Jesuit groups in Whitehall rally against Trump Muslim ban

A large group of volunteers and supporters of Jesuit Refugee Service UK together with members of the Mount Street Community and the Hurtado Jesuit Centre, (including eight priests and ten nuns) joined the demonstration in front of Downing Street on Monday evening, to protest against against President Donald Trump's decision to bar refugees from entering the USA and to close the country's borders to people from seven Muslim-majority nations.

Speaking before the vigil, Sarah Teather, Director of JRS UK said: "We can't pretend that what is happening in the US is not our concern," It threatens to destabilise refugee protection mechanisms elsewhere, both resettlement and asylum, let alone the possibility that this marks the beginning of even more serious descent into state sponsored discrimination. Now seems like an important time to join with others to speak up for refugees, and for Christians to stand with their Muslim brothers and sisters in solidarity."

Fr Damian Howard SJ, the Superior at the Hurtado Jesuit Centre, who teaches inter-religious dialogue at Heythrop College, believes that Donald Trump's orders on asylum unfairly punish all Muslims for the actions of a few. "They single out countries whose citizens have never carried out terrorist attacks on the US, meanwhile ignoring others, such as Saudi Arabia, whose records are rather less innocent," he said. "Helping Christian refugees from the Middle East is a good thing; abandoning others who desperately need our protection, simply because they are not Christian, feeds sectarian resentment. The most dangerous thing is that this unjust and needless step will at a stroke give credence to the claim that the West is at war with Muslims. This narrative, which always stokes the fires of radicalism, must not be allowed to prevail."

Also taking part was Fr Dominic Robinson SJ, Superior of the Mount Street Jesuit Community in central London, who said he was attending because he believes the decision of the US administration to be contrary to Christian and Catholic values of human dignity, care for the weakest in society and of religious freedom.

"In particular, the appeal to Christians by prioritising Christian refugees and refusing entry to those from Muslim countries is in fact a paradoxically pernicious way of promoting what is sheer contrary to Gospel values," he said.

"The tragedy of Islamic extremism is real and, rather than punish those fleeing terror by sending them back to terror simply because they were born into the Islamic religion, we need to support work for reconciliation in the Middle East."

Fr Robinson believes that Christianity is a unique and vital bridge in this work and so, in addition to offering welcome to those of all religions or none who have to flee, we need also to help the Christian community to stay in their historic homelands.

"Instead of this, the appeal to Christian prioritisation and blanket refusal of refugees from Muslim-majority countries distorts the Gospel and hampers the work for reconciliation by spreading a gospel of isolationism and fear. And it flies in the face of religious freedom."

Demonstrations also took place in Manchester, where about 3,000 people attended. There were also protests in Glasgow, Edinburgh, Cardiff, Newcastle, Sheffield, Oxford, Cambridge, Brighton, Gloucester, Leeds, York, Liverpool, Leicester and several other towns and cities.

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Source: JRS/ICN