoming welcoming, more people of faith were standing on the side of love. How would the balance be struck?

As we now know, despite significant faith organizing, frequent action in the halls of the legislature and thousands of messages and calls to legislators, the five year uneasy truce ended last May.

Now voters will have the question put to them this November: Shall the Minnesota Constitution be amended to provide that only a union of one man and one woman shall be valid or recognized as a marriage in Minnesota? Yes or No. That’s it. Love in the balance, at the tipping point.

We at the Minnesota UU Social Justice Alliance (MUUSJA, which we affectionately say as “moose-jaw”) were central to the 2006 success, and have stayed committed to interfaith organizing for LGBTQ equality ever since. As organizers and advocates, as a public voice for our UU values, it is so important for us to continue to believe, as we have for over ten years now, in the power of faithful voices working collectively for social change. We can proudly and lovingly claim our liberal religious imperative to create a just, sustainable, and peaceful world.

So I’m asking you to take a big step. I’m asking you to take some time off work, or set aside tasks you might ordinarily do on a March Thursday and travel to St. Paul — whether traveling a few blocks or the many miles of the prairie. Again this year, as in 2006, we need your loving presence, your gentle, angry witness for equality and against division, against separate and unequal.

OutFront Lobby Day and our evening Interfaith Community Worship are both Thursday, March 29th in St. Paul. Click here to help move Minnesota voters towards love. Click to be part of the interfaith community voting NO in NOvember on the anti-marriage amendment.

We’ve seen love’s power many times. We believe. I believe. Join us as we signal a big, big change of heart in Minnesota! See you in St. Paul on March 29th!

In faith,