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New York—A Mexican woman moved into a Chicago church in the summer of 2006 in order to avoid a deportation order that would separate her from her 7-year-old son, an American citizen. Almost a year later, she’s still living in the church.

Eight other undocumentated immigrants have since followed this woman’s lead and sought refuge in religious institutions across the country. Their supporters say that such acts of civil disobedience represent a new branch of religious advocacy, called The New Sanctuary Movement.

But sanctuary is not at all new. It is a concept that stretches back to the time of the Bible.

In ancient times, the practice of religious sanctuary was common throughout the world and across most faiths.

“The whole idea of sanctuary cities and congregations comes from Hebrew scripture. We are commanded to love and protect the stranger,” said Rabbi Michael Feinberg, the executive director of the Greater New York Labor-Religion Coalition, which represents over 600 clergy and religious congregations in New York City.

The Book of Numbers in the Old Testament spells out the origins of the sanctuary procedure. The ancient Hebrews designated six cities of refuge to which anyone who killed a person accidentally might flee in order to escape retribution by a blood relative.

God commands Moses to tell the sons of Israel to “select for yourselves cities to be your cities of refuge that the manslayer who has killed any person unintentionally may flee there.”

God also says that “these six cities shall be for refuge for the sons of Israel, and for the alien and for the sojourner among them; that anyone who kills a person unintentionally may flee there.”

By the 10th century BC, a tradition of altar sanctuary had developed in Israel. When Solomon succeeded David as king over Israel, his brother Adonijah, who had attempted to usurp the throne, fled and took refuge at the altar in “the tent of the Lord,” according to the book of I Kings. King Solomon pardoned Adonijah and sent him home without punishment.

Sanctuary appears in many Greek and Roman literary texts as well. According to one historical account, Romulus, the mythical founder of Rome, made Palatine Hill an asylum for fugitives. He erected a temple to a god named Asylæus—from whom the word asylum is derived—and in this he "received and protected all, delivering none back, neither the servant to his master, the debtor to his creditor, nor the murderer into the hands of the magistrate, saying that it was a privileged place, and they could so maintain it by an order of the holy oracle, insomuch that the city grew presently very populous."

The Theodosian Code in 392 AD is the first clear record of legal reference to sanctuary in the Christian tradition. Fugitives could be fed and lodged only in churchyards and surrounding church precincts, not within churches themselves. Sanctuary did not apply to public debtors, Jews, heretics or apostates.

The practice continued for centuries, with varying rules, intercessors and restrictions. In 887 AD, Alfred the Great granted temporary asylum to criminals, with punishment for violating the church protection. Sanctuary empowered clergy to intercede on behalf of fugitives and to help reach a settlement.

In early 16th-century England, Henry VIII designated eight sanctuary towns where fugitives could gain protection, consolidating his jurisdiction over the independent counties. Growing royal control over the practice of sanctuary made it more burdensome to sanctuary seekers. As the monarchy gained power, the authority of the church diminished. Widespread abuse and increasing regulation, like civil judicial systems, rendered the practice ineffectual. In 1624, Parliament abolished it.

Today, there is no legal right to asylum in places of worship in the United States and Canada, but immigration authorities tend not to intervene. Despite its lack of legal status, the right of sanctuary has been invoked numerous times in North American history.

In the years before the Civil War, churches participated in the Underground Railroad, helping slaves escape to free states--in direct violation of the Fugitive Slave Law of 1850. Church members based their aid on an interpretation of the Bible regarding the treatment of slaves and hospitality toward strangers and did not classify their actions as sanctuary. Nonetheless, church participation in the Underground Railroad prefigures the New Sanctuary Movement today.

In Canada, the first Sikh temple built in 1908 served as a sanctuary for men seeking to immigrate to Canada who were unable to bypass border guards because of the Continuous Passage Act. The law forbid people from entering the country unless they had made a “continuous passage” to its borders—preventing an influx of migrants from countries then deemed undesirable. Indians and other non-whites were unwelcome. But Indian men came anyway, traveling through the U.S. to their families and employers in Canada, said Satwinder Bains, the director for the Center of Indo-Canadian studies at the University College of the Fraser Valley.

“The temple was built on a high hill at that time. At the top of the flag pole outside the temple was a light. The story goes that if the light was on, it was safe to come across the border. If the light was not on, it wasn’t safe.”

In Sikhism, a religion founded over 500 years ago, sanctuary is central to its principles of public service and selflessness. The gurdwara, the holy place of worship, also acts as a community center and shelter for the vulnerable and homeless. Visitors of all faiths are offered food and shelter. In July, a Sikh temple in British Columbia became the first case of sanctuary from immigration authorities in a religious institution other than a church in Canada.

In the Canadian case, Laibar Singh, 48, entered the country in 2003 with a forged passport and applied for refugee status. In numerous administrative justice hearings, Canadian officials turned down his request. During the trials and appeals, Singh suffered a paralyzing aneurysm. Just two days before Singh was to be deported to India, he moved into the temple’s priest-residence.

The New Sanctuary Movement was officially initiated in May 2007, but its roots originated about five months before the Chicago case last summer. In March 2006, Cardinal Roger Mahony of the Archdiocese of Los Angeles said he would instruct his priests and others working in the Archdiocese of Los Angeles to disregard provisions of Federal Legislation that would criminalize providing humanitarian aid to persons without first checking their legal status. Cardinal Mahony's statements encouraged religious leaders to ignore the law, a tribute to the sanctuary movement of the 1980s, where churches offered refuge to thousands of Central American refugees fleeing human rights violations, to today’s context. But there is a distinction between the 1980’s movement and this decade’s movement.

The New Sanctuary Movement focuses on the livelihood of all immigrants in America, particularly those, who the religious institutions think, suffer under current and proposed legislation. For some member institutions, this support includes offering physical sanctuary on their property, but their support is not limited to this respect. Unlike the 1980’s movement, the New Sanctuary Movement offers public advocacy, pro bono legal representation and financial assistance.

The New Sanctuary Movement has congregational members from many faiths including Christianity, Islam and Judaism. Twenty-four congregations have joined the movement in New York alone, and the list is growing.

“We do everything from connecting them to immigration services and other lawyers, to accompanying them to courts and taking care of their families when they lose their cases,” said Sister Margaret Smyth of the North Fork Spanish Apostolate in Long Island.
Sister Margaret doesn’t consider her work inspired by the sanctuary movement. For her, it’s just a vocation.

“We’re an agency that acts as a voice for those immigrants who cannot always speak for themselves. We’ve been doing this for years.”