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KEN CHITWOOD

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“The person who knows only one religion, knows none”
— Max Müller

Episcopal Diocese Defends Migrant Shelter, Citing "Jesus" and "Constitution"

March 19, 2025

On March 11, the Department of Homeland Security sent the Episcopal Diocese of the Rio Grande a letter insinuating illegal activities at a diocesan shelter, including human trafficking.

The letter, sent by the Federal Emergency Management Agency’s acting administrator, Cameron Hamilton, states that the Department of Homeland Security, of which FEMA is a part, has “significant concerns” about organizations receiving FEMA grants using those funds to engage in or facilitate “illegal activities.”

Hamilton wrote that such organizations, such as the diocese’s migrant shelter, “may be guilty of encouraging or inducing an alien to come to, enter, or reside in the United States” and “transporting or moving illegal aliens, harboring, concealing or shielding from detection illegal aliens or applicable conspiracy aiding or abetting.”

In an online video posted on March 14, Bishop Michael Hunn of the Rio Grande diocese said the letter amounted to a not-so-subtle accusation that the diocese was engaged in human trafficking. Hunn did not share the letter with Sojourners. (The Denver Post published a copy of a similar letter.)

“I’m insulted by the insinuation that we have been involved in anything illegal or immoral,” Hunn said in the video after reading excerpts from the letter.

Read the full story
In Religion, Religion News, Religion and Culture Tags Faith and immigration, US/Mexico border, Episcopal church, Episcopal Diocese of the Rio Grande, Michael Hunn, Bishop Hunn, Shelter, Migrants, Migration, Immigration, DHS, FEMA, Letter, Human trafficking, Smuggling, Border, Borderlands
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"A Pilgrim's Tale of Religious Body Art" published in Diolog magazine

March 3, 2016

This summer I got a pilgrimage tattoo in Jerusalem. It was an amazing experience. You know what's even better? After writing about it on my blog Diolog magazine -- the Texas Episcopalian digital magazine -- asked to publish it. Even better? The editor Carol Barnwell paid me with a pecan pie. It was delicious. I can only hope the article is as well. Check out how it starts below and then head over to the digital site to read the rest! 

Apparently, getting tattoed on your chest is one of the more painful spots one can get a tattoo. When I buzzed the “call up” button with the name “Razzouk” sketched in Sharpie above it in one of the winding alleyways of the suq in the Old City of Jerusalem I didn’t know that little tidbit. What I did know was that I was about to be in contact with a seven-century old tattooing tradition. 

Indeed, for nearly 700 years tattooing has been the profession and the prestige of the Razzouk family. I finally found the parlor by asking a jeweler near the Jaffa Gate, “I’m looking for a tattoo artist, do you know…?” Before I could finish my sentence, the jeweler said, “You mean the Razzouks?” Their name and notoriety preceded my rendezvous with history. 

Follow the rest of the tattoo journey at Diolog


In Religion and Culture Tags Diolog, Episcopal church, Razzouk tattoo, Religious tattoos, Pilgrimage, Pilgrimage tattoo
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RELIGION | REPORTING | PUBLIC THEOLOGY