Fifty-nine white South Africans arrived in the United States this week aboard a U.S.-chartered plane to be granted refugee status. Upon the group’s arrival, President Donald Trump stated that the members of the ethnic minority called Afrikaners, who ruled the country during apartheid, have been subject to “a genocide” and that “white farmers are being brutally killed, and their land is being confiscated” by the South African government. No evidence has been found to back up those claims.
Meanwhile, also this week, the administration revoked Temporary Protected Status for Afghans.
A seemingly “whites only” refugee program is a morally bankrupt inversion of the Christian call to welcome the stranger and aid the most vulnerable
The move has been denounced by many — of particular note, the Episcopal Church in the United States’ presiding Bishop Sean W. Rowe, who in a letter to his congregation sent Monday said the church’s migration ministry would not help resettle the Afrikaners, as requested by the Trump administration, “[i]n light of our church’s steadfast commitment to racial justice and reconciliation and our historic ties with the Anglican Church of Southern Africa.” Rowe announced that, after nearly 40 years, they will stop receiving federal grants to resettle refugees by September.
A seemingly “whites only” refugee program is a morally bankrupt inversion of the Christian call to welcome the stranger and aid the most vulnerable.
The administration’s response to the Episcopal Church was swift and vicious. Vice President JD Vance called the decision “crazy” and White House deputy press secretary Anna Kelly said it “raises serious questions about its supposed commitment to humanitarian aid.”
Yet there is nothing “crazy” about the Episcopal Church’s decision to not aid the Trump administration’s abhorrent spin on refugee resettlement.
“If you are neutral in situations of injustice, you have chosen the side of the oppressor,” the late Archbishop Desmond Tutu of South Africa once said. “If an elephant has its foot on the tail of a mouse and you say that you are neutral, the mouse will not appreciate your neutrality.”
“Desmond Tutu was a teacher to us, and we were a partner to him,” Bishop Rowe told NPR. “In fact, his young seminarian, I remember driving him around Washington, D.C., during one of his visits. We have strong ties to that country and to that fight against racism and the apartheid regime. And the idea that we would be somehow resettling Afrikaners at this point over other refugees, who have been vetted and waiting in camps for months or even years, is unfathomable to us.”
Plus, the Episcopal Church isn’t ending its ministry with migrants — just its ties to the federal government. “We can’t be partners with the federal government at this point, but we will continue our work and our advocacy to the most vulnerable,” Rowe said. “That’s what Jesus calls us to, to care for the poor and the most vulnerable.”
In Matthew 25, Jesus tells his followers that nations will be judged by how they treat the hungry, the stranger, those needing clothes, the sick, and those imprisoned. A policy favoring white South Africans over all other refugees is not a policy aligned with Jesus’ teaching. In South Africa, whites make up about 7% of the population, yet account for about three-quarters of land ownership. Recent attempts at land reform and addressing systemic racial injustice in South Africa are not “genocide,” as Trump claims — and not giving into this rewiring of refugee resettlement is a faithful response by Christians. This isn’t the first time the Trump White House has singled out a particular denomination for rebuke. This isn’t the first time the Trump White House has singled out a particular denomination for rebuke. Vance, who is Catholic, questioned the U.S. Catholic Bishops commitment to aiding refugees and migrants by asking, “Are they actually worried about their bottom line?” Trump took aim at the Episcopal Church in January when Bishop Mariann Budde pleaded for mercy for immigrants and LGBTQ people at the inaugural prayer service. The consistent battles with non-MAGA Christians paints a disturbing portrait of Trump’s approach to Christianity, which includes tapping Attorney General Pam Bondi to lead a task force on supposed “anti-Christian bias” in the United States. “We are appalled by the hypocrisy of the Trump administration in shutting the door on our siblings in Christ who are attempting to flee real Christian persecution around the world, and call on the administration to restart the U.S. refugee resettlement program,” a group of 26 Christian leaders wrote in a statement denouncing the task force, organized by my place of work, Interfaith Alliance. “Far from Trump as a protector of Christians, the major threats to Christians in the United States are coming from Trump’s own administration,” the statement reads. Rep. James Clyburn, who leads the Democratic Faith Working Group, reacted to Rowe’s letter on X, writing, “I commend the Episcopal Church for modeling integrity in the face of injustice after the Trump Admin favored white South Africans while suspending refugee resettlement for others.” Clyburn quoted 1 Corinthians 16:13: “Stand firm in the faith; be courageous; be strong.” It’s a memorable call on Christians to ground our obedience to Christ — and not to Trump.
Guthrie Graves-Fitzsimmons
Guthrie Graves-Fitzsimmons is vice president of programs and strategy at Interfaith Alliance and the author of "Just Faith: Reclaiming Progressive Christianity." 
