Service of Lament for Immigrants and Refugees

A Congregational Practice

Photo by Ravi Sharma on Unsplash

Yesterday the church around the world celebrated Pentecost and the coming of the Spirit on people of every tribe and tongue to bring all peoples together in the love of Christ Jesus.

As followers of a reconciling God, we cannot help but lament and grieve the ways that the United States is treating (and has treated) refugees and immigrants.

We’ve been collecting Congregational Practices to share with the wider church. Amy Lee, who was recently interviewed on our podcast, shared this service of lament with us that she wrote in March. We hope that others might be able to use it to join their cries with the cries of immigrants and refugees in churches across the US and around the world. Feel free to use this service, or some part of it, in your own church context and community.

Lord Have mercy.

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This was a service of lament that I hosted at my home with about 30 friends from several local churches on March 31, 2025, which is Cesar Chavez Day in California. As a Christian and a nonprofit immigration lawyer, I was deeply disturbed and grieved by what was happening in our country and in the world, with the current administration. This service was in response to my longing to hold a safe and courageous space for Christians to gather to repent and boldly name the awfulness and injustice against immigrants and refugees. To cry out to God for mercy. To sit with the desolation, rather than perhaps our inclination to sprint to the consolation that “all will be ok because Christ is King.” Especially during Lent, I wondered
what we could learn about the heart of God by lingering together, at the foot of the cross with Jesus and the women at Golgotha. As God’s people, we are invited to participate in God’s cosmic movement of complete restoration that has already begun. To sit with the tension of our context, the here and now, while waiting for our King to return to claim us and this world as his own. ~Amy Lee, San Francisco, California, 
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SERVICE OF LAMENT FOR IMMIGRANTS AND REFUGEES

GATHERING AND CENTERING

Silence is kept.

Psalm 44
A reading from Psalm 44
We have heard with our ears, O God, our ancestors have told us, what deeds you performed in their days, in the days of old: you with your own hand drove out the nations, but them you planted; you afflicted the peoples, but them you set free; for not by their own sword did they win the land, nor did their own arm give them victory; but your right hand, and your arm, and the light of your countenance, for you delighted in them. 

You have made us the taunt of our neighbors, the derision and scorn of those around us. You have made us a byword among the nations, a laughingstock among the peoples. All day long my disgrace is before me, and shame has covered my face at the words of the taunters and revilers, at the sight of the enemy and the avenger.

If we had forgotten the name of our God, or spread out our hands to a strange god, would not God discover this? For he knows the secrets of the heart. Because of you we are being killed all day long, and accounted as sheep for the slaughter. 

Rouse yourself! Why do you sleep, O Lord? Awake, do not cast us off forever! Why do you hide your face? Why do you forget our affliction and oppression? For we sink down to the dust; our bodies cling to the ground. Rise up, come to our help. Redeem us for the sake of your steadfast love.

Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit; as it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be, world without end. Amen.

CONFESSION (adapted from the Book of Common Worship, Book of Common Prayer, traditional Kenyan prayer and Psalm 69.)

Let us pray the prayer of confession responsively.

Merciful God, you alone are good and holy.
We confess that we have sinned against you
in thought, word and deed,
by what we have done,
and by what we have left undone.

For our cowardice that dares not face truth;
laziness content with half-truth;
and arrogance that thinks we know it all.
Lord, have mercy upon us.

For our silence. For not naming injustice because we fear offending those in our churches who do not share our worldview. For judging one another.
Lord, have mercy upon us.

For our impulse to rely on our privilege to find solutions, rather than allow ourselves to be undone by the tension of living in the reality of the “already and not yet.”
Lord, have mercy upon us.

For your divided Church and nation. For our fractured allegiances, not unlike the religious leaders who crucified Jesus, crying, “We have no king but the emperor!”
Lord, have mercy upon us.

For our complicity in an inequitable economy that thrives from coercive power, cheap labor and the destruction of God’s good creation.
Lord, have mercy upon us.

For giving into our fears. For not having enough courage and imagination for the new world order that You invite us to participate in. One that is marked by wholeness and justice. We confess that we are mired in sin and cannot get free on our own.

Lord, have mercy upon us.
Christ, have mercy upon us.
Lord, have mercy upon us. Amen.

Silence is kept.

Beloved people of God, hear the good news.
In Christ’s boundless mercy, we are forgiven.

THE PRECES (short petitions)
O Lord, open our lips;
And our mouth shall proclaim your praise.
O God, make speed to save us;
O Lord, make haste to help us.
Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit;
As it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be, world without end. Amen.
Praise the Lord.
The Lord’s Name be praised.

MAGNIFICAT 
Please stand as we read the Magnificat responsively.

My soul magnifies the Lord,
and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior;
For he has regarded
the lowliness of his handmaiden.
For behold, from now on,
all generations will call me blessed;
For he that is mighty has magnified me,
and holy is his Name.
And his mercy is on those who fear him,
throughout all generations.
He has shown the strength of his arm;
he has scattered the proud in the imagination of their hearts.
He has brought down the mighty from their thrones,
and has exalted the humble and meek.
He has filled the hungry with good things,
and the rich he has sent empty away.
He, remembering his mercy, has helped his servant Israel,
as he promised to our fathers, Abraham and his seed for ever.

Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit; as it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be, world without end. Amen.

