In an era when the politics of immigration have become increasingly fraught, a powerful yet certain moral compass is needed to guide not only our policies but also our consciences. That is the central argument of a recent New York Times opinion piece by Rabbi Shai Held — “The Bible Tells Us to Love Immigrants” — which reminds Americans that our various scriptural traditions call us to welcome strangers as if we ourselves were strangers, as, in truth, almost all of us have been at one time or another.
Utah, like much of the United States, sits at a crossroads when it comes to immigration. According to Axios, “A handful of zero-tolerance immigration bills failed to gain traction in Utah’s Republican-dominated Legislature this session, a stark contrast with President Donald Trump’s push for mass deportations.” According to Rep. Cheryl Acton, R-West Jordan, those proposed bills violated the teachings of Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount.
Rabbi Held’s theological argument reminds us that such universal teachings aren’t just relics of religious history — they constitute a living moral call. Held argues that justice, hospitality and mutual respect lie at the heart of the scriptural message about strangers and immigrants: that the outsider, the foreigner and the resident alien are not to be seen as threats but as fellow humans deserving dignity and care.
For Utahns, this conversation isn’t abstract. Utah has a substantial immigrant population — nearly 300,000 residents who were born outside the U.S. and who have gifted us with their rich array of language and culture, as well as their significant contributions to the state’s economy. Utah also has approximately 138,000 undocumented immigrants. In regard to both groups, political responses throughout the state oscillate between calls for compassion and more restrictive enforcement.
The New York Times piece doesn’t shy away from the biblical call for compassion. Rabbi Held argues that the stories, laws and principles woven throughout scriptural narratives compel us to wrestle with what it means to treat the immigrant as inherently worthy of care, compassion and justice. This is not merely an optional religious sentiment; it is a moral declaration that should shape how we engage in both private and public life.
That moral imperative contrasts sharply with some contemporary political movements, which seek to fuse a particular religious identity with national policy in ways that often marginalize or demonize those who are different. This ideology, which argues that the United States was founded as a strictly Christian nation and therefore should privilege that identity, has been linked by researchers to exclusionary attitudes toward immigrants and other minorities.
Importantly, most Utahns do not support such nationalist beliefs. A recent poll shows less than a third of Utahns align with the idea that America should be governed by strict Christian nationalist principles. This suggests that the majority of Utahns may be open to a more inclusive approach to immigration — one that doesn’t conflate faith with exclusion.
Religious leaders across the spectrum are engaged in this conversation. For example, Episcopal Bishop Phyllis Spiegel, reflecting the sentiments of many Protestants, affirms, “We are places where people can come, they can bring all their worldly fears and they will find sustenance ... We stand profoundly with those who are marginalized.”
Too often, political rhetoric reduces immigrants to statistics, threats or problems to be solved. But the New York Times op-ed reminds us that at its core, our tradition’s deepest moral teachings see the face of God in the stranger at our gate. If Utah’s policymakers and citizens take that call seriously, they can build a future that honors both the rule of law and the fundamental call for justice and mercy — a future that welcomes the immigrant not as a threatening outsider but as a neighbor, a fellow human being and a potential friend.