Every year, the Faith and Justice Symposium challenges Houghton College students and the wider Houghton community to consider a social justice issue through the lens of the Christian faith they share. From Wednesday, September 21 to Friday, September 23, this year’s Symposium, entitled “Loving our Neighbors,” will explore immigration and refugee issues with two keynote speakers, a coffeehouse, four workshops, and the screening of a documentary.
The selection of a topic for the Faith and Justice Symposium is based both on student feedback from the past year and on what subjects are timely in wider society. This year’s topic was chosen by the Symposium Advisory Team, which includes Brian Webb, Sustainability Coordinator, and Kristina LaCelle-Peterson, Professor of Religion. According to LaCelle-Peterson, they agreed that the issue of immigrants and refugees was relevant due to the current political climate and refugee crisis.
“According to the UN there are over 65 million displaced people in the world, over 21 million of whom are refugees,” said La-Celle Peterson. “Christians around the world are reflecting on what they can do and what churches can do to help displaced people rebuild their lives. We want to be part of that effort.” She continued, “Even aside from a discussion of refugees, the issue of immigration is on people’s minds, especially because of the election cycle we’re in. We wanted the Symposium to be a place where we can move beyond the sound-bites which are often misleading or simply playing on fears, and reframe the discussion on Jesus’ call to love our neighbor.”
Webb and LaCelle-Peterson also invited the two keynote for this year’s Symposium: Jenny Yang, the Vice President of Advocacy and Policy at World Relief, and Danny Carroll, the Blanchard Professor of Old Testament at Wheaton College.
“We always try to get a diversity of keynote speakers,” said Webb. “We wanted people who could approach it from different angles. Jenny Yang is a well-known advocate on immigration justice issues. She’s highly regarded in Christian justice related circles on this issue. Danny Carroll comes more from an academic perspective, and has more of a theological background. He is a highly regarded scholar on biblical approaches to immigration.”
Yang will speak in chapel on Wednesday, while Carroll will both speak in chapel on Friday morning and will lead one of four workshops on Friday afternoon. The other three workshops will be led by speakers with a variety of perspectives on immigration and refugee issues. A representative from the Wesleyan Church will discuss the denomination’s approach, while an individual from the Christian Reform Church’s “Blessing Not Burden” campaign will discuss their organization’s attempt to reframe the immigration debate in terms of immigrants as a blessing to society. Another speaker who works in economic development in Buffalo will talk about how immigrants contribute to positive economic benefits of the country to which they immigrate.
“The workshops bring the opportunity to interact more closely with the speakers,” said Emily Barry ’17, who is part of this year’s Symposium Student Planning Committee. “It’s you in a classroom, so it’s more personal. They open it up for questions, and you can pick their brains how you want.”
On Thursday, the Symposium will present an “Engaging the Arts” coffeehouse organized by the student planning committee. It will feature live music and stories from Felix Madji, a second-year student at the Houghton in Buffalo campus and a refugee from the Central African Republic, as well as an art auction, participatory art project and free coffee. The Houghton College Gospel Choir will also make an appearance. This event is intended to help convey the human aspect of immigration and refugee issues, which is an overwhelming goal for this year’s Symposium.
“My hope is that students would see that these are real people with real stories,” said Webb. “Their stories matter, and we as Christians can value their stories and experiences in a way that uplifts the individual. Instead of arguing the ideology of an issue, I’d rather that people experience the real-life stories of ordinary people, and then frame their perspectives on the issue around what they learn.”
The wish to showcase the stories of real people is also why the Symposium will screen the film “Documented” on Friday. The documentary features Jose Antonio Vargas, a Pulitzer-Prize winning journalist who came out as an undocumented immigrant in a New York Times Magazine cover story in 2011. Webb believes Vargas’s story is an especially powerful one.
“His story is actually what changed me 180 degrees on the immigration issue,” said Webb. “Just hearing his experiences as an undocumented individual helped me see this a really different light than I had grown up with.”
The Symposium, “Immigration and Refugees: Loving our Neighbors,” will begin on Wednesday in chapel with Jenny Yang, and continue through Friday. The full schedule is available on the Houghton College website.