The head of a Protestant renewal organization says several evangelical denominations are distancing themselves from the National Association of Evangelicals because of its endorsement of illegal immigration.
As reported earlier, the National Association of Evangelicals Board of Directors passed a resolution earlier this month endorsing supposed "comprehensive immigration reform," which critics say is nothing more than support of amnesty for illegal aliens. In addition, the president of the NAE lobbied on Capitol Hill for liberalized immigration policies. Mark Tooley, president of The Institute on Religion & Democracy (IRD), says since that time several NAE member denominations have either distanced themselves from the resolution or clarified their intent. It started with The Salvation Army, he says. "The Salvation Army, which is one of the NAE's more prominent members, has publicly disavowed the immigration statement by NAE, saying that The Salvation Army did not endorse it and does not itself take a political stand on that issue," he explains. According to Tooley, the National Association of Evangelicals is looking more like the far more liberal National Council of Churches. "The NAE was formed in the [1940s] as an evangelical and conservative alternative to the National Council of Churches," he states. "With this current support for liberalized U.S. immigration laws, you really have to ask [if] the NAE [is] substantively any different from the National Council of Churches now." The IRD leader says several NAE member denominations have reported receiving -- in the words of one church official -- "hundreds of letters" protesting the NAE immigration resolution.
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