Letter from the Nisut (AUS) in Response to Current Actions Against Immigrants to the USA
Em hotep (in peace)!
There is a common ancient text, repeated over the millennia in moral and religious texts and even on the walls of tombs in ancient Egypt, where a person confirmed just behavior before the gods. In English, it goes something like this:
I made the god to be at peace with me, and I acted according to his will. I gave bread to the hungry, water to the thirsty, clothing to the naked, and a boat to the one who had no boat.
Actions in recent days by the United States Department of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), with the encouragement and agreement of United States Attorney General Jeff Sessions and the Trump administration, involving separation and detention of families and children at the US southern border, are distressing, appalling, and immoral. In addition, they are without support from religious doctrine, no matter how many Biblical verses the Attorney General or the White House care to quote out of context to justify them.
The people of Kemetic Orthodoxy, and the global membership of the House of Netjer Temple, join with many other religions around the world to denounce these actions. No human being is, or can be, "illegal." Refugees do not come to new countries to break the law; they come for survival. Immigrants move from one country to another for many reasons. These various "countries" are lines drawn on maps. There are no borders on the planet. None of the people that are potentially going to be deported or have already been deported under these actions made by ICE deserve to be mistreated or separated from their children. Families belong together. No one should lose access to their freedom, or their children for seeking asylum. No moral government would take infants from their mothers with no legal basis or support. To deny these immigrants and refugees access to human rights is absolutely wrong.
The people who have been detained and who are losing their children to this unjust action are part of our human family. We support them now and always. As people of Ma'at (both the goddess and concept of Truth and Justice), who believe in an ongoing and living connection with our ancestors and all humans on this planet we share, we must speak out on behalf of these families and children. Denying human rights and dignity to those who come seeking asylum is an abomination to any deities in any religion I am aware of, including the various sects of Christianity that many people enforcing these policies profess.
Every person should be welcome. Every person is worth protecting. Our beliefs and our deities teach us to reach out to those in need, to protect and provide for them. Therefore, we join with many other religious organizations and all people of good character and conscience everywhere in condemning these unjust ICE policies, and we call for these families to be reunited immediately with their chiildren.
May there be Ma'at, now and every day.
Rev. Tamara Siuda (Hekatawy Alexandros)
Nisut, Kemetic Orthodox Religion
June 15, 2018CE