LISTENING
Excerpts from a poem called Home by Warsan Shire, a British-Somali poet 
(Read it in its entirety here)

no one leaves home unless
home is the mouth of a shark.

you only run for the border
when you see the whole city
running as well.

your neighbours running faster
than you, the boy you went to school with
who kissed you dizzy behind
the old tin factory is
holding a gun bigger than his body,
you only leave home
when home won't let you stay.

you have to understand,
no one puts their children in a boat
unless the water is safer than the land.

if you survive and you are greeted on the other side
with go home blacks, refugees
dirty immigrants, asylum seekers
sucking our country dry of milk,
dark, with their hands out
smell strange, savage -
look what they've done to their own countries,
what will they do to ours?

i want to go home, but home is the mouth of a shark
home is the barrel of the gun
and no one would leave home
unless home chased you to the shore
unless home tells you to
leave what you could not behind,
even if it was human.

no one leaves home until home
is a damp voice in your ear saying
leave, run now, i don't know what
i've become.

Silence is kept.

Hymn: Give me Jesus

MATTHEW 5:38-48
Please stand for the gospel reading. The Gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ according to Matthew.

“You have heard that it was said, ‘An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.’ But I say to you, Do not resist an evildoer. But if anyone strikes you on the right cheek, turn the other also; and if anyone wants to sue you and take your coat, give your cloak as well; and if anyone forces you to go one mile, go also the second mile. Give to everyone who begs from you, and do not refuse anyone who wants to
borrow from you.

“You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’ But I say to you, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, so that you may be children of your Father in heaven; for he makes his sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the righteous and on the unrighteous. For if you love those who love you, what reward do you have? Do not even the tax collectors do the same? And if you greet only your brothers and sisters, what more are you doing than others? Do not even the Gentiles do the same? Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect.

The Word of the Lord.
Thanks be to God.

PRAYERS OF LAMENT
The Lord be with you.
And with your spirit.
Let us pray.

For our nation’s ruthless and dehumanizing treatment of immigrants and refugees. For sowing fear and othering. For turning away “the tired, the poor, the huddled masses” under the pretense and lie that they threaten our way of life.
Good Lord, deliver us.

For the 117 million people around the world who have been displaced from their homelands because of famine, enslavement, abuse, poverty, war and climate change.
Good Lord, deliver us.

For the 22,000 refugees who are now stranded, many in refugee camps, when this administration shut the door to refugees. For the uncertainty of their future and the fear they carry.
Good Lord, deliver us.

For the many who have lost their jobs at refugee resettlement agencies and NGOs around the world that have been senselessly defunded.
Good Lord, deliver us.

For the 1.9 million Palestinians displaced by the Israel-Hamas war.
Good Lord, deliver us.

For the 14 million Sudanese displaced by civil war. For the widespread famine and sexual violence against women and children.
Good Lord, deliver us.

For the falsely accused immigrants and international students who are now being hunted down, jailed and threatened with deportation because they courageously stood up and spoke out.
Good Lord, deliver us.

For parishioners of immigrant churches who are afraid to go to church because they fear ICE will show up. For courage for the pastors and leaders of these immigrant churches.
Good Lord, deliver us.

For the men, women and children who pick our fruits and vegetables, serve our food, take care of our children and elders, clean our houses and offices and tend our gardens. For those who are afraid to go to school, receive government benefits and seek medical care, for fear of deportation.
Good Lord, deliver us.

For the “disappeared,” especially the Venezuelans, who have been deported to the Salvadoran prison and the Panamanian jungle. For their families as they desperately try to locate their loved ones.
Good Lord, deliver us.

For those who have already been deported back to their home countries and will face serious harm, torture, imprisonment or death.
Good Lord, deliver us.

For the over 800,000 immigrants whose temporary protective status is being threatened with termination.
Good Lord, deliver us.

For the 3.6 million Dreamers, most of whom are undocumented and call this land their home.
Good Lord, deliver us.

For women who are forced to choose between being beaten by their partners or seeking legal protection at the risk of being found and deported. For immigrant victims of crime and exploited workers who are afraid to seek help from law enforcement.
Good Lord, deliver us.

For the judges, lawyers, community organizers and others who have been vilified and threatened because they choose to stand with immigrants and refugees.
Good Lord, deliver us.

Let us pray specifically for the immigrant and refugee friends and neighbors we know, using their first name only.

Good Lord, grant your protection and peace on these friends and neighbors.

Let us offer up our own prayers and lament, ending with “Lord, in your mercy” and responding together with “Hear our prayer.”

O Lord, hear our imperfect groans and pleas for help.
Save and deliver us.
Bring your shalom to your beloved people.

THE LORD’S PRAYER
Let us pray together the prayer that Jesus taught us.
Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy Name.
thy Kingdom come, thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.
Give us this day our daily bread.
And forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us.
And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.
For thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory,
for ever and ever. Amen.

Closing Hymn: Where Cross The Crowded Ways of Life

A COLLECT FOR PEACE
O God, the source of all holy desires, all good counsels, and all just works: Give to your servants that peace which the world cannot give, that our hearts may be set to obey your commandments, and that we, being defended from the fear of our enemies, may pass our time in rest and quietness; through the merits of Jesus Christ our Savior.
Amen.

A PRAYER FOR MISSION
O God and Father of all, whom the whole heavens adore: Let the whole earth also worship you, all nations obey you, all tongues confess and bless you, and men, women, and children everywhere love you and serve you in peace; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

DISMISSAL AND GRACE
Let us bless the Lord.
Thanks be to God.
May the God of hope fill us with all joy and peace in believing through the power of the Holy Spirit. Amen.