Presbyterian leaders and partners hail president’s immigration orders

Article by Rich Copley for the Presbyterian News Service

Presbyterian leaders and partners are celebrating recent executive orders from President Joe Biden as positive and hopeful signs for refugee resettlement in the United States.

The article includes comments by the Rev. Alice Fleming Townley, associate pastor at the Presbyterian Church of Okemos and co-founder of the All Faith Alliance for Refugees in Lansing.

“With deep gratitude and relief,” Townley said in the article, “we applaud the new presidential executive order to ‘rebuild and expand’ refugee resettlement. Refugees strengthen our communities. Lowering the number of persons admitted to the U.S. has cost lives and opportunities. As interfaith leaders, we organized to tell stories, raise money, and sustain our Lansing area resettlement office.”

“This is the news for which we have been hoping and praying and advocating. And we have work to do for this new day.”

The article also includes a video statement about refugees in the Lansing area recorded by Judi Harris, a member of the Presbyterian Church of Okemos and director of the St. Vincent Catholic Charities Refugee Services in Lansing.