Immigrants seek refuge in California churches

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By Julia Duin

The last of four parts.

SIMI VALLEY, Calif. - One of the most dramatic stories in America's immigration saga occurs here every Sunday morning on Royal Avenue outside Simi Valley United Church of Christ.

In this affluent, well-scrubbed community just down the road from the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library and Museum, a handful of people, bearing American flags and signs, parade up and down the sidewalk.

They used to shout anti-immigrant slogans through bullhorns, said the Rev. June Goudey, the pastor of about 80 souls.

The target of their ire lives in a small house behind the church and down the end of a driveway. She is Liliana, 29, a Mexican citizen.

She is one of the better-known participants in the new sanctuary movement, examined by The Washington Times in visits to eight churches to interview activists, pastors and the illegal immigrants they are sheltering. The subjects offered firsthand accounts of living on the run, insights into the goals of the movement and spiritually based justifications for flouting U.S. immigration laws.

California, which houses one-third of the nation's immigrants, is the epicenter of sanctuary activity. Liliana, who shows up at an interview wearing high heels, gaucho pants and a stylish blouse, is one of the more outgoing and telegenic of several immigrants camped out in Sunday-school rooms and offices throughout the southern half of the state. She seeks not to be deported from a country where she has lived a third of her life.

Simi Valley UCC voted to give her shelter July 8, declaring itself a sanctuary congregation and plowing more than $5,000 into remodeling a house on church property. On Sunday mornings, she and her children walk to the church.

"There is something powerfully holy happening here," Ms. Goudey said. "When that family worships with us, we are strengthened. People have rallied amazingly well."

The raid